Page 8 - August 2019

COVER STORY

To be fair though, these classes were for the state of Oregon for 19 years,

among those offered by Portland State beginning in 1991. Much of this was
University in a program for Seniors. in Vital Records and the CDC Adult
Karen began studying languages from Behaviorial Risk survey.
the 8th grade on. Two years of French She taught herself HTML. The first

in high school and three in college time she took a test in demographic
as well as Conversational Spanish. coding (part of the test for a State
Oh, and a year of Japanese too so she of Oregon position), she thought it
could write thank you cards to her was fun. She did not expect a call

in-laws (her son married a Japanese regarding the position for 6 weeks.
woman) and the Spanish because her Imagine her surprise when they called
daughter married a man of Mexican her the next day! Her test results had
descent. Ah yes, let’s not forget her been amazing!

major in college—German. She even You can’t know Karen well and
had a year of Russian. That makes ignore the fact that another big part
seven languages she has studied! of her life has to do with marathons.
And she can still diagram English Think half marathons, 42K (26.2

sentences which is more than a lot of miles), and Bridge Stride. Her interest
people half her age wouldn’t begin in this was piqued in 1995 when she
to know how to do! (If you are in a drove runners involved in the Hood to
Toastmasters meeting with Karen, Coast, (127 miles!) staying up much of

beware of making common English the night, getting a feel for the team.
mistakes!) Leo Kurkoski got Karen onto a
Education seems to have been a team with Susan Hays (her coach)
huge part of Karen’s makeup. She from the Catholic Sentinel in 2000.

earned her undergraduate degree in At age 58 she began training in the
1967. In the late 1990’s, at the age of 55, Ladd Addition for the Hood to Coast.
she went back to school and earned a She did 12-minute miles. She has
Masters in Public Administration in done several races including half

1998 and a Masters in Library Science marathons, 10K, and more. She did
in 2013 at age 70-1/2. her first full marathon at age 61. Karen
Asked how she got into finance has walked in 11 major races including
management, Karen had a ready reply. one in Honolulu.

She has a knack for it in many ways. Maybe she will slow down when
Statistics, accounting, spreadsheets— she is 80. She joined Foot Traffic
she has done much of this. And University in 2007, which does
some was self-taught. She worked 6-month training stints. Karen has

8 ONE COMMUNITY