Retiring educators pass the baton to next generation

As a new school year approaches, kids and parents rush to complete supply lists, in anticipation of a return to classes. While many of the faces of staff and teachers will be familiar to families, some of those faces won’t be in the buildings to greet the students.

At the end of the 2020-21 school year, the Cadott, Cornell and Lake Holcombe school districts, all saw retirements of long-time educators.

Cadott

Dan Kohls

Stepping down this year, as the head custodian at the elementary school, is Dan Kohls, who started out as part-time in 1985, at the high school. He then became full-time in 1989, and later became the head custodian at the elementary.

Although Kohls says he enjoyed his job, it was a lot of cleaning and maintenance.

“Every year, it gets a little tougher,” said Kohls.

Included in his list of daily chores, Kohls cleaned desks and mopped floors, while in the summer, he shampooed carpets, waxed floors and revarnished the gyms.

“All the spills, oh my gosh,” said Kohls, adding that at times, it was hard to clean up some of the messes. “It’s mind over matter.”

Kohls says kids will be kids, and while most are really well-behaved, there are some who waste toilet paper and string things about.

“You take the good with the bad,” said Kohls.

One thing Kohls says he really enjoyed, was seeing his kids and grandkids attending the district. Kohls said his grandkids loved seeing their grandpa at the school, and that it was nice to give them hugs now and then.

It wasn’t just the kids who were related to him that helped make Kohls love his job, especially when he performed magic tricks for the youngsters.

“I love the interaction with them,” he said.

Now that his time is his own, Kohls plans on a lot more fishing and hunting, and getting his garage organized. His wife probably has three or four more years at TTM before retirement, so he also wants to play more card games with the Halfway Hall group.

However, that doesn’t mean he won’t be a regular face in the district, as he is willing to come back and sub in some capacity, even if it’s in the kitchen. There are also no plans to live anywhere else.

“I love it here,” said Kohls. “I couldn’t be happier.”

Paula Lockbaum

Also bidding goodbye to the district, is Paula Lockbaum, one of the first faces you see when entering the elementary school. Lockbaum started in 2010, as a paralegal substitute, then in 2011, served in a long-term position in the high school. She then started fulltime in the elementary office and has been there ever since.

Her two daughters graduated from Cadott, but Lockbaum’s granddaughter attends school and lives in Sparta.

“She’s a lot of the reason why I am going to retire, because I want to spend more time with her,” said Lockbaum.

She also wants to travel around the country, with an Alaskan cruise on the bucket list. While it was a hard decision to step down from her position, Lockbaum’s significant other retired in December, and the two want to spend more time together and do things.

She also will sub in the district, if she’s available, and might dabble in volunteer work.

In her responsibilities, Lockbaum entered new student schedules, which allows the teachers to grade them, and got report cards done. She also kept up the bus list – who rides and when, planning for each student to be accounted for and safe.

When a student leaves the district, Lockbaum was also responsible for sending their records to the new district and closing out accounts. She said the kids were fun and the staff was great to work with.

“I’ve loved every moment of this job,” said Lockbaum. “It’s never a dull moment.”

Cornell

Sandy-Amdahl Amdahl

How does one write a goodbye after 34 1/2 years? That’s what first-grade teacher Sandy-Amdahl Amdahl puzzled over when she bid her comrades goodbye at the end of the school year.

Her adventures in Cornell, began one snowy day in January, in the mid-1980s, during a blizzard, when Amdahl left Stanley, in her little blue Dodge Omni, to interview for the full-time position.

“When I got to Cornell Elementary School, Mr. (Marv) Schufelt, the elementary principal, met me at the door and told me that he was trying to call me to reschedule the interview,” Amdahl recalled. “Of course, back then, the only way to get a phone call, was to be home.”

When she began at the old elementary school, in her classroom, two of the walls were blackboards, one wall was all windows and one had a sink in it. Amdahl also remembers the film strips and projectors she used to teach the kids, which have now been phased out with new technology.

“The change in technology obviously has been huge,” said Amdahl. “Never would I ever had expected that I would teach from home on a computer, where my students were in their houses and me being in mine.”

Amdahl grew up in Stanley, and has one daughter now teaching in that district, which is one reason she didn’t retire at the end of last year.

“My dad was a teacher and handed the teaching baton to me,” said Amdahl. “So, it was important to me that I carried on the tradition of handing her the baton. Plus, I had promised a four-year-old boy that I would wait for him to get to first grade, then I would retire. I wanted to keep that promise. That one family, if I had stayed another year, it would have been the third generation.”

