“I have a good friend who says people feel called,” 66-year-old Larry Perkinson said.
It’s a calling, he says, that led him to enter a career in education 45 years ago.
“A calling is often that you meet people whose lifestyle you like or who is influential in some respect,” Perkinson said.
The student assistance coordinator at Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp. will bid farewell to the corporation when he retires this December.
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A lot can happen in 45 years, Perkinson said.
He paused for a second.
A lot has happened in 45 years.
The beginning
Perkinson said his story extends beyond his 45 years in education. It began before he even entered this world. A black and white photo from his boyhood sits on the window sill of his office — a young Larry Perkinson smiles at the camera.
Next to the self-portrait sits framed pictures of three family members. Perkinson’s Uncle Clarence was a teacher. Aunt Mary was a teacher. Uncle Haas was — you guessed it — a teacher. Education runs in Perkinson’s blood. They’re a reminder of his roots.
As a young boy, Perkinson recalls his mother reading a book of Bible stories to him. He can still catch a glimpse of the “horrid picture” of the flood illustrated on one of the pages. Maybe that’s why he has a fear of swimming still, Perkinson reveals. Reading was always a passion.
Perkinson grew up in Azalia, less than 10 miles south of Columbus. As he grew older, his teachers started hiring him to work for them, completing extra work in their classrooms to gain experience when he’d one day, hopefully, have his own classroom, his own students.
There’s only one thing Perkinson said he’s planned in life: To go to college and become a teacher. He earned a degree in education and literature with a minor in German from Indiana State University.
His classroom career started in Jennings County Schools where he taught literature to middle school students. In 1979, he came back to his stomping grounds at BCSC and taught literature for 16 years at Northside Middle School.
“I learned to love teaching, and I like school a lot,” Perkinson said. “I went to school because I love to read, but you get in the classroom and find out you like the kids better.”
When his friend Phil Wasmuth, who he calls a “pioneer for student services,” held the role as student assistance coordinator in the ‘70s, Perkinson said he often watched how Wasmuth worked with families, researched policies and built community partnerships.
“We’re back to that calling — you like the way they carry themselves; you like what they do for other people,” Perkinson said.
He said he took a chance and interviewed for Wasmuth’s job 25 years ago — and here he is.
“When you start teaching books, you’ve probably got some sense of philosophy, education and otherwise,” he said. “But the learning curve is learning to recognize the kids and what they need besides being able to diagram a sentence or being able to read a certain book.
Literature is about taking a look at the story in front of you and what’s the meaning? What’s the value? Every student had a story. By the time I left the classroom I had a great sense of who was walking into my classroom and what their needs for and a great sense of what the barriers were for some of these kids.”
‘Who ya gonna call?’
Larry Perkinson now realizes he has no real job description.
“My job is hard to define because my nature is to respond to whatever I can,” Perkinson said.
One-third of his time is spent dealing with drug, alcohol and substance abuse situations. That includes everything from working with individuals who have school or athletic violations to responding to families with questions or concerns to working with community organizations.
Over time, Perkinson said he’s watched the challenges transition. When he accepted the job as student assistance coordinator in 1996, he said he would hear judges say there are three reasons people are in prison: “The first is alcohol, the second is alcohol and the third is alcohol.”
While he said alcohol remains a challenge, there are now more reasons.
“The opioid crisis is so tragic and at the same time its not the first time we’ve faced something that is devastating to families,” Perkinson said. “We’re always facing a challenge.”
Every day, Perkinson dedicates himself to navigating those challenges, walking alongside the students and the families who come face to face with the obstacles. Every day presents a new opportunity to help Columbus area youth.
“I’m an English teacher. You make up stories,” Perkinson said. “I spent 20 years teaching young people to read and write, and now I have a job — and I think most people have a variation of this job — to be able to read people in situations enough to help. Sometimes it’s not drugs and alcohol or safety, but the job moves into what can we do and what can I be aware of that deals with depression, anxiety, suicide ideation. There’s a mental health aspect of this job that I’m going to be involved in those efforts whenever possible.”
