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South Dakota's 50th Anniversary Celebration

Despite a storm that dumped nearly a foot of snow on South Dakota, the WICHE anniversary celebration on Jan. 15 in Pierre drew some 30 legislators as well as former legislators, educators, regents and others.

The Board of Regents cohosted the WICHE reception, which was followed by a policy briefing on K-16 linkages, presented by Cheryl Blanco.

At the reception, attended by three university presidents – Black Hills State President Tom Flickema, “Tech” President Richard Gowen, and Dakota State President Jerry Tunheim – 12 WICHE students and alums were honored. “These students and alumni members represent the thousands of outstanding citizens who have chosen to attend a South Dakota public university from a WICHE state. Our guests today symbolize the leadership and service that South Dakota gains from their presence,” said Robert T. Tad Perry, a WICHE commissioner and Board of Regents member. The honorees included:

From Black Hills State: Blakelee Binning from Pine Bluffs, WY, an elementary education major and All Conference volleyball player; and Harvey Krautschun, a WICHE alum, financial planner, and former state representative who lives in Spearfish and is originally from Fort Collins, Colo.

From Dakota State: Christina Mills from Saratoga, Wyo., an English major pursuing a bachelor of science degree in secondary education; and WICHE alum Rose Goeden, a registered health information administrator and a DSU faculty member whose efforts helped to reinvent DSU’s Health Information Administration Program as an online offering.

From Northern State: Baron Blanchard, an elementary education major and NCAA Division II heavyweight wrestler from Kindred, N.D.; and Kevin Burckhard, originally from Devils Lake, ND, now in charge of Wells Fargo retail operations in Aberdeen.

From the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology: Chris Hill, who’s receiving his bachelor’s degree in computer engineering this year and is originally from Douglas, Wyo.; and Elaine Foy-Baker, assistant director of the Institute of Atmospheric Sciences on the Tech campus, originally from Helena, Mont.

 From South Dakota State: Heather Hall, from Cheyenne, Wyo., a double major in speech communication and journalism and a sprinter on track and field team; and Kayde Spilde, a student from Ypsilanti, N.D., a scholarship winner who is a working toward a journalism-advertising degree.

 From the University of South Dakota: Lynn Van Koch of Moab, Utah, a freshman planning to major in political science and international studies; and Tom Hannan, originally from Colorado, now a Highway Patrol trooper in Selby.