Former Northfield school counselor receives prestigious Heywood award

More Coverage Beth Berry will receive her award on Wednesday, Sept. 4 during the Joseph Lee Heywood Distinguished Service Award Banquet at the Northfield Ballroom, 1055 MN Highway 3. For details and reservations for the banquet, long onto the festival’s website, djjd.org 5c7ec742-5a22-47b4-80ce-67a79ab80c1d

Before she was involved in helping shape the futures of countless Northfield youth as their guidance counselor, advocate and advisor, Beth Berry wanted to be a flight attendant.

Alas, Berry’s height may have prevented her from a career in the fuselage, but now in retirement, she’s been able to travel to Australia, Asia, Africa, Europe and Scandinavia.

Over the years, as a guidance counselor within the Northfield School District, and later, as a community volunteer, being tall was never an obstacle when she was dealing with youth who needed extra assistance growing up.

Berry helped establish programs that supported Northfield youth and their families, such as the Northfield Youth Sports Collaborative, a sports scholarship program that is run through the Community Action Center and the Northfield Community College Collaborative. She was also involved with the development of Hillcrest Village and Post Secondary Education Option or PSEO classes.

Berry will be the 41st recipient of the Joseph Lee Heywood Distinguished Service Award, an annual tribute that is bestowed on a deserving Northfield resident by The Defeat of Jesse James Days Committee.

Berry will receive her award on Wednesday, Sept. 4 during the Joseph Lee Heywood Distinguished Service Award Banquet at the Northfield Ballroom, 1055 MN Hwy. 3. For details and reservations for the banquet, long onto the festival’s website, djjd.org .

“Beth is someone that has been doing such great work behind the scenes for many years that the full impact of her work is often overlooked,” said Galen Malecha, DJJD General Chairperson. “We are thrilled to celebrate Beth, while also recognizing the tremendous work that she, along with others in our community, have worked so hard on to better our community.”

Last week, one day before Berry and her husband Dennis were leaving for an extended vacation in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, she sat down for an interview with the Northfield News.

With their suitcases packed and waiting in the foyer, Berry reflected on her years helping Rice County’s youth, many of whom she stays in touch with and meets for coffee or shares a meal with.

“Today, my former kids are nurses, bankers, police offers, dentists, mechanical engineers, a doctoral program student and a head coach of a college soccer team,” she said. “They reach out to me directly, not through Facebook.”

To conquer the high dropout rate for Latino students in the early 2000s, Berry said she worked with Joan Lizaola, a diversity liaison, to plan an event held at the Northfield bowling alley that asked parents to make a commitment to keep their children in school until graduation.

When diapers and tampons were determined to be items that welfare would not pay for, Berry organized several events to raise funds and awareness of the discrepancy, the first of which was a fundraiser called “Wine, Women, Period.”

Recently, Berry became involved with the Dolly Parton Imagination Library that sends a book a month to children in reading deserts.

“There a definite correlation between reading and academic benchmarks,” she said. “The presence of the books fosters education and a closer relationship with the adult reading with them.”

Berry said “It hits you,” working closely with at-risk youth who may be homeless and constantly couch surf, or who are concerned for the safety or legal status of their family members.

But, her commitment to helping those youth was deep and unwavering.

After one young boy who didn’t see the need for positive change walked out of her office, Berry told him to “come back when you you are working as hard on your own future as I am.”

Now, in retirement, Berry said that while she’s honored to be recognized with the award, it’s honestly Sunday’s parade that most excites her five grandchildren.

“They can’t wait to ride in it,” Berry said of the grandkids, who range in age from 6-12 years old.

Berry, a native of Kansas City, Missouri, who graduated from Beloit College in Wisconsin, said she changed her major from chemistry to psychology after an internship at Mayo Clinic where she was involved in long-term residential treatment for adolescents.

She said her interest in psychology grew when she saw previously at-risk kids who were struggling to turn the corner to get on a path toward success.

Prior to moving to Northfield 45 years ago, Berry was the director a children’s residential treatment center at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis. There, she helped youth face a wide range of problems from adoptions to drugs to suicides.

While she was helping adolescents get through tough times, she said she was usually hopeful, because “we were always sending them on to a better situation.”

Elizabeth Child, executive director of Rice County Area United Way, witnessed Berry help United Way launch the Imagination Library fundraiser last year when funds were flagging.

“She is a huge advocate of early childhood literacy as a way to give children a foundation for success in school and in life,” said Child. “Beth is a visionary leader. Moreover, she is unstoppable when it comes to helping youths.”