During class the last week of April, Auggie Bethany Johnson, a current DNP-FNP student, wondered how she could help her local community during the COVID-19 pandemic. She wanted to volunteer her time at Augsburg Central Health Commons, a common practice for Augsburg nursing students. However, due to safety precautions, students cannot be on-site right now. Bethany asked Katie Clark, her professor and Director of Augsburg Central Health Commons, how the community is doing.

“Katie said they need water. I thought that seems so elementary,” says Bethany. “But everything is closed, none of the regular bathrooms or shops where a marginalized person can fill up water are open. My husband’s coffee shop has slow business right now so I called him and asked how much water he had.”

Bethany’s husband, David, owns UP Coffee Roaster and told her he’d order a pallet of water.

One week later, Bethany loaded up her daughter, her husband, and 1800 bottles of water in the UP Coffee Roaster’s delivery van and headed to the Health Commons.

“I think everyone in the community is shocked to hear people need water because we don’t think of things like this. It’s a basic, basic need,” says Bethany.

The COVID-19 outbreak has affected everyone, but it has particularly affected the marginalized communities in the Twin Cities.

“Encampments are being torn down and individuals coming to the Health Commons are saying they have no water,” says Dr. Joyce Miller, Chair of Augsburg’s Nursing Department.

Bethany finished her Bachelor of Science in Nursing at Augsburg in 2019 and is now part of the Doctor in Nursing Practice program.

“Their mission is what brought me to Augsburg,” says Bethany. “To reach out and be so inclusive in their neighborhood and the greater community. Augsburg felt like my people. Felt like home.”

It’s no surprise to her professors, then, that Bethany jumped at the chance to help.

“Bethany’s generous donation to the Augsburg Central Health Commons was truly moving. Not only is Bethany working on the frontlines, but she is caring for those who are marginalized. Healthcare for the Homeless, St. Stephens Outreach, and AICDC also took portions of our water donation to distribute to the unsheltered population,” says Katie Clark.

“I have two kids in college, plus I’m in college, and Augsburg is the only one not closing everyone out. Not everyone has a safe home to go home to, so Augsburg is staying open to take care of people. It blows me away, I love it,” says Bethany. “They walk the walk and talk the talk.”

While she waits for approval to volunteer at the Health Commons, Bethany and her family are already planning to donate more water. They have also generously offered to help others donate water to the Health Commons.

If you would like to donate, please contact Bethany directly at johns173@augsburg.edu.

Augsburg’s Health Commons

The Augsburg Central Health Commons is a nursing-led drop-in center that is dedicated to building relationships based on mutual benefit and understanding with those who utilize our space. Nursing faculty members and students from Augsburg University lead, organize, and participate at the Augsburg Central Health Commons in hopes to create changes in our healthcare system to honor the wisdom of all people as they seek to reduce bias, increase compassionate based care, and discover what it means to be a citizen nurse.

The Augsburg Central Health Commons was founded in 1992 (previously called the Nursing Center). It has provided an opportunity for faculty and students from the Nursing Department at Augsburg to become involved in independent practice. Through the years, Augsburg nurses have met community members who have welcomed their service. In the relationships that have developed, nurses continue to experience the mutuality of health–when someone grows stronger, that strength helps everyone in the community.

Jon Dahl has many roles in life. He’s a husband, father, screenwriter, director, marathon runner, and a Captain and Logistics Officer for the Army National Guard. His current role as Contract Specialist in the National Guard is what is keeping him extra busy right now, during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a Contract Specialist working for the U.S. Property and Fiscal Office, Jon is one of a dozen people in Minnesota authorized to recommend federal vendors, vendors who usually bid on government contracts, to fulfill the State of Minnesota’s medical supplies needs.

Dahl joined the National Guard and went to basic training in 2004, commissioned as an officer in 2007 and still serves today. In his time since joining, his favorite job was contracting for Moral Welfare and Recreation in Camp Buehring in Kuwait in 2018. It allowed him to indulge in his love of movies and entertainment while stationed in Kuwait.

