Thanks to Southview Animal Hospital for their support.
ISD 197 announced the first members of the Warrior Hall of Fame, a who’s who of the ISD 197 community, “open to anyone who has become a person of distinction from service to country, state, community, or school.”
The Warrior Hall of Fame Class of 2023 includes:
- Ann Bancroft: Henry Sibley Class of 1974, the first woman to reach the North Pole, an explorer, educator, speaker, philanthropist, and founder of the Ann Bancroft Foundation.
- Helen Fisk: Henry Sibley Class of 1975, Sibley Debate Team State and National Tournament Award winner, former Henry Sibley principal, co-founder of Global Academy.
- Tom Gustafson: Former teacher and coach in ISD 197, serving the community for more than 30 years.
- Dean Verdoes: Former teacher, coach, and athletic director at Henry Sibley High School, member of the 1960 state champion Edgerton basketball team, currently serves on the ISD197 Educational Foundation Board.
Event: This inaugural class will be celebrated before during halftime of the homecoming football game on Friday, September 22.
Selection process: Hall of Fame inductees were nominated by the community and chosen by a selection committee made up of the Two Rivers principal and activities director, plus Two Rivers staff and community members.
Nominate: The next round of Warrior Hall of Fame nominations are due May 1, 2024.
Warrior Hall of Fame Class of 2023
Below are the detailed inductee biographies from ISD 197:
Ann Bancroft
Ann Bancroft graduated from Henry Sibley High School in 1974. Bancroft founded the Ann Bancroft Foundation in 1991. It was originally called the AWE Foundation (All Women’s Expedition), but in 1997, Bancroft and the board of directors decided that the Foundation would better achieve its mission by focusing on honoring and encouraging girls and women to reach, explore, and discover their own dreams. Thus, the Ann Bancroft Foundation was born.
The vision of the reborn organization is to provide girls who dare to dream with the support, inspiration, and resources that will help make their dreams come true. Bancroft is a spokesperson for the Learning Disabilities Association, Wilderness Inquiry, and Girl Scouts of the USA. She serves on the board of Youth Frontiers, co-chairs the Wilderness Inquiry capital campaign, and is a judge for the Nuclear-Free awards and the National Women’s Hall of Fame inductions. Bancroft serves on the advisory board of the Melpomene Institute and Medica.
“The awards are the things that make me feel a bit fraudulent, like how did I get this?”
Ann Bancroft, Oct. 15, 1995, Star Tribune
Frustrated with setbacks in classes [due to a learning disability], Bancroft decided after her sophomore year to switch from St. Paul Academy to Henry Sibley Senior High School in West St. Paul.
The kink in that strategy was that in 1972, Sibley lacked women’s basketball and tennis, the rewards that made the academic agonies bearable. Track and swimming were the only athletic opportunities for women.
So Bancroft simply reorganized athletics.
“We had Girls Athletic Association, and that was a farce,” she said. “I just took over the GAA’s gym time and started a basketball team.”
The school didn’t recognize the team that year, but Bancroft lined up games with teams she had played while at St. Paul Academy.
“She pretty much organized it,” said Sue Cook, a St. Paul lawyer who played guard the next year, on Sibley’s first official women’s basketball team. “She was a natural leader as far as sports.”
Nancy Pilgrim, now a dentist in St. Paul, remembers helping Bancroft make uniforms for the first team. “We bought blank gold T-shirts and painted numbers on with red house paint.” …
In her senior year, Ann Bancroft was captain of Sibley’s first official women’s basketball and tennis teams as well the track team.
July 6, 1986, Star Tribune
Helen Fisk
Helen Fisk has been a teacher and administrator in private, traditional public districts and charter schools for the past 43 years.
