Northeastern Junior College

One of my favorite college professors just announced that he just received his gift from NJC for teaching there for 20 years. This took me back to my time in his class balancing feed rations, laughing at his jokes and trying to soak in his words of wisdom. I learned so much from Mr. Pollart and I still have all of my notes from class and still take a peek sometimes.

When I was a senior in high school I took a lot of ribbing for choosing a junior college when I had good grades, scholarships and could have gone to a 4 year school right off the bat fine. But, NJC had what I wanted and I had my mind set that’s where I was going.

I wanted to go to NJC because it was a smaller campus that was ag based so it didn’t intimidate me like the large state schools and most importantly I could take my horse with me and show on their Ranch Horse team. What I got out of it was that and so much more.

What I found at NJC was a school full of teachers that loved what they were teaching. Teachers that spent more hours at the office helping students when they didn’t have to. Teachers that let students experience things in the real world. Teachers that pushed us to be competitive, even if that ment traveling all over with some crazy college kids.

It was a shock to me that when I went to 4 year college that it wasn’t the same way. I did have some good teachers at Tarleton but it wasn’t the same.

I couldn’t believe that our Range Management coach didn’t bring his kid’s to practice with us because we practiced multiple times a week and spent hours going over plants instead I didn’t see our coach till we got to the competition he had his student aid teach us. I will always be grateful to Mr. Matney for spending so much time with us and then signing Brian and I up for extra events because he believed in us and wanted to push us.

Turns out it’s not standard for professors wives to brave a road trip with Farm Bureau students from Sterling, Colorado to Grand Rapids, Michigan. I will always be grateful to Mr. Brownell and his wife for making that such an amazing trip where we not only got to attend the Farm Bureau Young Farmers and Ranchers event but got to make stops at the great lakes and the John Deere combine plant. They didn’t even offer Farm Bureau at Tarleton.

I was suprised when at Tarleton the only cow we ever touched was just vaccinating some calves because in Junior College Mr. Anderson and Mr. Pollart set up a weekend class during winter break where we actually learned how to AI cattle. A skill that I still use twice a year.

I was suprised that my professors at Tarleton however extremely qualified and knew so much about the subjects they were teaching didn’t actively partake in farming and ranching or whatever they were teaching on the side. Most all of my teachers at NJC farmed or fed at the feedlots on their down time and my speech teacher was an aspiring actor who made our class so much fun by treating us to his impromptu acting when we rocked our speeches.

Those are just a few of the memories I treasure from NJC. Going there was definitely one of my best decisions. The campus was a great, I was able to show my horse and best of all my professors really cared about their students and subjects they were teaching. Although NJC was nestled in the little town of Sterling they offered the opportunity to travel. I traveled to the mountains and went snow shoeing with my biology class. I went to Michigan with Farm Bureau, Washington with Range Management and all over Colorado, Wyoming and Texas showing on the Ranch Horse team.

So congratulations to Mr. Pollart they are very lucky to have you as a professor. I appreciate all of time you took to go above and beyond to make sure you turned out students that were well rounded individuals ready to enter the real world after we left your class.