October 14, 2024

Homecoming 2024 was incredible!

All week, the students were busy with activities like Bob Ross Night, a chalk art contest, dodgeball, the talent show, and more. The weekend kicked off with the annual Fun Run on Saturday morning followed by the Family Fun Zone and football, soccer, and volleyball games.

The MLC football team had an exciting Homecoming game against Minnesota Morris when Rees Roecker (Pilgrim-Menomonee Falls WI) scored a touchdown with only five seconds remaining to give the Knights the 21-14 win.

But the highlight of the weekend was the special Homecoming worship service held Sunday morning in the Chapel of the Christ. Students and their families, faculty and staff, alumni and community members gathered to praise God for his grace and for making us part of the body of Christ.

Check out pictures from all of the Homecoming events in our SmugMug gallery!

Professor Jon Hermanson (music) may be a new faculty member at MLC, but the New Ulm area is near and dear to his heart. Professor Hermanson was born and raised in New Ulm, and he grew up around the MLC campus. For the past nine years, Professor Hermanson served at Minnesota Valley LHS, teaching music and a variety of other subjects.

“It has been wonderful and a bit surreal being able to raise my own children in New Ulm,” he said, “and have them attend St. Paul’s and MVL, the schools that I went to.”

Between his graduation from MLC and his return to New Ulm, Professor Hermanson earned his Master of Music Education degree from VanderCook College of Music, taught grades 5-6 at Trinity LES-Kiel WI, and taught music at Illinois LHS.

“Over the past 18 years, the most important thing I’ve learned is that I have a deep love for ministry and for those I am blessed to be able to serve,” he said. “I am looking forward to the opportunity to share that love of ministry with future pastors, teachers, and staff ministers.”

Professor Hermanson’s ministry at MLC includes directing the Women’s Choir and the Chorale, as well as teaching Intro to Choral Conducting, Aural Skills, and Musical Heritage of the Lutheran Church. He is excited to get to know MLC students both in class and in on-campus activities and hopes to encourage visiting high school students to consider the public ministry!

What is Professor Hermanson looking forward to most? “Sharing Jesus and his incomparable love for us!” he said. “Without a doubt, this is the greatest part about ministry. These students won’t be students much longer. Soon, it will be their purpose and privilege to share Jesus with their students and congregations full time. What a tremendous gift that we can be his witnesses!”

The academic side of training for ministry can feel challenging, which is one reason MLC offers so many opportunities for students to put what they've learned into practice. Staff ministry students at MLC experienced one of those opportunities this September when they were able to attend the 2024 WELS Staff Ministry Conference held on the MLC campus.

Staff ministers gathered to grow in their ministerial skills and enjoy fellowship with others, including our students.

For sophomore Mary Niebuhr (Immanuel-Gibbon MN), the conference gave her a glimpse into the staff ministry community and the support they have from lay people, pastors, and teachers. “It was amazing to see my potential co-workers and grow closer with them,” she said.

While Mary enjoyed the fellowship of the conference, her main takeaway was how much people are counting on her and her fellow staff ministry students to share the gospel. “I'll have the opportunity to be a leader and have people look up to me,” she said. “I’m more determined to soak in everything that I’m taught, keep looking back to the cross, and make faith the utmost priority in my life.”

Pictured: All conference attendees gather for a group photo.

Thank you for making Ladies’ Auxiliary Day 2024 a success!

The Auxiliary voted to continue their list of standing projects that benefit students directly: scholarships, student teaching travel assistance, and Daylight trip travel assistance. They also prioritized a list of annual projects to fund, which are submitted by faculty, staff, and students.

This year’s list of projects is diverse, including whiteboards for the foreign language classroom, branded door wraps for the athletic department, shelves for the ECLC infant room, and manikins for first aid and CPR training.

Altogether, the Auxiliary is hoping to fund over $32,000 worth of projects that will directly benefit the ministry at MLC. As a result of generous donations from the Auxiliary Day attendees and individual donors, five out of the 15 projects are already funded—valued at over $9,000!

2024 Project List.

Pictured: The presidency of the Auxiliary transferred from Connie Scharf (right) to Jackie Dalueg at the end of the morning.

The MLC men’s and women’s golf teams had a strong September! On September 17, the women’s team topped Bethany in the annual Saxony Cup. Both Chloe Berg (David’s Star-Jackson WI) and Brooke Parkhurst (St. Luke-Watertown WI) led the way and took first in the match.

Later in the month, the Knights hosted all eight UMAC schools at the MLC Fall Invitational, where the men’s team came in second and the women’s team finished in fifth place.

Benjamin Pearson (St. Paul-New Ulm MN) finished second overall in the Invitational, and the Knights celebrated a few more top-15 finishes from Noah Walta (Faith-Fond du Lac WI), John Martin (St. John-Newburg WI), Aidan Berg (David’s Star-Jackson WI), and Brooke Parkhurst.

The golf teams wrapped up their 2024 fall season at the UMAC Championships on October 3-5. Out of eight schools, the MLC men took sixth, and the women placed fifth.

Read more highlights on the MLC athletics site.

Dr. Miles Wurster (music) opened the MLC Wind Symphony’s first concert of the 2024-25 school year with a reflection on the new beginnings that arrive with the start of fall.

For the Wind Symphony, fall means a new mixture of musicians working together to create something wonderful—similar to the concert’s theme of “Potpourri.”

This year’s mixture of musicians performed a diverse program featuring compositions by Claude Debussy, Jack Stamp, Ferrer Ferran, Eric Whitaker, and Ron Nelson, including one of Whitaker’s original compositions for wind band: “October.”

Watch the concert on MLC’s YouTube channel.

Visit our website to read more and register!