Teacher who died in crash honored at IDEA’s Weslaco headquarters

WESLACO — Whitney Presas-Weddel’s passion for nursing and education is evident in the students she helped blossom out of their cocoons and it was honored Thursday with a memorial butterfly garden at the IDEA RGV Headquarters in Weslaco.

Whitney, 39, a former nurse and devoted teacher, served as the Nursing Science Curriculum Manager with the IDEA Career and Technical Education (CTE) team before being killed in a car crash in February in San Antonio.

Martha Gonzalez, director of CTE at IDEA Public Schools and the rest of the CTE team honored her life and legacy with a butterfly garden to symbolize the transformative influence she had at IDEA as a nurse and an educator.

“When all of my team members were hired,” Gonzalez said. “We immediately bonded, we laughed, and there was a transformation in the department. There was a lot of joy and a lot of beauty that she brought to the team. I felt that a butterfly garden encapsulated two of those elements, which was the transformation and the beauty aspect. So, this was a way that we could have a tangible space to remember her and to remember the contributions she made, not just to our team, but our lives and to the world.”

In attendance for the unveiling of the memorial garden was Whitney’s mother, Monique Presas and her grandfather Larry Rickettes

Asked what her reaction to the memorial butterfly garden was, Presas said tearfully , “I was completely overwhelmed with gratefulness. I feel very blessed. Whitney instantly became a part of their family. They embraced her here at IDEA and she fell in love with them and to know that they think enough of her to do this for her really means a lot to us. We cried for days about how proud we are and I’m just glad to be here and it keeps her memory alive.”

Presas added that a lot of her former students would call her to let her know about passing their nursing exam or when having a hard time.

“The day that when he was taken to the hospital, one of the nurses on the trauma team was one that she talked to, she’s everywhere,” she said.

Presas said one of Whitney’s favorite locations to travel to was South Padre Island which started back when Presas would take the family on vacations.

“She’s a beach girl … she had such fond memories of South Padre Island that she wanted to go there every year so we did that,” Presas said, holding back tears. “I would read and she would sun tan and that was a place that we always had long talks and enjoyed each other’s company. Everything about her was a precious memory, too many to mention … we were very close so we made lots of memories there together.”

Also in Whitney’s honor is a scholarship for IDEA students interested in pursuing studies in medicine.

Presas said the scholarship is to offset the costs that students encounter such as scrubs and testing fees. She added the scholarship fund is nearing $10,000 in the three months since she passed.

She worked and lived in San Antonio.