Talk to any of the hundreds of people who were touched by her life, and they will all tell you different stories.
Karon Cheek left an impact on much of the Franklin community, but though everyone provided different accounts, they all share a common theme of someone who cared and wanted people to be the best version of themselves.
On May 8, Cheek died at the age of 52 after a battle with ovarian cancer that lasted more than a year. The memories of a woman who was full of life until her last breath are plentiful.
As a mother, she was someone who preferred tough love, always wanting her children to reach their full potential, said Kassidy Love, her daughter.
“She expected excellence but if she saw that an effort was being made, she was willing to help you meet that excellence she expected,” Love said.
As an English teacher and drama director at Franklin Community Middle School, she expected the same dedication, said Rita Holman, the school’s principal.
“She had extremely high expectations of her kids,” Holman said. “She was one of the best teachers I ever had the opportunity to work with. There was just a way about her. Kids responded to her as well as adults. She was deeply respected; no one gave her grief. She was a phenomenal educator.”
After she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2019, Cheek tried to teach as long as she could. But with the tolls of chemotherapy and cancer weighing upon her, she was physically unable to during the 2019-20 school year. Still, in respect to her career and impact on the many students who filled the chairs of her classrooms each year, she was named the district’s Teacher of the Year.
Cheek carried herself through 16 years of teaching at the middle school level with the same sarcasm, wit and selflessness that her family, closest friends and colleagues remembered her for. Becky Roberts, a lifelong friend of hers, said she was always there for people, through celebration or tragedy.
“More than anything, she was always there,” Roberts said. “My husband or my grandparents passing away, I had children born, church stuff, baby showers, she was always on the list to be there. She would come, be in the middle of everything and sit for hours and just talk. The bond we had as friends was always going to be there.”
Although Franklin was her home, Cheek traveled far beyond Johnson County in order to help others. She went on several mission trips, including to Mexico and Arizona, and traveled to Uganda and Kenya with teachers from Franklin Community Middle School. She hosted nine foreign exchange students and two immigrants from Guatemala. That interaction helped her replace a void once her biological children grew up and left the household, Roberts said.
“I felt she was compelled to be part of a child’s life, mentoring them, filling her empty nest with people and having the same bond as they had with having kids in the house,” Roberts said. “She was very smart and caring. With foreign exchange students and the idea of schooling, she helped young kids develop and wanted to teach kids there’s more to life and they can accomplish anything they set their mind to.”
On Saturday, those friends, family members and colleagues will pay Cheek their final respects, at Fellowship Baptist Church in Trafalgar. Later, she will be laid to rest at First Mt. Pleasant Cemetery in Franklin. Luckily, for many of the people who knew and loved her, they were able to show their appreciation in her final moments, Roberts said.
“As I sat next to her bed, everyone just wanted to make sure they had a chance to say ‘Thank you,’” Roberts said. “She had an impact on their lives in different ways, and they wanted to make sure they said it before she left this world.”