“If it wasn’t in Kuwait, I’d still love to be doing that job,” Dahl says.

Dahl worked with the USO and MWR, the restaurant and clothing vendors, the movie theater, basically all the entertainment directorates at Camp Buehring. He was also in charge of all the talent who visited camp, including The Couples of Comedy, the Blizzard Call of Duty team, and the band Joyride.

Now, Dahl spends most of his day processing vendor offers to get medical supplies to Minnesota during the current pandemic. He leverages the federal system – System of Award Management – to manage vendors around the world who are interested in selling medical equipment to the State of Minnesota. And the items Dahl is working hardest to get are Nitrile Gloves; N95, BiPap, PAPR, and disposable face masks; face shields; and medical gowns, hoods, and coveralls.

“3M, Boston Scientific, there are lots of large Minnesota businesses we’re talking to in order to get medical supplies,” Dahl says. “There are a lot of local people doing a lot of things!”

Unfortunately, there are also a lot of criminals trying to take advantage of the high demand for medical equipment, so Dahl is working extra hard to make sure legitimate vendors are selling correct supplies to the state government. After sorting through hundreds of offer sheets each day, Dahl picks the top vendors based on delivery schedules, terms, and price. He then checks with state and federal databases to make sure the vendors have a clean record and are quality vendors. Once verified, Dahl recommends vendors to the state and negotiates specifications to make sure the vendor and their product fit what Minnesota needs right now.

Most of the time, Dahl is able to work from his home in Big Lake, where he lives with his family. When he needs to go into the office, he drives to Camp Ripley or to the State Emergency Operating Center. His temperature is checked at the door and he’s questioned about any symptoms of illness or people he’s been in contact with before he’s allowed in the facility.

“They’re following guidelines because there are a lot of critical people in a closed space,” Dahl says. “Overall, we’ve tripped and fallen through the whole process. But we’re tripping and falling forward. We’re getting the process done.”

Augsburg University

Dahl spent two years at Metropolitan State University, earning second his Bachelor’s Degree in Screenwriting, before coming to Augsburg.

“I was looking for a film or screenwriting master’s program to apply to just as I was graduating from MSU and Cass Dalglish (the MFA’s first director) and her team started up the program at Augsburg. Between meeting her and Stephan Eirik Clark (the MFA’s current director), I knew this would be the program for me,” Dahl says.

He was part of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing’s inaugural cohort, specializing in the Screenwriting program. He graduated in 2016 with the makings of two feature length screenplays. After graduation, he has stayed in contact with a few of his professors, and he is looking forward to the day people can gather in groups again so he can start auditions for one of those screenplays, ironically titled “Matter of the Apocalypse.”

Ever since Bob Stacke ‘71 started classes at Augsburg, he has been a strong influence on its music—first as a student, then later as professor and director of the band and numerous ensembles. And since his retirement in 2014, the Music Department Chair Emeritus continues to make his mark.

With a passion for exploring international music and finding ways to fuse dissimilar styles, he has performed jazz and interesting new music in a surprisingly wide variety of venues. But beyond that performing experience, as band director and professor he has provided hundreds of Auggie students with growth opportunities that draw them into an expanded world of music and enable them to discover the joy of creating and performing their own compositions and styles.

Former music composition student Brendan Anderson ‘02 found a mentor in Stacke and has said that Stacke’s early advice—to “say yes”—opened up his Augsburg studies and career in ways that he would never have envisioned in earlier years. Rather than focusing on one aspect or style of music, which may or may not be useful in a career, Anderson found that being willing to say yes—getting outside one’s comfort zone and practicing a lot—could expand opportunities dramatically, both musically and in life in general.

The wisdom of this philosophy became real to Anderson after graduating from Augsburg and settling in Los Angeles to pursue his childhood dream of being a film composer. It was all going splendidly and his goal within reach, when a new awareness of many other possibilities took hold. Now he serves as associate pastor of worship and communication at Highlands Church, a large interdenominational church in Scottsdale, Ariz. In his “free time,” he freelances in mixed media and video production for local nonprofits. He also has worked with Stacke on Augsburg Sesquicentennial music. And he is loving it all.

