The Parent

After losing her daughter in shooting, Robin Treat remains determined to help kids

Robin Treat, whose daughter was killed in the 2018 Santa Fe High School shooting, now works for the district as a school psychologist.

Robin Treat was an example of perseverance and resilience long before May 18, 2018, the morning her daughter was one of 10 people killed in the Santa Fe High School shooting.

After a difficult childhood, she had two kids of her own and a stepdaughter by age 19. Her son, Amadeus, was diagnosed with autism at age 3, putting her on a decade-long quest to a degree in school psychology. Treat had almost finished college when her daughter, Angelique Ramirez, was killed in the high school art room by a gunman who shot 23 people.

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About this series:

This is the fourth of six pieces that expand on my freelance article focusing on how the Santa Fe, Texas, school district is moving forward following an on-campus shooting in May 2018. To read the story, which appears in the December 2022 issue of American School Board Journal, click on this link.

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“I seriously thought I was going to homeschool my kids, but I saw how great Santa Fe was, specifically with children with special needs, and we just started here,” said Treat, who volunteered at her kids’ schools and then worked as a substitute teacher as well as other jobs during the 10 years she pursued her degree.

Gill Strait, director of the school psychology program at the University of Houston at Clear Lake, said on a June 2021 podcast that Trent is one of the strongest people he knows. “If you looked up the word resilient, there should be a picture of Robin,” he said. “I can’t think of any other person who really defines that word more than Robin.”

Working ‘On the Front Line’

After the shooting, Treat doubled down and returned to college as she worked to overcome immeasurable grief. She received her long-awaited degree in 2019 and has worked as a school psychologist in the district’s elementary and middle schools since.

Treat called the role her “dream job” and said she did not thinking about working in a district other than Santa Fe. The reason: It gives her an opportunity to help children like her son while working to address students’ mental health needs.

“This job given me the prime opportunity to have a hand in helping people heal. It puts me on the front line,” she said. “And that means a lot.”

She has no pictures of her children in her office, and she changed her last name back to Treat so her students would not easily identify her as the parent of one of the victims. “When they get to high school they figure it out, but I don’t think I can be as effective if the first thing you know about me is that.

“If they ask about me being a parent, I say I have two kids and one bonus daughter who lives in Oklahoma. I talk about Angelique like she is alive, because she is alive inside of me.”

She has worked to raise funds for the Santa Fe Ten Memorial Foundation, which is working to build a memorial to the victims, and has become good friends with the foundation’s director, Megan Goulet. She also remains in touch with members of her daughter’s class.

When I ask what the district and community can do to continue healing, Treat paused.

“We’ve got to keep our relationships strong with our students,” she said. “We have to be on the lookout to see if something is different, if they’re doing something that needs to be addressed. And if you don’t have transparency with families and parents, there’s no trust. Parents have to know their children are going into a building where they’re going to be loved and cared for.”

Hounded by ‘Ruthless’ Media

This is Treat’s first media interview and only the second time she has spoken publicly in-depth about her journey. She went into detail about the shooting and her life before and after on The Psychologists Podcast, which is hosted by Strait and his wife Julia, two of her mentors. But she had refused to talk to journalists until our sit down in September.

“I don’t trust the media,” Treat said. “They’re not kind. They don’t care how what they do affects the people they’re writing about. The only reason I took this (interview) was because it’s about the school district and not about my daughter. It’s important to me that SFISD is covered in a positive and caring way, the way it deserves to be after going through what they have as a district.”

In the onslaught of attention after the shooting, she said reporters were “ruthless” and “wouldn’t leave me alone.” When she refused to give interviews, she said the media “poached whatever they could get” from social media posts and “made up what they wanted” about her daughter.

“We had people from New York to California showing up at my house, sleeping outside our house. We had a ‘No Media’ sign in our front yard and that still didn’t deter them,” Treat said. “At the time, I was selling vitamins through a middle company and we had business signs all over my car. I had to take all of that off and quit selling because the media wouldn’t leave me alone.

“I would hang up on someone after saying no, and they would call right back. It was just nonstop.”

Treat said she did not want to talk to the media in part because of her position with the school district. In the aftermath of the shooting, some families of the victims were highly critical of the board and administration and “I don’t want to be part of that either.”

“Santa Fe pours their entire hearts into their students, and they’re doing the best they can with no instruction manual,” Treat says. “I know they have used their hearts to navigate this uncharted territory, and they really want to do what is best for all the families involved, whatever that looks like.”

Remembering Her Daughter

Over time, our conversation broadened to include other topics. Treat has a large tattoo on her left arm, a mother-daughter symbol with a black rose and angel’s wings. Treat and Angelique had planned to get the same tattoo when the latter turned 18, but that day never came.

“She was the most thoughtful, kind human being in the world. She cared for everybody that was different,” Treat said of her daughter. “She loved on everybody who needed someone to love on them. She sought those people out.”

Like many of the victim’s families, Trent raised money in honor of her daughter and is using it to provide graduating seniors with an annual scholarship. The first year it was handed out was in 2021, the year Angelique was supposed to graduate, and Trent spoke to the class.

“I said to them, ‘You guys were born into trauma,’” she said. “I was pregnant with Angelique when 9/11 happened. Then during kindergarten, their year was wrecked when Hurricane Ike tore up their school and they finished the year spread out among schools and portables. Then we had the solar eclipse on the first day of their freshman year, followed that Friday by [Hurricane Harvey] and then the shooting. And then COVID. It’s just unbelievable.”

Treat said her daughter took care of Amadeus, now a senior who works after school in the district’s print shop, and watched over him.

“She was the best caretaker for her brother. She did anything and everything to make him comfortable and happy and feel safe,” Treat said. “She stuck up for him and for anyone else who needed to be stuck up for.”

On graduation day, Amadeus accepted his sister’s diploma.

Coming Next: The Superintendent.