Custodians make schools welcoming

National Custodian Day, celebrated on Oct. 2, recognizes the vital work of custodians who maintain a clean, safe, and welcoming environment in schools, offices, and public facilities. Team Dallas ISD is thanking them by highlighting their efforts.

Diana Feagins, custodian at Stephen C. Foster Elementary School, spent only a few months in retirement before she felt the pull of the school hallway again.

Her husband predicted it at her retirement party. She laughed it off at the time, but he knew her better than anyone. She was not built for sitting still.

“I like to move around. I like to exercise and do things,” Feagins said. “I was getting bored.”

Feagins first joined Dallas ISD in 1992 as a part-time custodian at what was Herbert Marcus Elementary School, working evening shifts. When a full-time position opened at Tom C. Gooch Elementary School, she took it. Over the years, Feagins worked at several campuses and eventually retired from what was called Harry C. Withers Elementary School in May 2023.

By October, she was back, this time at Foster Elementary. Now, her mornings start before sunrise when Feagins walks into a dark building and turns on the lights in the gym and auditorium. She checks the cafeteria and hallways. Then she steps outside to walk the front of the school and the playground, scanning for bottles, cans, and anything that could put students at risk. She finishes her first loop before people even arrive on campus.

Some days bring more than spilled milk or muddy footprints. Just recently, she handled what she considered the strangest task of her career.

“I was called about 7 a.m. before I even went out to pick up trash,” Feagins said. “We found a dead animal by the playground and the parking lot.”

She put on gloves, lined a bucket with bags, used a grabber to move what she could hardly stand to look at, and carried the remains away.

“That’s the worst thing I’ve done since I started at Dallas ISD,” she said. “I’m just glad it wasn’t a snake or anything like that, because they would have been on their own.”

For Feagins, custodial work is tied directly to learning. When she arrived at Foster, restrooms in the sixth grade building needed some work. She tackled the task by asking teachers for time with the students who used them. 

“I told the sixth graders, ‘You are the leaders of this building,’” she said. “I want to keep this building clean, especially the restrooms, and you have to help me.”

Her appeal made a difference. 

The restrooms stay cleaner, and the students show respect for the space and the work that it takes to keep them clean. 

Much of what Feagins does remains invisible but very important to the life of the campus. She tracks work orders when the air conditioning feels warm, keeps an eye on dumpster enclosures, wipes down the places where students eat, and conducts dozens of other tasks during the day. 

“If the building’s not clean, it can disrupt the whole learning process,” she said.

In the middle of all the work, the moments that matter most to her are a hug from a prekindergarten student, a hello from a child, a comment from a teacher who notices that the campus looks a little brighter.

When she finally retires again, Feagins wants people to remember her by one simple measure.

“I did the best job I could for the kids and Dallas ISD,” she said. “At every school, I gave them 100 percent.”