Fisk began her career teaching social studies and English for four years at Coon Rapids Junior High School in Coon Rapids, Minnesota. She then taught high school history and geography at St. Paul Academy and Summit (SPA) for the next 11 years. At SPA, Fisk was also a successful debate coach, bringing home a state championship for SPA. After a successful career in teaching, she went on to become the upper school director at Mounds Park Academy, a private college preparatory school. In 2001, Fisk left the private sector to work in the public charter school movement by becoming the first principal of two Minneapolis schools founded by the East African immigrant community (the Twin Cities International Elementary School and the Minnesota International Middle School). After leaving the international schools, she became principal at Henry Sibley (now Two Rivers). In 2008, Fisk co-founded a new K-8 charter school called Global Academy. The school is an authorized International Baccalaureate site serving a diverse immigrant population of 50 students. Global Academy recently celebrated its 15th year of operation and has been a leading school in closing the achievement gap in Minnesota. Fisk served as the executive director of Global Academy for 15 years until her retirement in June of 2023.
“One of the things that happens with English learners, especially when they were a newer population in Minnesota, and even now, is they’re looked at as a burden and people think they need extra help and attention. In an IB program, that kind of diversity is highly valued. Kids who are safe, honored and happy tend to learn more—go figure!”
Helen Fisk, Propel Nonprofits case study
“I would encourage all parents to just ask their kids a simple question, ‘What did you learn about at school today?’ and then talk to them about it. Even immigrant parents who can’t help their children with homework due to language barriers can instill a love of learning by doing this.”
Helen Fisk, Sept. 16, 2014, Laker Pioneer
“If you love to read, if you love to learn, if you like to solve problems, that’s what ultimately makes people successful.”
Helen Fisk, Sept. 15, 2013, Star Tribune
Tom Gustafson
Tom Gustafson is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin. After graduating from college, Gustafson moved to Australia to coach and teach for 2 years, followed by serving in the Peace Corps in Samoa.
After returning home, Gustafson began his teaching and coaching career in School District 197, where he served our school community for 33 great years. Tom taught physical and adaptive physical education and coached girls and boys cross country with 13 conference titles and 16 trips to state. Tom also coached girls basketball and Nordic skiing, track and field coaching distance runners, with many runners winning the conference championship and moving on to state appearances.
Gustafson has received the Breaking Barriers Award from Girls and Women’s Sports Day. Gustafson now lives in Biwabik, Minnesota, with 46 years of marriage and still coaching.
The cross country program at Sibley has grown to such an extent under coach Tom Gustafson that some of his colleagues are referring to him as the school’s pied piper.
Eighty-one runners turned out for the boys and girls programs this season. “That’s a lot of kids for our school,” Gustafson said. “It’s the most we’ve ever had.”
Approximately 25 of the runners volunteered to man the water stop at the 25-mile mark of the Twin Cities Marathon this year. That was incentive enough for Gustafson and his assistants, Amy Dennis and Shari Petersen, to finish the race.
“We had to get there,” Gustafson said.
Oct. 27, 1998, Pioneer Press
Dean Verdoes
Dean Verdoes served as a math teacher, coach, and athletic director at Henry Sibley High School for 20 years.
At Sibley, Verdoes started the soccer program and was the head soccer coach for 10 years. He was also the head boys basketball coach for seven years and an assistant for six more. He served as the head coach for the golf team for 10 years. He then switched hats and in 1986 became the school’s athletic director, a position he held for 12 years. As athletic director at Sibley, he was named the Region 3AA Athletic Director of the Year in both 1988 and 1995. Verdoes was also inducted into the Minnesota State High School League Hall of Fame in 2011.
Now, as a community member, Verdoes serves on the ISD197 Education Foundation and volunteers his time in the District Office.
“There’s lots of things you enjoy. In my case, I loved the camaraderie of the other coaches. I love math teaching, too, but you never get to know the kids when there’s 30 in a math class like you do when you have 12 or 15 on a basketball team. So it’s just a lot of fun. When you reflect and look back, I always said I wish I could have been–I think I did a good job with the kids–but I wish I could have been 50 and started then with what I knew after being an AD for some years. It takes so much insight to really do a good job in coaching.”
Dean Verdoes, May 12, 2011 Patch.com article
“But if you look at the level of the competition in all sports these days, you have to be impressed. The kids are really dedicated. They’re also more knowledgeable. They’ve gotten so good that it’s amazing to me. It’s really fun to watch, and that’s one of the reasons I’ve enjoyed this job so much.”
Dean Verdoes, Dec. 8, 1998, Pioneer Press
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