Congrats to this week's Teacher of the Week Rachel Neutzling of Cold Spring's ROCORI Middle School!

Each week, we have the pleasure of surprising our Teacher of the Week at their school or in their classroom. This week's visit was a little different. We surprised Rachel at a special get-together on her behalf at Pizza Ranch in Waite Park. One of her colleagues -- Jessi -- organized the event and nominated Rachel as Teacher of the Week:

I will start off by saying that Rachel does not only fully deserve teacher of the week, she should get teacher of the year, better yet teacher of the decade!!! Rachel is a Special Education teacher at Rocori middle school. She is so much more though! She teaches with her heart on her sleeve and her students are not only her students for 7th and 8th grade but we are (as she calls us) her kids. She is still in contact with students who are upwards of 27 years old! She has always stuck with us kids through the good and the bad. She is so generous and has such a kind heart with a radiating, and free spirited soul! I honestly do not even have any more words for how amazing she is! Rachel recently found out that she is battling stage 4 Pancreatic and Liver Cancer. She is currently undergoing chemotherapy. I can say with certainty that I am speaking for everyone who knows her, we were all so deeply saddened by this news! However, if there is one person who could beat this, it is Rachel! In shortly over one day of being made public, her Facebook fundraiser had collected $10,000! Between pizza sales at Jimmy’s, a benefit at Winner’s and all the wishful thinking of the people in the community; Cold Spring, Richmond and Rockville really came together to their show support for her. There is nothing anyone can say or do to make this all go away... but at the very least we can make sure she knows how important she is and has been to everyone! Thank you for being a part of showing her exactly how big of a difference she has made! - Jessi Goerger

We were blessed to see the community of friends, family, colleagues and even students who came out to support Rachel at Pizza Ranch.

With the support of our sponsors Great Harvest Bread, Concrete Image Salon, Coyote Moon Grille and All-Star Trophy and Awards, we congratulate Rachel Neutzling as our Teacher of the Week and wish her all our support and prayers as she fights her fight!

Watch our special surprise visit below:

Nominate another Teacher of the Week here.