Article written by Olivia Simonson. Photo courtesy of Kate Haglin.
Kate Haglin, a junior at SCSU who is majoring in Physical Education and Health, has classes on campus three days a week. With this being her first year at St. Cloud State University, she commutes from where she lives in Brainerd to St. Cloud State and back, staying with her family and spending time with her dog while she is not in class. Haglin originally was a PSEO student, which granted her junior status as an 18-year-old fresh out of high school.
Haglin’s goal is to work in the education field as a P.E teacher for upper middle school and high school students.
“I’ve been looking at becoming a P.E teacher since middle school. It just seemed really fun to me, and then there’s the misconception around what a good physical education should look like. I just want to be part of a good physical education program…I want to help kids have a positive experience with physical activity. I want to foster an environment that is positive and inclusive through nontraditional games,” said Haglin.
The stereotypes that surround gym teachers can affect how students interact with the material in class. For Haglin’s profession, this means being viewed as someone who only wants to play games that they are good at, leaving the students who are not athletically inclined to sit on the sidelines.
“The stereotype is ‘Oh, it’s time for dodgeball, go punt each other in the face.’ But it needs to be about teaching kids to take care of themselves. It should be about lowering those obesity rates and lowering those depression rates and giving kids the tools to succeed later in life. It should be about knowing how to take care of yourself and your physical activity,” said Haglin.
Her passion for athletics extends beyond the classroom. Haglin enjoys lacrosse and rowing, and she is a part of the St. Cloud State University rowing team in her downtime. Starting in her sophomore year of high school, Haglin helped build a rowing team in Brainerd and has continued to learn and grow while she has been on the St. Cloud State team.
“Being in rowing has taught me how to work well with other people. In rowing, we have a lot of international students, so we work with people from all sorts of backgrounds. Having than open perspective has always interested me, and then we’re all working to achieve a common goal and race together,” said Haglin.
The rowing team practices 3 times a week, with their fall competitions focusing on distance sprints that are 5ks. In the spring, the team competes in sprints, which are 2ks. Their practices occur on the river during the fall, and the team normally rows a 10k to work on stamina and endurance. They compete in rowing competitions, called regattas, across the Midwest, travelling to Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, and Wisconsin to compete.
“[On September 28] we went to a regatta in Iowa and got third place, and we have more coming up that I’m excited about,” said Haglin.
When she is not on campus, Haglin helps at her family’s kennel, Pine Shadows, up in Brainerd as the receptionist. The kennel trains therapy dogs, K9 dogs, service dogs, and hunting dogs. Throughout her time there, Haglin has learned skills that will help her once she enters the education world. While she hopes to work with adolescents and teens, she is also willing to work with younger children, where a different set of skills is needed.
“[Working at the kennel] really taught me how to understand body language, especially in dogs, but also in people. And sometimes younger kids don’t know how to articulate their feelings and may express them consciously or unconsciously, and I want to be able to help that as best as I can and help them succeed in each grade range,” said Haglin.
During her time at St. Cloud State, Haglin’s major of Physical Education was cut during the spring of 2024, resulting in most of her professors and classes being significantly reduced. Most of her classes for her major are in the same room, and with the same kids. With Haglin graduating in May of 2026, these cuts have affected her plan for the next couple years.
“I’m trying to lay out my schedule for the next two years, since there may not be a program in two years. But we have 18 kids in our program right now, and at the beginning of May when they did this, we only had 2, so it kind of shocked everyone and took the room by surprise. So maybe we can get it reinstated,” said Haglin.
With Haglin graduating at the age of 19, she will be looking for a job in Central Minnesota, with hopes to stay close to family, but is unsure of how the job market will pan out for her.
“I’ve been very apprehensive about [looking for a job], as I know that I’m really young. I’m afraid that potential employers won’t take me seriously or won’t hire me because of my inexperience,” said Haglin
Despite her inexperience in the teaching profession, Haglin’s outlook and what she hopes to get out of teaching make up for it.
“I want to help kids have a positive experience with physical activity. I want to foster an environment that is positive and inclusive through nontraditional games. When you have teachers in that position, they’ll play sports they are good at and they don’t see from the student’s perspective that don’t play sports or who are not good at basketball. Then they start to have a negative relationship with physical activity, which contributes to obesity, depression and suicide rates. I want to change that,” Haglin said.
On St. Cloud’s campus, the ability to choose what you do and how you interact with campus is left in the hands of the student. For some, that means trying every club or event they can. For others, it simply means attending classes. But there’s more to these students than just who they are in the classroom.
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