COLONY — Sydney Stephans has wanted to be a first responder since she was 3 — and she has the scar to prove it.
She’s the daughter of Paul and Cathy Stephans of Colony; Paul is assistant fire chief for the Colony fire department. He was called away one night when Sydney was just a toddler. She tried to follow him, fell and cut her forehead.
“I knew that it must be an important thing,” she recalled.
She points to the scar as proof of her determination. She’s been trying to follow her father to emergencies ever since.
Sydney joined the Colony fire department and first responder team when she was 17, on April 17, 2022. For more than a year, she’s been to numerous fires, accidents and medical calls. She’s the youngest first responder by at least a decade; most are her father’s age.
“When I was little, I just wanted to be the cool kid who got to ride in the ambulance,” she said. “The first two calls I went on, one was a small grass fire and one was a traumatic medical call. Immediately I realized I don’t just want to fight fires. I want to save lives.”
In April, she helped with a mock DUI accident at Crest High School, when she was a senior. She played the victim, who “died” from her injuries. She’s since traveled to perform the skit at a mass casualty training for the Missouri National Guard.
This summer, she took an intensive EMT training course hosted by the Anderson County EMS department. She graduated on Aug. 8 and will take state exams in September.
And though she plans to always serve as a first responder in some capacity, she’s taking a slightly different path when it comes to a career.
She’s attending Kansas City Community College to study mortuary science.
She chose that career as both as a first responder and as someone who has grieved the loss of loved ones.
“When I was 14, I lost my best friend. That was the first funeral that I remember,” she said.
As she grieved, Sydney wondered what had happened between the death and the funeral. Because of her proximity to first responders, she knew death can arrive in unexpected ways.
Then, the funeral. She knew the end of a life was not the end of a story.
“I just started asking questions,” she said.
