Students do not always view school as a happy place, but as one teacher at Frisco High School has proven, that can be changed with the right person at the wheel. “Ms. Sauls makes everyone feel safe,” one student said about this special educator, “She works very hard to make the department feel like a family.” Affectionately deemed “Mama Saulsa” by the multitude of her students that view her as a mother figure in their lives, theatre educator and director Jami Sauls is one of the rare teachers who can turn a classroom into a second home. When asking, in a room full of her students, who felt their lives had been positively impacted by Ms. Sauls, every hand in the room shot into the air.

“I love my students more than anything else,” the director proclaimed. “Theatre is my passion. I love directing, I love being creative, I love that process… but my heart is for my kids.” Though she’s only been at Frisco High School two years, Ms. Sauls treats every student with this encompassing attitude.

“She’s really easy to talk to,” one student said. “I know if I ever need to cry, I can go to her.” Over and over stories like this appear of Ms. Sauls getting students through their toughest failures, breakups, and family troubles. But apart from the support she gives her students, she also helps them to learn and grow.

“Ms. Sauls is an amazing director,” one student stated. “I’ve learned so much about acting from her.” Many students agreed with this, a handful commenting on how much the department has improved since Ms. Sauls took it over. Her management style is by design. “We treat things professionally in the way that we hold rehearsals and the way that we expect our productions to look,” the director explained, “and that comes from an overreaching attitude of ‘whatever you think your limit is, we’re going to bust through that wall’.”

There have been two main goals since she came to the department. “Number one, I want to always have a family-oriented, tight-knit organization. I want everyone to feel like their theatre department is their home away from home. We’ve implemented all kinds of things in the last couple of years so that it feels smaller.” On an academic note, “I’m passionate about trying to give everyone as many opportunities as possible and push them past what they think their limits are to find out they can do so much more. I really, really want to push my kids to be the best, and to create a family environment where they can do that.” And it shows. Students across the board called theatre a home or a family, and many of the upperclassmen said that it’s a recent change. “The department wasn’t like this when I got here,” one older student said. “Ms. Sauls, Ms. Custer, and all of us as students have worked hard to make it this way.”

Ms. Sauls had known for a long time that she wanted to be a Theatre teacher. “I wanted to go into theatre, because theatre is my passion,” she said, “but my mom convinced me to get an education degree to teach it as a fall back just in case. Surprisingly, I fell in love with my education classes. I loved everything I was learning and when I was in the classroom with kids, it was a perfect fit. It was like a puzzle piece of me I didn’t know was missing. When I found that, I knew this is what I wanted to do.” As a result, Ms. Sauls has been teaching for over twenty years. Even without her incredible talent for directing that helps create the polished, professional production that have come to be the norm for this department, it is this attitude of truly, deeply caring that draws students in towards Ms. Sauls.

“She’s really welcoming to the freshmen,” a new high-schooler commended her, “As a freshman this year, I feel like she’s one of the reasons I’m having a good high school experience.” Another said, “I love how honest she is with us. I’ve definitely improved because of Ms. Sauls.”

This year, the FHS Theatre Department has passed a rigorous nationwide audition process to get the rights to Disney’s Frozen: The Musical. We will be one of just fifty schools in the country, and the only one in Texas, to premiere this hit show for the first time. It’s an honor and an opportunity, and one that will not go unappreciated. “This is really the best job in the world,” Ms. Sauls declared without hesitation. “I feel bad, sometimes, for people who don’t teach. How can their job possibly be as fulfilling as mine? I don’t imagine that it’s possible.”

From her motherly attitude to her incredible eye for directing, “Mama Saulsa” has had a positive impact on dozens of FHS students in two short years. “I really do love my students like they’re an extension of my family,” she said. “They are like they’re my own children. I really do feel that way about them.” It’s a sentiment of family that is clearly and plainly reciprocated by many. Her students feel the same way.