Cari Ramirez, 45, Redlands

As an elementary school teacher and mother to a young son with autism, Cari Ramirez believed strongly in an individual approach to education. “She was very innovative in her teaching philosophy,” longtime friend Emily Bradford-Lewis said. “She hated putting kids in a box: ‘You have to learn to read this way, you have to learn to do math this way’ — she hated that.”

Ramirez began teaching in the Redlands Unified School District in 1997 and was a kindergarten teacher at Judson & Brown Elementary School. She was known for her vivacious personality and a boisterous laugh that you could hear “from two blocks down,” her daughter Alexa said.

“You could put her in a room full of strangers and she’d make friends with practically everyone,” Alexa said.

When Alexa was 7, they began visiting Mexico regularly for weekend road trips; her mother liked it so much that she eventually bought a condo in Rosarito. A former cheerleader and water polo and volleyball player who grew up in Idaho, Ramirez enjoyed “anything with the ocean,” Alexa said.

But Ramirez’s biggest passion was education, and it was her dream to open a school for children with special needs in Mexico, where her husband, Jesus, lives and where she split her time. Ramirez named the school Azulado and wrote on its website:

“We are committed to allowing every student, especially children with special needs, a school where they are not confined to curriculum contained in a workbook, but rather driven by their own curiosity and desire to understand the world around them.”

Bradford-Lewis said Azulado, in Rosarito, had obtained nonprofit status and was set to open when the pandemic hit. “With Cari passing away,” she said, “its future is in limbo.” Ramirez and her parents, Roger and Mary Tomlinson, contracted COVID-19 after a Thanksgiving trip to Mexico. Ramirez died at Redlands Community Hospital on Dec. 11, at age 45. Her father died later that month.

Ramirez is survived by her mother, who is recovering; her husband; her daughter, a son, Jesus; and her brother, Dylan.

“My mom used to say she liked to sit down, but really she wanted to do anything and everything,” Alexa said. “She wasn’t one to wait for the next thing to come to her — she would go and seek it.”