PTO leader Pair remembered

When the COVID-19 pandemic left parents unable to visit their children at school during the 2020-21 school year, Amanda Pair served as a link between them.

Pair, a photographer and PTO president at Vestavia Hills Elementary Liberty Park that year, was one of the few parents allowed in the building due to the pandemic and its threat to the community. While inside the school, she made sure to get photographs of students and then share those photos with parents as a way of seeing how their children’s day was going when they could not be there.

When the end of the year came, Pair took photos of students and faculty outside, a way to try and make up for not being able to have class photos that year, said VHELP Principal Blair Inabinet.

“It was the first time I’d seen our kids' faces,” Inabinet said. “It captured her [Pair].”

 Pair died at the age of 40 of lung cancer on June 5, leaving behind her husband, Allen, and two daughters, Ava and Anna.

“She was so tough,” Allen Pair said. “She’s left a huge legacy.”

Amanda never smoked and had no family history of lung cancer, but she likely was exposed somewhere, Allen said a doctor told him. In the summer of 2021, she began getting sick, being diagnosed with RSV, pneumonia and the shingles, along with COVID-19, her husband said.

Following an ER visit due to a blood clot in her legs and lungs, she was diagnosed with cancer, Allen said. Doctors found a tumor the size of a fist in her lung but said she had a good chance of beating it with therapy. By Christmas 2021, she began to feel better, and in mid-January the tumor was gone.

The family was able to celebrate her 40th birthday in the British Virgin Islands, Allen said, and was able to enjoy nine more months with her. Still, the cancer came back, with a new spot found on her liver and her brain.

Amanda still served at VHELP during her sickness and helped students, parents and staff there. But in early summer, she declined and began having seizures, and was eventually intubated before Allen made the decision to let her go in peace, he said.

“We thought we could keep her longer,” Allen said. “It’s just a terrible cancer.”

Amanda lived a life “that was not wasted,” Allen said.

Along with serving on the PTO, Amanda had a successful career in photography, running her own business taking family, birth, wedding and lifestyle photos professionally from 2008 to 2018.

Becky Cockrell worked with Amanda for five years as a PTO leader. Cockrell said the two had planned on Amanda joining her on the PTO at Liberty Park Middle School during the 2022-23 school year, as her oldest daughter Ava will move up to the school this fall.

“She was so willing to serve, even in difficult positions,” Cockrell said.

Amanda was never a complainer and always cleared her calendar for whatever needed to be done, Cockrell said. As a devoted Christian, she modeled a Christian attitude and character, she said.

“She was a willing servant,” Cockrell said.

Amanda was a role model for her friends and also for the students she encountered, Cockrell said.

“For kids, when you’re at the school as much as we are, kids are always walking up and down the hall,” Cockrell said. “They always think the PTO’s president is a big deal. If she knew a kid, she’d speak to them and give hugs.”

Jordan Elder also worked with Amanda on the PTO.

“She just had such a presence,” Elder said.

Amanda told her she felt called to serve on the PTO, using the gifts the Lord gave her to better her community, Elder said.

“It was never about her,” Elder said.

Amanda taught Elder how to serve on the PTO, showing her the ropes of the job, she said. She had a “good head” for the job, which served her well during the challenging year of the pandemic in 2020-2021, Elder said.

“She just always valued her community and her school,” Elder said. “Her girls were her number one priority; she wanted to make it a better place for them.”

Elder said she’ll miss Amanda’s “gentle nature,” “laid back stroll” and big smile, along with being able to talk to her.

“There’s so much that I’ll miss,” Elder said.

Inabinet knew Amanda before becoming principal at VHELP and before Amanda became involved with the PTO. Befriending one another through their husbands, who were coworkers, they became good friends, Inabinet said. When Inabinet found out Amanda would be on the PTO at VHELP, it lifted her spirits, she said.

“I just felt this overwhelming relief,” Inabinet said.

During the 2020-2021 school year, Inabinet said she didn’t make many decisions without Amanda’s input.

“We wouldn’t have been able to do life without keeping that PTO connection,” she said.

The help of the PTO is hard to summarize, Inabinet said. They are “critically and monumentally involved in what we do,” she said. PTO leaders will ensure projects get funded, teachers have what they need and more, she said. They also help the school’s “climate and morale,” Inabinet said.

Amanda’s authenticity and ability to “bring everything back to an even keel” served the school and its leaders well, Inabinet said.

“I’ve never known anybody quite like her,” she said. “I’ve never felt judgment from her. … She had a perfect wit about her.”

When VHELP celebrated retirees, they also celebrated Amanda, Inabinet said, because she was “a part of our faculty.” Not knowing what gift to give her, Inabinet gave her a children’s book, called “What Do You Do With a Problem?”

For Amanda, challenges and problems were opportunities, Inabinet said.

“She found a way to move forward productively,” she said.

Amanda never let things go unsaid or undone, Inabinet said. It’s a practice the VHELP principal hopes to emulate, she said.

Amanda left a legacy at the school and to those who knew her, Inabinet said.

“She just leaves a massive hole in our school community,” Inabinet said.

Amanda also leaves a big hole in her family’s life as well.

Amanda had a “great heart” when it came to loving her girls, Allen said. She was also heavily invested in her health and in exercise.

The couple met at an Iron Bowl party at Auburn University. During the game, they climbed up on the roof and watched a meteor shower. At one point, Allen remembers falling asleep in her lap.

The family loved to travel, Allen said, visiting the Bahamas and Walt Disney World.

With Amanda gone, the family is moving forward “slowly,” Allen said. After her death, Allen said he is tired and struggling to finish even one thing, but there is “a little bit of improvement” each day. The girls are doing OK and while they have their moments, Allen said they’re able to have a lot of conversations about their mom.

“I’m proud of them,” he said.

“We’re just putting our faith in God,” Allen added.

In the future, the family plans to start a nonprofit in Amanda’s honor, Allen said.