Mr. Michael Pierce, director of admissions and member of the social studies department graduated from Blanchet in 1986.

“I wasn’t very involved,” he says. “I played freshman football but that’s about it. My biggest regret is not getting involved enough while I went to school here.”

A lot has changes since then. Now, he is the director of the ski and snowboard club and leads college road trips to schools students might be interested in with Mr. Hecko.

“I think there’s so many more opportunities for students to get involved here now. I mean, I love leading the ski and snowboard club and I know that wasn’t around when I was a student because I would’ve loved to be in it.”

He’s also the director of admissions and often leads tours of junior high students interested in Blanchet. If the door to your class happens to be open during one of these, you might hear him raving about the school and it’s amazing staff.

“I think the biggest thing for me coming back was calling my former teachers by their first names. It took a little while to get used to. I saw everybody so differently, these were my colleagues now and not people trying to mess with me. That teacher gave me a D in algebra, but now that I think about it he was probably just trying to help me out.”

“I really started liking Blanchet when I came back as a teacher.” Says Pierce. “Almost all the same teachers I had were still here, and the building didn’t change at all, the halls looked exactly the same as when I was a student. That’s one of the really great things about Blanchet, you can come back years later and it feels exactly the same, everyone here is so welcoming. It didn’t take me long to feel right back at home here.”

As a final question, I asked him what one thing that never changed here is. “The commitment of the people that work here. Sure the school has its problems, as all schools do. That never changes the commitment of the faculty to the catholic education and their work, I just find that amazing.”