Sara Sandstrom joined The Mountain-Ear team in 2017, and during the past four years has served as an editor, reporter and photographer.

As editor, Sara has edited the copy and proofs for each edition. As a reporter and photographer, she covers Nederland school news as well as community events and obituaries. Sara covers feature news, has written many Mountain Folk Tales, history, staff bios and more.

“Working for The Mountain-Ear has been a very unexpected path in my life. It has challenged me beyond anything I could have imagined, in professional and personal ways. From the very late night emails asking if I have a photo or a short story to fill a space, and it needs to be done an hour ago, to seeing a mistake when the newspaper arrives in my mailbox has often had me wondering why I love it so much.

“I enjoy having my kids along on this journey. They like to learn how to use a camera and take an interest in writing.

“Now I find myself interviewing amazing people in our community and sharing their stories. That is my favorite part about the paper -- sharing someone’s story and how their lives have made this community and the world richer.

“History is a passion of mine and sharing some of the historical stories of our past I hope helps us all be a little less ignorant, a little more grateful and acknowledge the shoulders we are standing on,” Sara said.

Born in rural southern Indiana, Sara grew up in northeastern South Dakota and northern Wisconsin. She attended Concordia University, St. Paul, Minnesota. She graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in secondary education social studies with a concentration in history.

Sara traveled to Europe a couple times as a teenager and fell in love with the cultures. After graduating from college, she moved to Central Europe to teach at a high school in a small town in central Slovakia. After teaching in Slovakia, she moved to Prague, Czech Republic, and attended the Univerzita Karlova (Charles University).

“I came back to the United States with a completely new view of the world and the United States,” Sara said. She then taught and lived in Texas, and North Carolina, before moving to Colorado and attending the University of Colorado for a Master’s degree in social, multicultural and linguistically diverse education.

Sara lives near Rollinsville and has been teaching at the Nederland Elementary School from 2018 to the present. “I love working with the students at Nederland Elementary. I love writing and working with The Mountain-Ear. Being a mom is my greatest challenge and greatest joy,” Sara said.

Sara said when she applied with The Mountain-Ear, she really didn’t think she would be called for an interview. “I had been a stay-at-home mom for a number of years and was getting desperate for a little income and work besides being a mom to balance my life out a bit more.”

A lifelong learner and educator, Sara has recently returned to the university classroom pursuing another degree, this time in educational sustainability - social justice.

“We’re all burdened by our history of racial inequality. It’s created a kind of smog that we all breathe in, and it has prevented us from being healthy.” -Bryan Stevenson