Dr. Who? Dr. Kay.

Dr. Kay. Photo by Jin Yup Jung '14. Copyright Red Cloud Indian School.

 Dr. Who? Dr. Kay.

                                                           By Jin Yup Jung ‘14

Historically and traditionally, Red Cloud School has recruited lots of volunteers from other states. While most volunteers are young and fresh out of college, Kathryn Reisdorfer is the only volunteer this year (and possibly ever) who has been a college professor and holds a Doctorate degree.

Kathryn ("Kay") teaches US Government, Personal Finance, and Sociology at Red Cloud. She used to teach history and humanities as a professor in Yavapai College in Arizona. Kay has now retired from college and devoted her life to Red Cloud this year. 

“I felt wonderful after I retired from teaching college because I worked really hard in college, and I was so excited to do new things since I really didn’t have enough time to do what I wanted when I was teaching in college,” Kay said happily.

“I have had an interesting life. Fun and rich,” Kay added. “I was born in southwestern Minnesota and graduated from the University of Minnesota.” Subsequently, she moved to San Francisco at the period of the Summer of Love, which occurred during the summer of 1967 and was an event when hippies gathered together in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco.

“Four years later, I moved back to Minnesota and married,” Kay added. “After I spent my time with my family, I started teaching in a community college in Arizona. I met wonderful people and was having a great time while I was teaching in college.”

Believe or not, Kay used to live in Germany for about four months to learn voice and she actually was a singer for a while in her life.

Some might have wondered at one time or another why a college professor came to the Pine Ridge Reservation when she could spend her time in another city or by doing more fun activities. “After I retired from college, I was doing some volunteer work because I feel people should give of themselves,” she said. “While I was doing volunteer work, I heard about Red Cloud on Pine Ridge Reservation, so I came here.”

Kay’s future plan is to come back to Red Cloud next year. Then she will go to Germany and then spend time in the city of Bisbee, Arizona to hang out.

The transition between teaching college and high school students is not always easy. “It’s really hard to say the difference, but there are still differences about maturity level,” Kay added. "Since college students went to college because mostly they wanted to study further beyond high school, whereas high school students are usually kind of forced to stay at high school by their parents or some other reasons. However, I believe that kids at Red Cloud are fantastic and great!”