Berkley Center

Mark Biermann: When I got to college, I really had to sort of define what it meant for me personally. I went to the University of Rochester in New York. I started out getting a ride to a Lutheran church off campus because that's what I grew up with. And it's probably one of the few things that got me through my freshman year, because freshman year was really overwhelming. Everything was so different. But that touchstone was really important. It was something familiar that was familiar for the first 18 years, and now here it was again, and it helped to get me through. I started going to the Protestant Chapel community on campus, and even though none of the Protestant denominations that were there were actually Lutheran, I don't know, it was a good place for me. It's a great place to meet people who had shared aspects of my faith, but also came from really different backgrounds. Methodists and Presbyterians and Episcopalians and Church of Christ and Baptists.

And that just gave me a chance to really start thinking about what my faith meant to me. And I realized that my faith meant a lot to me, that it was sort of foundational for who I was as a person, and it helped define who I was as a person, and it helped me know this whole sense of calling and vocation and things like that. It's something that Lutherans talk about a lot.

Jonah Koetke: What did you think that sense of calling and vocation was?

Mark Biermann: Well, when I went to college, I was going to be an engineer. That was the whole plan. So get a bachelor's degree in engineering, go off and do optical engineering stuff. And I got a summer job at Kodak. And one of the things I learned was that I was good at engineering, but I didn't necessarily like it as much as I would've liked to. And about the same time during my junior year undergraduate, I got a job as a teaching assistant. It was one of the best jobs I've ever had. I mean, they actually paid me to do this. And so, I decided I was going to stay and get a full Ph.D. so I could teach at the college level. And it was just this sense that that's what I really was meant to do, to help people to improve their lives through learning.

Education is powerful. It's one of the most powerful things around and it changes people's lives fundamentally. Although I don't get to teach very much as a provost. I really love working with students. And it's that those connections and those relationships are just so powerful.

Jonah Koetke: Do you have any advice for me, a hopefully soon college graduate who will be going into science and a science teaching hopefully in the next few years?

Mark Biermann: Treasure your students. They're what make it worthwhile. Challenge them because they're capable of a lot and they just need the right person to help them bring it out. Stay humble. I think working with a bunch of students over the years has given me a lot more humility. Even when they're not the expert, they ask really good questions sometimes that make you sort of have to go back and say, "Never thought about that. I wonder. I don't know."

And just be willing to deal with them where they are. I had a student one time and she worked really hard. She came to class all the time. And I always thought that she could do a little bit more. And then one time she was in my office talking about stuff. And if she's saying, "Well, I got to work two jobs. I have these two jobs along with going to school." With that context, when I would see her come into class late and have to rush out and fly into my office outside of office hours, because it's the only time that she could get there and ask questions, it was a lot easier for me to just clear everybody else out and say, "She's here. We've got to work on this." But it was knowing that context. And so, always seeing your students as whole people that have all this other crud going on in their lives.

Jonah Koetke: And does that relate back to your sense of vocation and your sense of faith and how that is connected to your teaching?

Mark Biermann: Sure. I mean, we're all created in God's image, so we're all incredibly valuable. And Christ died for us. So each and every person is insanely valuable. And I think that's really important.