"It's a Good Day to Be an Adult and an Eagle"
(originally published by the Maple River Messenger)
Note: In the spring of 1995, I got my student-teaching assignment: Maple River High School. My supervising teachers were John Solting for Public Speaking and World Literature and Kathy Gjerde for English 9 and Journalism. Since this series will profile my 30 years of former students to find out where their journeys took them, my first subject will be one of the very first students I ever met, Brian Gjerde.
In 1995, the paint was still drying on the new signs for the consolidated district of Maple River. For senior Brian Gjerde, he’d seen the transition first hand, having attended elementary school for the Amboy-Good Thunder district, middle school for M-A-GT, and finally in seventh grade, he witnessed the creation of Maple River. Yet when he graduated high school, he had no idea of the part he’d play in the final evolution of the school decades later.
Gjerde now lives in New Prague with his wife and three children. After graduating from the University of Minnesota with a degree in engineering, he moved back to Mankato to work at ISG. After beginning as a design engineer, he moved into project management and is now vice president in charge of the food industrial business unit. Although his mother Kathy had retired from Maple River and they moved to their property on Lake Jefferson, Brian found himself back in his old school when he received a phone call. “Jeff Annis had called me one day and asked if I could come down there to do something about the school’s weight room. It was fun to go back in the position I am now to, you know, to look at what what can we do to improve the school and what started as a discussion of a weight room improvement” turned into much more “and that can of worms got fully opened at that point where it was ‘boy, when you really boil this down, the significant improvement needs to be made for the betterment of the community in the school’”
His earnest conversations with Dan Anderson about the state of the building led to significant changes to the district. “it was really fun to be able to be part of that,” Gjerde admitted. “My schooling at Maple River put me in this position, so that part was fun and really rewarding to be able to design that new school, and be there the day the ribbon cutting happened.”
Gjerde describes himself as an active kid during his time at school who was involved in athletics, academics, and the arts. Looking back, he “really enjoyed the diversity of being involved in a lot of different things.” He attributes his professional and personal success to the lessons he learned growing up in a small community. “A huge part of my foundation is rooted in growing up in a small community. So valuing all of the things that you know, as an adult I can see now where that you know, the sense of community that it brings for both.” He also believes that small town living also brings a different type of accountability. “You're looking out for one another. And, you know, kids are going to be kids and make mistakes, but if you've got a community looking out for one another, I think the opportunities for those mistakes are more limited. And maybe you catch them before they're a bigger deal.”
For this reason, Gjerde chose to live in New Prague to be centralized between “grandma day on the lake,” his work at ISG, and an opportunity to raise his three children in a similar environment. Gjerde also credits growing up in a rural community with some of his success at ISG. “My roots in an agricultural community really brought me to focus on our clients or their processing, you know, cheese and dairy and pork and poultry and doing projects like that all over the United States.” His opportunities at Maple River also helped his path. His competitiveness in sports quickly turned into workplace competitiveness that fuels him to this day. Opportunities of “experiencing failure, experiencing success” helped equip Gjerde for the challenges as an adult and a profession. Many of those failures and successes came from his math teacher, Maureen Hollerich. “She is a wonderful teacher, and I guess inspired me on the math side to recognize that was a strength of mine.” Her mentoring helped “turn it into a career in engineering.”
While touting the benefits of a small school and community, Gjerde also listed it as one of the challenges he faced. “I really had to work at putting myself out there. You spend 12-13 years of your childhood with people you met in kindergarten or preschool; it made those friendships easier, but I think I took it for granted too. I went from a class of 96 to a class of 9,996.
For Eagles who are still young and in the nest, Gjerde has some advice for young people about entering the real world. “And I think one of the best advice I got and it is advice I'd give anyone is when you've identified areas of interest, reach out and find people that are doing it, you know, get a job shadow. But put yourself out there where you experience at least part of a day of you know, someone who's out there doing it on a daily basis, because I know when I did that my perception of what ‘a day in the life of’\ really helped.” Now that Gjerde has entered the mentoring stage, he plans to continue being competitive at work while preparing for a day when he can indulge his own family in retirement.
Life in 1995
Oscar Winner: Braveheart
Top-selling artist: Alanis Morissette
President: Bill Clinton
Viking Season: 8-8
Twins Season: 56-88
Price of gas: $1.21
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