Student-led Initiative

Stacke first arrived on campus as a student in the turbulent 60s, when music gave full-throated expression to differing viewpoints on issues of the day—politics, faith, women’s rights, race, and human rights. On campus, he found a number of students who, like him, loved traditional music but were also interested in expanding Augsburg’s performances to include jazz and contemporary music.

With the blessing of the music faculty, several of these students formed a group, running it by themselves and practicing regularly in a music room. Uniquely, they used unusual progressive instrumentation, adding French horn and tuba to the traditional jazz band, and calling themselves the Neophonic Brass. Later, they added vocalists—the Cabaret Singers—which included current music professor, Merilee Klemp ‘75.

With gratitude, Stacke remembers mentors such as former band director Mayo Savold, who encouraged the students to develop their own musical style, and percussion teachers Elliott Fine and Marv Dahlgren. When Stacke would lament, “I just can’t get this part,” Dahlgren would respond, “Then you just haven’t practiced enough!” These Augsburg experiences and living in the 60s formed how Stacke presents music today.

Even at an early age, he performed a wide variety of music with numerous show and jazz groups. He was part of the Skeets Trio, teaming up with accordion player and Augsburg alumnus Skeets Langley ‘64 (who won the world accordion championship) and tuba player Stan Freese (who became the head of Disney Park music). Perhaps Stacke’s biggest thrill during his student years was playing as an extra percussionist for the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra.

Though Stacke knew early on that his career would be in music, he wasn’t clear on the details. Teaching or performing? But with time, and after observing Freese’s teaching style at Edison High School in Minneapolis and working with the percussion students there, Stacke decided to look seriously at a teaching career.

In the 70s and 80s, he taught music at local schools (junior high and high school) and at the University of St. Cloud, while continuing to perform in several venues, like the Chanhassen Dinner Theater, where he played in the band for 13 years.

In 1990 Stacke returned to Augsburg, this time as faculty, and in 1998 he was named chair of the Music Department. He also served as director of the Augsburg Band, as well as the Jazz Instrumental and Vocalist Ensembles (JIVE). To his delight, the appointment enabled him to re-energize the Jazz Band that he and his classmates had started years earlier.

Former student and mentee Dave Kerkvliet ‘95, who has been director of bands at Sebeka, Minnesota, for 24 years is—like Stacke—a drummer. Forever grateful for what his mentor did for him, he believes in using the same, most effective, tool to mentor his own students that Stacke did—“encourage your students (never discourage), and provide opportunities to showcase their talents.” Kerkvliet and some of his Sebeka band members recently enjoyed a backstage give-and-take with members of the well-known rock band, 311.

Another former student, clarinetist Lauren Lesser ‘12 of St. Louis Park, Minnesota, knew when she came to Augsburg that she didn’t want to major in music but definitely wanted to continue playing in a band, which she had done since the fifth grade. Stacke made that possible, and she never felt any less a part of the band than the music majors playing alongside her. She has said that, though Stacke expected a lot from his band members, he was able to make everyday things fun. “Bob always made sure there was plenty of time for exploration—both educational and just fun—mixed into the practices and performances,” she said.

Though Stacke acknowledges that the music faculty had more than a few animated discussions about what constitutes a music education, there was never any doubt they shared the same goal—to give the students the best education possible. They expanded the curriculum greatly and built individual skills by taking into account each student’s talents and individuality—and also strove to develop in all students a lifelong love and appreciation of all musical styles.

Music under Stacke’s tutelage has delighted many over the years, exemplified at several Augsburg commencement ceremonies, when Auggie instrumentalists and vocalists have delivered a fulsome jazz performance of the traditional spiritual song, “This Little Light of Mine.” These renditions have brought listeners to tears with their tender power.

