Hillsdale College student workers can be found in every corner of campus, from the admissions office to AJ’s. Some people, however, work more niche jobs on Hillsdale’s campus.
Sophomore Johannes Loock cleans whiteboards and chalkboards in Strosacker.
“When I signed up for this job, I expected to be entertained by the doodles of artistically inclined students,” Loock said. “I, however, failed to consider that I would be cleaning chalkboards used by soulless, overworked, STEM majors. I can tell that an organic chemistry test is coming when I see an inordinate number of badly drawn hexagons scribbled across the boards.”
Loock said he occasionally comes across interesting drawings when working.
“I choose which doodles to preserve for another day, and which to consign to an acidic fate,” said Loock. “The elect few drawings which I deem worthy of preserving for another day have included a snail labeled with the name Snailelius Bromelius.”
Loock said his job has weird hours, often late at night.
“The security patrolmen aren’t the only people I’ve met while working,” Loock said. “You run into some interesting things in supposedly empty buildings past midnight.”
Freshman Elena Sickau works for Professor of Biology David Houghton sorting Caddisflies in the biology lab. Sickau said she’s been working this job since the end of January.
“Dr. Houghton looks at how many species of Caddisfly are in a particular sample,” Sickau said. “He uses that combined with other factors to determine how healthy a stream is.”
Sickau said her job responsibility is fairly simple.
“Dr. Houghton has samples from rivers across the U.S. and Canada. He gives me a jar of bugs, I dump them into a tray, and then I sort them into their species,” Sickau said. “I have to group them based on looks. It’s great to work in a lab if I decide to go into ecology.”
Sophomore Madison McClure works in the CCA office on campus. According to McClure, the week she spends preparing for the CCA seminars is incredibly busy.
“For prep week, we stuff registration envelopes with name tags, reserved seating, and basic information,” McClure said. “We also prep for student check in. Typically we lock ourselves in a conference room and work for as long as we can.”
According to McClure, during the CCA conference, she checks in guests, answers questions, and gets to eat all the meals provided at the conference.
McClure said one of her favorite things about her job is meeting visitors.
“They are always such interesting people. I’ve sat next to an aerospace engineer, the guy who invented telemedicine, a judge, and multiple high-ranking veterans,” McClure said. “It’s cool to see how many people support the school and to actually meet them.”
