Kristy Faber named Dodge Center ‘Citizen of the Year’

Kristy Faber, long-time Triton Community Education Director, is Dodge Center’s Citizen of the Year. The award was presented by the Dodge Center Chamber of Commerce and announced at the February meeting of the group.
“It’s very sweet, it’s very nice,” Faber said of the award.
Faber has been Community Education director since 2008, she said. She has a master’s in educational policy and administration, she said, with licensure to be a director of community education. “I started here and plan on retiring here,” she said.
She originally had other career plans in mind. She attended Winona State University receiving a bachelor’s degree in exercise physiology. She worked in cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation, she said, but when her oldest child started preschool, she thought it would be nice to work in the school. She looked at opportunities said she landed on community education and went on to earn her master’s from the University of Minnesota.
Faber said a lot of people don’t realize how many activities Community Education is involved in. There is something for people from the very youngest to adults. Preschool, early childhood education and childcare are all part of Community Education, she said. The department also works with adults to earn their GED degrees. As part of the Triton district, she said, she currently serves as the Student Council advisor and is working with the students to organize the Prom, which this year will be held on April 12.
An upcoming activity of the Student Council, she said, is a “Build Your Own Breakfast Bar” on March 23.
She also works with the Triton backpack program which makes sure that students who need them will have meals for weekends. Faber said she is basically involved with the financial aspects of the program. Since Channel One stopped providing food for backpack programs, Faber said, the Triton group has connected with Every Meal in the Twin Cities to purchase food.
They purchase meals from Every Meal which delivers the pre-packed meals to the school on Fridays.
Because they purchase the complete meal, she said, they are always in need of financial donations to have the needed funds.
Triton Community Education has also partnered with Kasson-Mantorville Community Education to sponsor the Dolly Parton Imagination Library. This program offers a free book every month to youngsters 0 to five as an incentive to increase literacy. The program, she added, is available to every family in Dodge County with children in the age group. The books, she added are “quality and age appropriate.”
Faber is also involved in a variety of community-wide activities. Currently, she said, that involves the Dodge Expo that is scheduled for March 29 at Triton High School. This is the Expo’s 25th year, she said, and to celebrate there will be breakfast for 25 cents beginning at 8 a.m.
Other community events that she is involved in, she said, include Dodger Days in June and the Vendor Market in December.
Working together with other groups, she said, is how things get done.
“Power in partnership, working together,” she said.