A Spartan for life: Bockes looks back on a long career in education

GRUNDY CENTER- After 23 years teaching at Grundy Center and helping to launch its alternative education program, Beth Bockes didn’t get to say goodbye to her students and coworkers in a traditional way because of school shutdown caused by COVID-19. Nonetheless, she’ll always remember her years of service to the district—as a student, a school board member and an educator— and carry her Spartan pride wherever she goes in life.

“It’s kind of a hard time to leave it because you don’t get closure,” she said. “That made the end of this year kind of difficult.”

Bockes (maiden name Brockway) grew up in Grundy Center, graduated from high school in 1970, earned a degree from Iowa State in 1974, married her husband Roger and first took a job teaching Home Economics at Beaman-Conrad-Liscomb. After three years there, she stayed home to raise her two children.

When an opportunity arose to run for a seat on the Grundy Center school board, she jumped at it because she hoped to bring the perspective of someone who had sat behind a teacher’s desk. Bockes ended up spending 12 years on the board during a period that included the construction of a new elementary facility and a new playground, but her love for teaching never went away as she substituted at several surrounding districts through her tenure.

Former Principal Steve Vanderpol approached Bockes about the possibility of creating an alternative education program in Grundy Center, and although she came from a Home Economics background, she relished the chance to get back into education in 1997. The program started as a partnership with Hawkeye Community College and grew to serve students from around the area.

“(Vanderpol told me) I need a teacher. I need a teacher for this program, and I told him, ‘I don’t know how to teach these kids,’ but I’d been subbing in high schools, and I loved subbing,” she said. “I agreed, on a short term basis, to do it for him, but I said ‘You’ve got to look for the right person.’”

The first year, she had four students, and 23 years later, she’s retiring as the leader of the program, which is now independently operated by the Grundy Center school district. Over the years, she worked with students from Gladbrook-Reinbeck, Dike-New Hartford, BCLUW and Aplington-Parkersburg and moved the alternative education classes to the new Western Outreach Center on Highway 14 near the Highway 20 intersection. Under Bockes’s leadership, 130 diplomas have been presented through the program, and she’s also been the National Honor Society advisor for the last several years.

“It has evolved in a lot of different ways, but there are a lot of students that just need extra encouragement,” she said. “Success was getting them to walk in the door. If I could get them in the classroom, then that was half the battle.”

In working with alternative education students, Bockes learned that they came from all types of family and socioeconomic situations and needed instruction outside of a traditional classroom setting.

Bockes reflected that it was actually her substitute teaching background that prepared her most for alternative education because she learned about a wide variety of subjects. As a college student in the 1970s, she had wanted to teach English, Government and Social Studies but was advised that those positions were typically given to men.

She also thanked the great teachers she had along the way, including Harry Dole, Max and Roseanne Geers and Jo Thielen, and she hopes that she inspired a few younger educators who are in the field now. She plans to spend more time with her children and grandchildren (and maybe even do some traveling with her husband), but it’s a safe bet she’ll stay active in the district in one way or another.

“It’s been great. I look back on it, and I value the people that I’ve worked with, the administrative assistants—they’re so valuable in the schools—and the support,” she said. “I truly am a better person for having done it. I have learned some very valuable lessons in life for sure.”

And through it all, the moments she’ll always remember are the graduation days, the special ceremonies for kids who may not have otherwise had a chance.

“That’s just the best day. That’s everything coming together. It doesn’t matter, on that day, if you graduated with a 4.0 or a 2.01, it’s graduation day, and it’s a celebration day,” she said. “I love the chance and the opportunity at the end of the year to be able to recognize kids—not just the top of the class—but recognize kids for their citizenship or the awards they’ve earned in different organizations or through athletics.”