The nostalgic warmth of a traditional school classroom fills payroll coordinator Emily La Fave’s office, located in the hallway behind the Davern security desk. The paper-covered bulletin board on the right wall, framed with a dollar bill border, is lined with the months of the year and a colorful assortment of candy packages from various countries. The former French teacher, who now pays the school’s employees, shares these international candies to bring joy, connection and quite a bit of sugar to paydays.

La Fave’s job is simple yet important. She maintains a cycle to ensure that teachers, maintenance staff, administrators and student-employees, such as Adventure Kids staff, are paid correctly at the middle and end of each month. “I just pay the people,” she said.

Nevertheless, as a former teacher, she’s found a special purpose as a school payroll coordinator. Her purpose is to connect with the staff and make payday a fun experience. La Fave’s main way of doing this is through her “Payroll Outbox” of candy on her desk, something that attracts adults and kids alike.

When La Fave first started working as Payroll Coordinator in September 2024, she tried to bring in money-themed candy each payday, including gold coins and 100 Grand bars. La Fave has a knack for puns. She also brought Riesen chocolate caramels, telling teachers, “Payday is a ‘riesen’ to come to work.” This candy-sharing hobby manifested as her candy wall, where she used modified Tootsie Rolls and Payday wrappers to craft the title “Check the Payroll Outbox every payday.”

Soon, however, she ran out of money-themed candies and decided to share international candies from different countries each month. The candy wall is now filled with the packages for Japanese Hi-Chews, Mexican Chipiletas, Belgian Biscoffs, German Werthers, Indonesian Kopikos, Taiwanese mochi and more. Her personal favorites are the Werther’s Caramels while the faculty favorite were the Biscoff cookies. The Chipileta suckers were the least popular, as evidenced by the leftovers in the “Payroll Outbox.” La Fave said, “I spend a lot of time looking at spreadsheets and stuff, [the candy] gives me a chance to interact with people.”

Beyond sweets, she brings fun and color through her clothing as well. Before she had this job, she found sparkly green shoes at a thrift store and made them her “Friday shoes.” When she got into payroll, they became her go-to shoes for payday. Soon, on paydays, she started dressing all in green for money bills, then got sparkly silver shoes and eventually dressed in complete sparkly outfits. “A lot of people think payroll is boring … if I got to go to work every day, I may as well have some fun with it,” La Fave said.

Before SPA, La Fave worked in payroll and employee benefits at larger school districts. However, her career started in teaching. When she graduated from high school, she already knew she wanted to be a French teacher. She taught for 13 years, primarily to middle school students. “There are parts about it that I really miss, but it does feel like it would be hard to go back right now. It’s been a while. The technology has screamed past me, I guess,” La Fave said.

She moved to SPA to find a smaller school setting because of her love of interacting with others. La Fave particularly enjoys the tradition of everyone eating lunch together and the fun stories about students she hears from teachers. She said, “I like being around schools, around students, even if I don’t support education the same way that I did before … It’s a way for me to be able to appreciate the work that [teachers] do by spending time with them.”

As much as she’s enjoyed the Spartan community, La Fave has also strengthened it with her passion for bringing fun. With each international candy and sparkly outfit, she fosters connection in an unexpected place, one payday at a time.