Hi, our names are Zach and Zorina. We are Ramona’s kids. We would like to reflect a bit or meander if you will through Mini-School. We each got to write the Meandering the year we were born (Doug really made us), but this year we wanted to because it’s our mom’s last year in Mini … [Read more…]
By Merlin Zimmerman As the school year begins, it strikes me how much Mini-School is a mixture of the old and the new. Take our new students, for example. We have 35 new students – about half the program – but among them there are many familiar faces. Mini-School teachers teach several of Minnetonka’s Summer … [Read more…]
By Pauline Engelby During my first years as a Mini-School teacher, I was working in the trip room and I came across a box of t-shirts. Printed on them was the quotation, “We, the unwilling led by the unqualified, have been doing the unbelievable for so long with so little, we now attempt the impossible … [Read more…]
By Merlin Zimmerman The first quarter of 2001-2002 has been an exciting one in Mini-School. Several students have graduated during the first few weeks of school: Josh Reisgies, Andy Sheats, James O’Day, Tyson Haeg and Matt Prich. It feels good to be a part of Mini-School, a place where so many people find their goals … [Read more…]
By Pauline Engelby And they’re off! Another year in Mini-School has begun. I feel sometimes that we never really ended. The summer break has come and gone with the blink of an eye. Mini-School seems like one continuous year with some seniors diligently, anxiously trying to complete graduation requirements into the summer, and us preparing … [Read more…]
By Merlin Zimmerman September 1999 marks the beginning of the first school year in which none of the original founders of Mini-School remains on its staff. How shall we begin the New Era? Do we act like nothing has changed? That won’t work. Do we throw out the old and rebuild from the ground up? … [Read more…]
By Doug Berg Well, this is it. My last issue of Com-mini-cations, my last “Meandering.” I led my last Mini-School big trip to Utah in April, will lead my last Mini-School trip to the BWCA in late May, participated in my last Mini-School parents’ meeting the other night. As the “lasts” accumulate, it’s time, I … [Read more…]
By Doug Berg As will be indicated in articles throughout this issue of Com-mini-cations, much has been happening in Mini-School the first couple months of 1999. Awards, trips, babies, new students- a busy time. In addition, everyone’s excited as we move toward the end of the school year as the biggest trip time of the … [Read more…]
By Doug Berg As the Holiday season approaches, the excitement around Mini-School reaches a fever pitch. Dustin Olson, Derek Knowles and Andy Black increase their physical abuse of one another, Matt Thompson increases his number of calls to California to see what’s in store for him on that front, Aaron Hoerst becomes pesky beyond belief, … [Read more…]
By Doug Berg I have run a couple of marathons, skied quite a few Birkebeiners and Vasaloppets, and paddled in a good many long distance canoe races. In each case, I feel a bit of anxiety before the event, then after the gun goes off, an adrenaline rush and a lot of physical and emotional … [Read more…]