{"id":1914,"date":"2012-11-01T14:26:44","date_gmt":"2012-11-01T14:26:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/?p=1914"},"modified":"2016-02-16T21:28:37","modified_gmt":"2016-02-16T21:28:37","slug":"karen-hartz-05","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/2012\/11\/01\/karen-hartz-05\/","title":{"rendered":"Karen Hartz ’05"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"picture<\/a>Karen Hartz \u201905 enrolled in Augsburg\u2019s Weekend and Evening College because earning a college degree was her lifelong goal.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was missing something,\u201d Hartz said. \u201cI knew that I had excelled in my career, but I wanted to go through the classroom experience. I wanted to meet fellow students, take exams, write papers, and do everything else students do. There was a hole in my life, and I knew I could fill it by going back to school and getting my degree.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hartz declared a major in communication studies because she believed sharpening her organizational communication skills would positively impact her vocation.<\/p>\n

For more than 20 years, Hartz has worked as a church administrator\u2014a role, she said, she fell into by \u201chappenstance.\u201d While in her mid-30s, Hartz switched from a career in banking and finance to one where she could serve her church congregation. Her professional career since has led her to work for multiple suburban churches in the Twin Cities metro area, and in 2009 she became the director of operations at Minneapolis\u2019 Plymouth Congregational Church.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the challenge of being in an urban setting and having the pulse of city life around me,\u201d Hartz said. \u201cI experience all that\u2019s going on in the neighborhood and in the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

As with all of her previous church administration roles, her position at Plymouth Congregational Church requires quick thinking and a \u201cready-for-anything\u201d attitude. Hartz oversees approximately 20 employees on the church\u2019s support staff team, and each of her workdays is unique. \u201cI never know exactly what is going to come up,\u201d she explained. \u201cI could have a tree fall down, or a plumbing leak, or an HR problem, or maybe an issue with donor giving.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe that in order to work as a church administrator, as with any ministry position, you need to be called to serve because it can be tough, tough, tough work,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Hartz dedicates more than 40 hours a week to her job, and she juggles numerous volunteer and family commitments that require much of her time. She said that Augsburg\u2019s adult undergraduate program accommodated her schedule as a working adult and supported her educational ambitions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went to school thinking that the professors were going to be very strict,\u201d Hartz recalled. But, she soon realized that the first priority of faculty members and academic advisers was to help her succeed at the College. \u201cThe people at Augsburg respect adult students and understand that we all have very busy lives with families and jobs,\u201d Hartz said.<\/p>\n

Hartz wanted to live the college experience firsthand, but she also wanted to finish her degree by the time she turned 50 so that she could move on to new life goals.<\/p>\n

And she did it\u2014with a month to spare.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Karen Hartz \u201905 enrolled in Augsburg\u2019s Weekend and Evening College because earning a college degree was her lifelong goal. \u201cI was missing something,\u201d Hartz said. \u201cI knew that I had excelled in my career, but I wanted to go through the classroom experience. I wanted to meet fellow students, take exams, write papers, and do <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":6388,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[12,14,54,17],"class_list":["post-1914","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured-stories","tag-alumni","tag-communication-studies","tag-fall-2012","tag-weekend-wec"],"wps_subtitle":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1914"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1914\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6540,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1914\/revisions\/6540"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}