International Influence

While Stacke was a student at Augsburg, music from other cultures was becoming a popular genre. He and his friends would listen to the Beatles collaborating with Indian musicians and jazz musicians such as Don Ellis and Buddy Rich using the rhythms of India and Eastern European countries. The world of music exploded for him in its use of rhythm.

When asked what had made him curious about such a variety of genres, he responded with one word—rhythm. He wanted to go beyond the more conventional time signatures and phrasing, and found inspiration in the words of his former teacher, the late Lee Sateren, who said, “Don’t be confined by the tyranny of the bar line.”

What continues to excite Stacke about two dissimilar musical genres “bumping up” against each other is the remarkable blending that can result. He recalls Gunther Schuller of the New England Conservatory of Music, who created a new genre he called Third Stream. It was an incredible blending of “classical” and jazz/contemporary music, Stacke says. As college students, he and his friends were extremely interested in it. Augsburg students of the 60s—such as John Eidsvoog, Greg Lewis, and Ellis Holcomb, who wrote original compositions and arrangements for the Neophonic brass—were highly influenced by Third Stream.

A survey of Stacke’s musical travels (Ireland, Turkey, Haiti, China, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Venezuela, and Europe) is indicative of the degree to which he has lived by his own advice—to say yes to learning and embracing new styles.

Ever the Collaborator

Over the years, Stacke has collaborated with a wide variety of organizations to create unique performances. He has worked with musical artists in the Somali neighborhood near campus and directed a group called Midnimo (Somali word for “unity”). Since 2001, he has volunteered every summer at a children’s music camp in Haiti. In 2008, he recruited a big-band-style orchestra (including professional, college, and high school musicians) to present “Students Play in Witness to Duke Ellington.” With collaboration from several Twin Cities high school band directors and the Walker West Music Academy, he assembled a band of high schoolers, and added jazz ensemble members and a couple of professional musicians as mentors, in order to produce the Ellington special.

In the fall of 2013, he developed an alumni jazz band, fondly known as Bob’s Band. He continues to direct the group, which specializes in performing a fusion of jazz and world music. In 2016, Stacke was awarded the Spirit of Augsburg Award. See footage of the award ceremony here.

When he isn’t doing music, Stacke is enjoying another passion—photography. Find more at finalshutterphotography.com. He and his wife Mary live in Spring Park, Minnesota, with their border collie Rainy, and have two children, Ben and Sarah, and four grandchildren.

—by Cheryl Crockett ‘89

If the temps dip too low, having winter fun in Minnesota can often be a matter of trying to make lemonade out of lemons! Learning how to do that can be tricky. So in the late 70s, Augsburg offered a self-directed interim class, authorized by then-dean Charles Anderson, to beat the winter blues. Entitled “Recreation and Conditioning for Minnesota Winter,” the class included working out in Si Melby, then going outside for winter sports—cross-country and downhill skiing, skating, snowshoeing, and even ice fishing.

At an Augsburg event two years ago, six Auggies in attendance realized that the entire group from that 1978 interim class was present, so they gathered for the picture above. They are, left to right: Donadee (Melby) Peterson ‘78, a big fan of winter activities and currently in Oslo, Norway, where her Auggie husband, Tim Peterson ’76, is serving as an interim pastor; Noreen (Walen) Thompson ‘78, a retired medical device marketing vice president, in front of husband Steve Thompson ’78, a retired US Bank vice president; LuAnn (Hedman) Wingard ‘79 in front of husband Tom Wingard ‘78, who together own a large family-run potato farm operation near Elk River, Minnesota; and Bev (Ranum) Meyer ‘78, a retired actuary in benefits consulting. Bev’s husband, Dennis J. Meyer ’78, also an Auggie grad, is a retired marketing executive who serves on the Board of Regents.

For some, this class has been fondly remembered as a reason to stay in Minnesota and enjoy the winter weather.

Gather your friends and make plans to join us at the first-ever All-School Reunion on September 26, 2020!