ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Students and staff at Northside Christian School say there is a lot of love for Lisa Jones, who has spent her entire teaching career at the school.

“She’s built just deep, deep, deep connections in this community and she is a beloved person and has been for many years,” said Brandon Elam, the middle and high school principal at Northside Christian School.

Jones has been teaching at the school for 32 years. She started out teaching history, then left for a few years to pursue a counseling degree at a seminary in Dallas.

Jones said she then returned to continue her passion.

“They hired me right back and I was like, 'I want to teach Bible — I don’t want Bible to be a textbook,'” she said.

Jones said she's not only there for her students in the classroom but also during life’s big moments. She goes to sporting events and performances to take pictures of the kids for their families, something she says she’s been doing since 1984.

“It’s the memories — you can’t replace those memories," she said. "And this way parents can watch their kids and they’re still going to have pictures of them."

Jones shares the photos online so parents can have the memories forever. They say they love it and so do her students.

Jones said she has given a lot to the school, and in turn, the students and staff have wrapped their arms around her when she needed it most.

“I was in the hospital for five months," she said. "I was in a drug-induced coma for two of those months. I had pseudocysts on my pancreas."

Jones said it meant the world to her that students and staff at Northside Christian School prayed for her recovery.

“This school is seriously a family,” she said.

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