Diane F. Hoffman
9/29/45 – 8/28/08
Diane F. Hoffman passed away on August 28, 2008, at her home in Rockville, Maryland. She succumbed to advanced stage lung cancer. She was 62 years old.
Diane was born in Belleville, Kansas, and was raised on her family's wheat and livestock farm. She married childhood friend Keith Hoffman in 1965. After completing her undergraduate studies in early childhood education at Kansas State University in 1967, she moved to Rockville, Maryland.
Diane began her career as one of the first teachers in Maryland to work in the Head Start preschool program in 1968. She and her family moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in 1980 where she taught preschool and kindergarten in the British Public School System. They returned to the United States in 1986 and settled in Burtonsville, Maryland.
Over the next two decades, Diane taught kindergarten and 2nd grade in the Montgomery County School System, became one of the first consulting teachers in the County's Peer Assistance and Review program, served as a staff development teacher at Broad Acres Elementary, and became an in-district trainer at the Center for Skillful Teaching in 2005. One of the teachers she mentored was named 2006 National Teacher of the Year. She was featured in the Washington Post Magazine Educational Review in November of 2006.
After being diagnosed with lung cancer in 2005, Diane continued to work full-time, completed a Master of Science in Educational Leadership at Hood College in 2007, was named 2007 Graduate Student of the Year, and became a grandmother. She never retired. Diane is survived by her sons Kevin (Philadelphia, PA) and Jeremy (NYC, NY); her grandson, Owen; her siblings Doug Williams (Davis, CA), Don Williams (Pratt, KS), Diedra Woolery (Clearwater, KS), and Drew Williams (Wichita, KS); her father, Wayne Williams (Pratt, KS); friends and colleagues in the Montgomery County Public School System; and her close neighbors in King's Farm.
Memorial gifts can be made in her memory to the National 4-H Council, The Montgomery County Public Schools Educational Foundation in Maryland, and the American Cancer Society.