John and Kate plus four

Kate Danyluk, B.A. Art '88, B.Ed. Elementary Education '96 John Larsen, B.B.A. Accounting '85 Elliott Larsen, B.S. Mechanical Engineering '12 Avery Larsen, B.S. Civil Engineering '13 Justine Sanders, B.A. Sociology '13

They met in Colorado. John headed south from Alaska to attend veterinary school. Kate traveled west to get out of her native Kansas. But we're not here to talk about Colorado.

John and Kate are both UAA alumni and former Seawolf athletes. They're also proud parents of two recent UAA grads-their sons Elliott and Avery. Elliott's girlfriend Justine also graduated from UAA. And so did her brother Van. John and Kate are at the center of an orbiting galaxy of UAA grads.

The tight-knit family recently met to chat about their experiences at their hometown university.

Swimming Seawolves

John started his college career in the veterinary program at Colorado State University, but quickly reassessed his academic goals. "I went out to Colorado and was basically homesick just about every day I was gone and thought... 'What am I doing here?'" he said. There was one obvious benefit to his time in the Rockies, though-he met Kate. "My family's from here, so I dragged her up here too," John smiled.

John and Kate both enrolled at UAA and inadvertently found themselves competing for the Seawolves. John-who played at East High School-walked on to the men's basketball team and competed three seasons (1983-1985). Kate's athletics career was a little more accidental. "I was working at the pool and they needed a swimmer," she laughed. She joined the short-lived UAA swimming and diving program for two years, before motherhood superseded her swimming career.

Elliott, too, joined the swim team... in a way. "My last year I was swimming with one of those," Kate smiled, pointing across the room at her oldest son. "So he was on the UAA swim team."

"Then I redshirted for 20 years," Elliott joked.

Name-dropping German basketball captains

Like any solid family, the Larsens are quick to add details to each other's stories or finish each other's jokes. It helps, of course, that both sons stayed close to home.

Elliott and Avery graduated from Bartlett High School and both entered the UA Scholars Program at UAA. Avery opted for UAA because he wanted to attend the university's growing engineering program and be closer to his high school sweetheart (and soon-to-be wife) Hilary. Elliott just always assumed he'd end up at UAA. "I always wanted to go there just because I thought it was cool. My parents went there and I knew all the basketball players," he noted.

Knowing the basketball team certainly helped Elliott impress his girlfriend Justine's father-a longtime Seawolves basketball fan. "I told him Hansi Gnad [UAA all-star, captain of the 1992 German national team] was over a couple weeks ago." Justine's dad was floored.

"He had instant credibility," John laughed. "And me too."

Keeping close to home

Today, the extended Larsen family works across the city in diverse fields. John is a CPA with the Alaska Department of Revenue while Kate teaches fifth- and sixth-grade in the school district. She works at Chugach Optional, along with Hilary, who is a special education teacher's assistant. Avery is an engineer-in-training, working on transportation projects for the state and municipality. Justine is in real estate property management and Elliott travels throughout the Northwest as a corrosion control engineer (a job that occasionally involves 10-day business trips living off a snowmachine).

Although both sons have left the nest, they haven't flown too far. "Elliott and Justine bought a house three blocks this way from us and then Avery and Hilary bought a house three blocks the other direction from us," Kate laughed. It's close enough where the kids can (and frequently do) still stop by for dinner.

"I am very lucky in that my family loves Alaska and would never leave," Kate reflected. "John and I had a wonderful experience at UAA. We made many connections throughout the community and we maintain those connections today. I believe my boys have those same kinds of connections. Had they not gone to UAA, they would have missed out on that. They are amazing, adventurous young men."

Hometown university

The family recently gathered in Kate's colorful classroom at Chugach Optional School to chat about UAA. The conversation shifted from things that have changed (the arena, the merged campus) to things that have stayed the same (the Spine still gets chilly, even though it's no longer an open-air breezeway with walls of chicken wire). In between observations, they shared thoughts on attending their hometown university.

"I could go to work, leave for two hours to take a couple classes, and go back to work, so it was nice to get my education and still have a full-time job," Justine reflected. "And go visit my parents. And go camping on the weekends. And have all these things that I'm used to-that I grew up with ... I didn't have to separate myself from the whole life I knew."

"I think having the local access is nice," John added. "It's just nice to have the recreation opportunities that we were used to growing up."

Making local connections was important, too. Justine enjoyed knowing her friends and family were in class, too, so they could meet for lunch on campus in between classes. Kate still regularly works with the artists and educators she attended UAA with.

Hometown roots even led directly to a job for both Elliott and Avery. "We had friends say, 'If you don't go to Colorado School of Mines, you'll never get a job in engineering,'" John recalled. "Both our boys went here and they both interned while they were going to school and pretty much got offers right when they got out of the university,"

"So," John noted, "it worked pretty well being local."