He also serves as a community liaison between the school corporation and local organizations. At least four days of the year are spent in school safety trainings where he learns how to better educate students, faculty, staff and community resources to be better responders.
“I’m always asking, ‘What’s the best we can do?’” he said. “Sometimes you just feel like the Ghostbuster guy — “Who ya gonna call?” I’ve got hundreds of numbers in my phone; if there’s an issue, if I don’t have the ability to get something done, maybe my neighbor does. We are a community that I think shares as much as any community in the nation.”
Taking his own advice
“The greatest trait I know about caretakers is that caretakers take care of everybody but themselves,” Perkinson said. And he admits he doesn’t always do the best job of taking his own advice.
But he has found the things that keep him going.
Perkinson said he can’t walk into the office without making eye contact with at least one other person, and that person won’t let him walk by without asking how he is.
He credits his wife for keeping tabs on his emotions and allowing him to debrief when necessary.
A writer himself, Perkinson also turns to the pencil and paper frequently to reflect.
“I like to write about people I’ve met and moments,” Perkinson said. “I like to write about markers in life, moments or individuals who made a difference and caused me to reflect and to learn something.”
His two books, “Daffodils and Dog-ears” and “Nudge Me Gently,” incorporate his favorite memories, the people he’s encountered and even the hard times.
Over the last 45 years, Perkinson has done a lot of learning, including learning how to ask for help or how to use new technology.
The best parts of the job come to mind quickly: meeting new people, identifying people’s strengths, watching former students change the world.
But there are also difficult moments.
“After 45 years, I live in a world of a whole lot of hellos — you say hello to somebody every day — and some really hard goodbyes,” Perkinson said.
A year into his role as student assistance coordinator, Perkinson said he lost his 18-year-old daughter April. A photo of April sits on the window sill — just a few feet away from that same photo of his boyhood. Another reminder of why he keeps pushing forward.
“Just over the years, I’ve learned how fragile life is,” Perkinson said. “We have worked very hard to talk about preventable tragedies, but life is just fragile. We’ve also worked very hard to respond and take care of kids and families when we know they’re facing the loss and the grief. That’s been a community-wide effort. It’s hard to lose, but it’s a blessing to have people who step forward and say, ‘Here’s what we think we can do for somebody.’”
Someone once told Perkinson’s wife that her husband’s job must be awful.
“My wife says, ‘He meets the best people in the world every day. Do you?’” Perkinson said. “There’s a purpose. You’ve got somebody you can help. I get to do what I like doing every day. That’s an easy motivation.”
Finding purpose
And that’s what he said is the awkward part about his upcoming retirement: Still finding purpose. He just hopes, he said, that he’s left something that somebody else can pick up.
But even as retirement approaches, Perkinson knows this corporation will always be home. He’ll always have a family in BCSC.
“I’m not escaping home to be here,” Perkinson said. “It’s just an extension of my family. My kids grew up in the gyms and classrooms here. I’ve been in education — in the classroom or some fashion — for 60 years. Fifty-two of those years have been in this corporation as a student, as a teacher, as an educator. I couldn’t ask for a better place to be or better people to be with.”
When he packs up his office come December and hangs up his BCSC lanyard one last time, there’s no doubt Perkinson will be remembered. There’s no doubt Perkinson has left something that somebody else can pick up.
“I hope people will have seen me as caring and fair, and despite the bad jokes, maybe a little funny.”
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Larry Perkinson
Age: 66
Title: Student assistance coordinator for Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp.
Education: Bachelor’s degree in English from Indiana State University, master’s degree in English from Indiana University.
Career: Perkinson has been an educator for 45 years, with all but four years of that in Bartholomew County. He spent his early years in education as an English teacher in Jennings County Schools and at Northside Middle School.
Family: The Columbus native still lives in Columbus with his wife, Julie. They had four daughters; April died in 1997.
Favorite book: "Lord Jim" by Joseph Conrad and anything written by Lewis Grizzard
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