Candyce Lund Bollinger ’87. Photo: Michaela Winkley
Author’s note: Candyce Lund Bollinger has conducted three interactive workshops for the Evergreen parent and child caregiver community, with four more scheduled, during the 2014-2015 academic year. Following Bollinger’s third workshop on January 9th, we sat down for an interview.
Candyce Lund Bollinger ‘87, well-known for her work in the Olympia parenting and education communities, is a parent educator at South Puget Sound Community College and in private practice.
Bollinger keenly remembers the first time she was told she couldn’t do something because of her gender. She was eight and half years old, and the discrimination came from a another female student – she even remembers what she was wearing at the time. Bollinger was top ten in her high school class, and when she was among the first students called in for career planning, her goal of becoming a great mother wasn’t the answer her teachers were hoping for. Now, when she’s asked how others can follow in her footsteps and become a parent educator, Bollinger gives a different response than that of her earliest teachers: take parent education classes, get life experience, and be a great parent.
A typical day for Bollinger runs from 8:30 – 8:30, starting with meeting a client, then teaching a class, seeing more clients, speaking at a public forum, seeing even more clients, and teaching another class. Within her hectic schedule, Bollinger relishes the daily opportunities to work with and teach diverse groups of parents, including military groups, parents in prison, parents over and under 30, and students. Bollinger’s work hasn’t stopped with the local community, and until about four years ago included biennial humanitarian trips to Africa.
Candyce Lund Bollinger ’87. Photo: Michaela Winkley
Bollinger completed a year of traditional college before marrying, and had two children before she turned twenty one. One child was biological, and the other she and her husband adopted from Korea, making her one of the youngest parents in Washington State to adopt. She later returned to college to earn a degree in physical therapy, which she practiced in various settings for about ten years. Her last employer as a physical therapist was at the Olympia School District, where she picked up additional responsibilities in advocacy work on behalf of disabled children and their families. This time was a turning point in her career, as she considered new-found interests in counseling and advocacy, including law school. Ultimately, she decided to travel to Uganda to do immunizations after seeing news reports on the famine in Ethiopia. Her trips became a regular occurrence, including a research project in Zimbabwe to study the effects of famine on infants and mothers. Bollinger fondly considers those trips her graduate school, paid for through her volunteered time.
It’s no surprise Bollinger became an entrepreneur. One of four sisters, all have gone on to become self-starters and entrepreneurs. Her grandparents on both sides of the family were blue collar entrepreneurs, one in deep sea fishing and the other in farming. Her parents were married for 57 years: during this time, her dad had his own business, while her mom raised the girls full time.
Before enrolling at Evergreen to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree with an emphasis in counseling, she was already teaching three classes at SPSCC and continued teaching while studying at Evergreen. The Olympia-based public Liberal Arts and Science College made sense for Bollinger. It was convenient and allowed for raising a family while working – she had three children at the time. Evergreen turned out to be a great fit, and Bollinger “loved the Evergreen process and experiential learning,” which she uses as a pillar of her own teaching method. While a student, she completed an internship in the counseling center, and after graduating worked in the center for a few years. Compared with the more traditional institutions she’s been at, studying at Evergreen was refreshing, especially learning how to learn. This model has become a big part of her teaching, which she describes as being highly conceptual, identifying less as an academic and more as a service provider. She emphasizes that needing to keep learning for 25 years is essential to parenting, as parents are always learning for the next stage.
Bollinger has again come to turning point in her career. Last year, her big project was fixing up her new home in Costa Rica. She traveled there five times last year, and hopes to visit again several times this year. The year before, her project was creating a series of podcasts. Now, working on her book is “the next thing,” mostly involving compilation and editing. That’s on top of an endlessly busy schedule. Bollinger’s private appointments are booked three months out – she wipes the slate clean beyond that. Speaking engagements are booked nine months to a year ahead.
The next time private appointments will open up is on March 2nd, and they usually fill up the same day as they open. Anyone interested in working with Candyce Lund Bollinger can call her office line, 360-357-9480 and visit her website, where newsletters and podcasts are available for purchase.