After teaching junior- and senior-high English for 10 years, Karen Imholte never wanted to become a school principal. But, when colleagues encouraged her to intern as assistant principal, she found she loved it. “Getting my hands on a different area of education was a new challenge,” Imholte said. “It’s something different every day, and the variety was fun.” Imholte was assistant principal at Denfeld High School in Duluth for five years before becoming the principal of Kimball Area High School in 2000. Education The St. Cloud native grew up “playing school” in elementary and middle school and always said she wanted to be a teacher. That is, until she started ninth grade at Apollo High School and started denying it. This continued through her sophomore year of college at St. Cloud State University (SCSU). Imholte was taking speech and English classes, but still didn’t have a major. “I decided if I wanted to use English and speech, teaching was the way to go,” she said. “It was a natural fit and I love being in education.” Imholte graduated with a major in English secondary education and a minor in speech. Her first job was in Duluth teaching eighth grade, first at Morgan Park Middle School then grades 10 and 11 at Denfeld High School. While she was assistant principal, Imholte spent her evenings and weekends attaining her administrative degree and sixth-year degree (administrative license) through SCSU. KAHS As principal at Kimball Area High School, Imholte does scheduling, works on the budget, hires and supervises teachers, disciplines students, plans curriculum, and supervises activities. “The principal becomes kind of the P.R. [public relations] person for the high school,” Imholte said. Imholte especially likes interacting with people (for instance, giving a prospective student a school tour)hiring new staff, and working with teachers and students. “I love the size of the school and getting to know people on a personal level,” she said. The most difficult part of her job is dealing with politics: people who have their own agendas or become overly offensive. “I find myself in a role to defend the school and the school rules,” she said, “and we lose the opportunity for students to succeed.” One of the most enjoyable parts of her job has been focusing on the new school building. “We have a nice school and I think the community is proud of it; the teachers are proud of it and the students are, too,” Imholte said. “With the new construction in town, it’s almost like a renaissance of the community; a rebirth, and it’s been a lot of fun to be a part of that.” Dunce’s cap When students get in trouble at school, Imholte is the person they see. “If I were six-foot-five, 250 pounds and male, some people feel it would be easier,” she said. “But in order to impact change, you need to have a relationship [with the student}. If you respect each other, you can do that.” A sense of humor is essential, she added. “If I couldn’t laugh at the mistakes I make and, in turn, their mistakes, the stress would be overwhelming,” Imholte said. One of the most intense disciplinary situations she’s been in was when an 18-year-old student in Duluth robbed a bank one evening. While Imholte didn,t have to deal with the crime because it was off-campus, she did have to deal with the media frenzy. So, what’s students’, biggest influence to stay out of the principa’s office? Parents. “Students are so into their rights and parents are fearful of that,” she said. “But, parents still have a lot of influence. If they can say, ‘here’s your limit,’ they grow to have success.” Family Imholte avoided conflict with her own two sons by not being their principal. “I talked to a lot of other principals and it creates difficulties that I didn’t want to deal with,” she said. “I want to be their mom, not their principal.” The Imholtes live in St. Cloud. Will is an eighth-grader at South Middle School and Owen is a junior at Tech High School. Imholte met her husband Paul, also a St. Cloud native, while in college. Imholte went to a friend’s house and Paul was on the front porch playing banjo. They kept running into each other around campus until they had their first date: a game of tennis. They were married in August 1985. Paul is a musician and performs acoustic, folk music on string instruments. He was performing in California this week. Hobbies Imholte loves to cook, which is a good thing because, “we all love to eat good food,” she said. She enjoys cooking meats with different sauces and pork is her favorite meat to work with. “New Years Eve I made a chocolate tort,” Imholte said. “It was delicious.” Imholte also enjoys reading, traveling, playing tennis and walking. “Walking is a nice stress reliever and it gets me active,” she said. Since moving back to the St. Cloud area the Imholtes have also enjoyed spending time with family and friends. Imholte has four siblings in the St. Cloud area and two of Paul’s four siblings are in the area, too.
