Enterprise Dispatch Blog

ARDEN HILLS – Sam Kampa, a 2009 Dassel-Cokato graduate and student at Bethel University, recently wrapped up seven performances of the play, “The Clearing,” highlighting a topic he holds near to his heart.
Last July, Kampa received a $10,000 scholarship for his essay, “Stories,” on intimate conversations he had with Holocaust survivors. The contest was part of the Holland & Knight Charitable Foundation’s Holocaust Remembrance Project.
In his essay, Kampa begins by writing about a personal experience as an 11-year-old talking with Jewish women over matzah ball soup at an inter-faith Seder dinner at Temple Israel in Minneapolis.
“The stories make Holocaust education real to students and adults so we can effectively prevent genocide in the future,” Kampa said in the July 6 Enterprise Dispatch article.
This past fall, Kampa was able to bring to stage the message of genocide as the lead role in “The Clearing,” based on “Oliver Cromwell’s reign of terror on the Irish people” in which one-third of the population was killed due to war, plague, and famine.

“I felt strongly compelled to try out for the show with the hopes of perpetuating genocide education and discovering the meaning of my summer experience,” Kampa said, in regards to his trip to the new Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center which was in addition to the scholarship.
Continue reading ‘Sam Kampa performs at Bethel University’

DASSEL, MN – An eight-minute segment of Dassel’s Lakeview Ranch was featured on FOX 9 News last night. The in-depth segment highlighted the difficulties of having loved ones with dementia and the model of care that is used to care for the sometimes aggressive behaviors that come with the disease.

The segment was titled “Hidden Heaven,” which Delores Herr says is where her husband Vern is. “They say there are really two goodbyes. The first one is hard when they take him out of the home but there’s always that final one that you have to wait for,” Herr told the reporters.

The segment also explains that because Judy Berry, CEO of Lakeveiw Ranch, is so successful with her model of care and greatly eliminating the need for medicating her patients, the government cuts the money she gets paid by patients on medical assistance and the need for the Dementia Care Foundation.

To see the full segment, click on the link http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/news/In-Depth-Hidden-Heaven-nov-24-2009