Teacher reflects on half century at Elgin school
It was 1967, the summer of love, and Peter Mikulak, like many young people, was going to collect his possessions and head to California.
Mikulak had spent the summer doing odd jobs at Chicago Junior School in Elgin after graduating from New Trier Township High School in Winnetka.
Before he could leave for California, Head of School Charles R. Trick stopped him.
“The headmaster handed me my paycheck and said, ‘School starts next week,’” Mikulak recalls.
Without Mikulak’s knowledge, Trick had enrolled him in Elgin Community College, where he would earn an associate degree before graduating with a degree in English and history from Northern Illinois University.
It was the start of Mikulak’s 38-year run as a teacher at Chicago Junior School, later renamed Fox River Country Day School, a span that would far eclipse Trick’s tenure as head of the independent school.
Mikulak retired this year after more than 50 years as a student and teacher at the school.
Before heading to Ludington, Mich., where he plans to spend his retirement with his wife of more than 35 years, Mikulak reflected on what kept him at the school for half a century.
Mikulak enrolled in Chicago Junior School as a boarder in 1960, when he was 11. His parents lived in Wilmette, where his father owned a printing press. Halfway into his first year at Chicago Junior School, Mikulak’s mother died.
As he coped with the loss, Mikulak became part of a new family at Chicago Junior School. Trick, the head of school, presided over a small community of boys who lived away from their families. The dormitories were run by older women who acted as surrogate mothers.
“It was a very friendly environment,” recalls George Kirkland, who was a classmate of Mikulak’s. “They had dorm mothers that were very sweet. You felt cared for.”
Each of the boys was expected to do his share of the work at the campus. Mikulak had chores in the morning and afternoon. In the eighth grade, he washed dishes after every lunch.
When he graduated from Chicago Junior School, Mikulak was one of six eighth-graders. When he entered New Trier, he was one of 1,300 freshmen.
During high school, Mikulak worked summers at Chicago Junior School. The week after graduating, he moved onto the Elgin campus to work for Trick, cleaning toilets, mopping floors, teaching swimming — anything that was needed.
After Mikulak finished college, he was heading off to Saugatuck, Mich., to work as a carpenter when Trick asked him, “Can you teach math?”
“He was stuck,” Mikulak says. “I fit the bill. I hadn’t studied math in college, but I was good at it.”
Mikulak, the English and history major, taught math to sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders. In Mikulak’s class, the life lessons were more important than the material he taught.
A former student contacted him recently and said he couldn’t recall any of the math Mikulak had taught him.
“I wrote back and said it was never about the math,” Mikulak said. “Anything I’m going to teach someone is going to be repeated. Are they going to stand you up straight and make you answer ‘yes’ or ‘no?’ Are they going to teach you to treat your classmates with respect?”
Over the next 38 years, Mikulak taught most of the subjects at the school — everything except art, music and Spanish — and moved into administration, while still teaching a full load.
One year ago, Mikulak’s 50th anniversary at the school, the school rededicated the Alumni Room, the former library, in his name. A plaque outside the room recognizes his service to the school.
On the way home from the dedication ceremony, Mikulak’s wife, Julie, turned to him and said, “You have one more year.”
During the past year, Mikulak watched with concern as the school struggled to raise enough money to continue its mission. This week, the sobering news came that the school would have to close after 98 years.
“It’s been a very unsettling time,” Mikulak said. “It’s hard not to have faith. It’s hard not to believe it will continue.”
At this year’s eighth-grade graduation ceremony, several former students returned to pay tribute to Mikulak. The honors were nothing new for him.
“He is the person that students most reference in their graduation speeches,” Head of School Karen Morse said. “He had high expectations. He not only taught them about math ... but he taught them about leadership and perseverance and embedded character into his everyday lessons.”
In Mikulak’s half century at Fox River Country Day, the school changed from a boarding school for orphaned boys from Chicago to a diverse group of commuters and international students, both boys and girls. Mikulak was a steadying presence through it all.
“The original need for the school didn’t exist anymore, but we (could) still do good things for good kids,” Mikulak said. “I think it was worth all my time and effort.”