Now that Amdahl is retired and has more time to spend with her family, she is keeping her fingers crossed that she will get the grandchildren she is hoping for – and with three kids, the odds look good. In the meantime, she and her other half plan to travel, and especially visit Florida again.

“I did want to work at Disney really, really bad,” said Amdahl, who said potential grandchildren could change that. “Family comes first.”

Amdahl says she wishes she could have had more time for her own children when she was teaching, but that her students required a lot of her time.

“I know that some people thought that I was strict, but they had to learn how to read – it was important,” she said.

Amdahl credits current superintendent Paul Schley for making her the teacher she is and pushing her to always be better. To have someone say 50 years from now, that she is the reason they can read, made it all worth the while.

In her “golden” years, Amdahl intends to do what she loves, which includes substitute teaching.

“I cannot rule out little people in my life,” said Amdahl. “I have to have little kids in my life.”

Kerry Bjorklund

Serving as a special education teacher for 34 years, Kerry Bjorklund spent one year at the Cornell Elementary, but the rest of her career was spent at the middle and high school. Living in Eau Claire the entire time, Bjorklund was able to disconnect after the school day ended.

“If you ask my husband, he’ll tell you I drove like half a million miles in 34 years,” she said, adding that she planned in her head what she needed to do for the day at school. “On the way home, I got rid of all the stuff I needed to get rid of.”

When Bjorklund began her teaching career, she didn’t have access to many computers.

“For me, I guess, in special ed, when I started teaching, I was working more with intellectually disabled students,” she said.

At that time, Bjorklund had her students in her room for most of the day, but when learning disabilities started taking the forefront, students were in her room on a revolving basis. Bjorklund then needed to learn many different things, to support the chemistry, biology, English and math classes.

“It makes it a little more difficult, because you kind of have to have a little bit of knowledge about everything and you really have to be willing to collaborate with your peers,” said Bjorklund. “So, I learned a lot of different things. My thirst for learning was always ongoing.”

After becoming a “granny nanny” and taking care of her small grandchildren for her daughter, Bjorklund knew it was time to hang up her teaching hat. Since her married daughter is trying to work and finish her education, it was a no-brainer for Bjorklund to pitch in.

“She just needed a little help,” said Bjorklund.

She also plans to walk and read more, and once her husband retires, Bjorklund plans to travel.

For Bjorklund, when she started at Cornell, she had a fiveyear plan, with intentions to begin in Eau Claire, but because she was from a small district herself and invested in her students, there was no turning back at that point.

“I just really enjoyed my time in Cornell,” she said. “It was a good work experience for my entire life.”

Lake Holcombe

Mark Porter

For more than two decades, Mark Porter has been on hand to walk students throughout their day, to greet families and to help teachers solve any problems that come. Now, a new face will take over those responsibilities.

“Most of my life, before Lake Holcombe, was spent south of Highway 29,” said Porter. “I had been married for just a year, and we moved here to get a start on a family and a career.”

Not many stay that long in an administrative position, but Porter says his family stayed because of effort and value.

“I saw the impact of the effort of what I was doing and the value it had,” said Porter. “At the same time, those around me saw the same things and jumped on board. My wife and I saw the benefits of the school, and we decided this was where we wanted our children to go.”

With his oldest son graduating this spring from Lake Holcombe, Porter, who presided over the commencement ceremony, tried to focus on remembering the small things – sights, sounds, faces and reactions.

“Lots of excitement of what comes next and sadness of a chapter ending,” said Porter.

Porter carries with him a tradition he started, of wearing his master’s degree robe to symbolize the link between the role of the staff and the graduates on stage, even though that broke with “normal” proceedings.

“Believe it or not, the one thing I won’t miss, is the politics that goes on in a school,” said Porter. “What I will miss, is the interactions with the staff and students, but the students most of all.”

Porter said as a 4K through 12th-grade principal, he saw every grade and the nuances in them each year.

“It’s odd, because I know each child has a family, but when the students are at school, I think of them as my own children,” he said. “I want them all to do well.”

As some advice for any listening ear, Porter says to own your choices and learn from them, and that education is a process that takes a lifetime, that school is just a practical application of how to look for the things you don’t know.

With two more children to usher through the halls of learning at Lake Holcombe and his wife as a teacher in the district, Porter and his family aren’t going anywhere any time soon.

Though he is now considered retired, Porter says he saw the highs and lows of his students’ struggles every day, and with it, the growth that takes place in each of them.

“That, to me, is the biggest prize in any school.”