GREENUP COUNTY, Ky. (WSAZ) – Students and staff on Thursday were mourning the death of Greenup County High School teacher and coach Jamie Kennedy.
A health teacher and assistant football coach, Kennedy’s passing away was announced Wednesday by Superintendent Traysea Moresea.
Kennnedy was 49.
“When I had to speak the words to our team that Jamie Kennedy had passed away, it hurt deeply,” said Zack Moore, Greenup County High’s head football coach. “Although everyone in the room knew it was true, the words hurt because we had to acknowledge what we had lost. A friend, coach, teacher, and one of the most genuine men any of us have known.”
Players on Kennedy’s team, including Tanner Fortson, said Kennedy was more like a father figure and role model.
“You could call him at three o’clock in the morning in the middle of the night and if you needed anything, didn’t matter what time it was, he was there to help,” Fortson said.
Superintendent Moresea tells WSAZ that Kennedy had been quarantined since last Friday. He was taken to the hospital Wednesday by ambulance.
“He was highly respected by students,” Moresea said. “More than just a teacher and more than just a coach. Educators and coaches, they become a part of your community. They are people who others look to for advisement. They are people who put their heart into what they are doing. He was one of those top notch educators that did all of those things.”
Moresea says Kennedy’s wife is also an employee at Greenup County High School.
In a letter addressed to the “Greenup County family,” the superintendent said that due to high number of COVID cases and “a recent loss in our GCSD family,” schools will be closed on Thursday, Aug. 26 and Friday, Aug. 27. These will be non-instructional days. Makeup days will be added to the end of the school year calendar.
According to the superintendent, 400 of the county’s 2,700 students are quarantined.
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