Thursday, August 30, 2018
Ten days after Bradley Jordan finished high school, he took the 30-minute ferry ride from Washington Island and settled right back into his college coursework at Northeast Wisconsin Technical College. An avid hunter, fisherman, and islander, Jordan’s ultimate goal is to be a power lineman back on the island.
Jordan is a graduate of Washington Island High School, which is housed with all other grades in the same building. As one of three graduating seniors last year, Jordan played an important role for the other kids in the school. “The younger kids always try to high five everybody,” he said. Many of the children looked up to Jordan.
In a district with 72 students in total, everyone knows everyone. A highlight of Jordan’s high school experience was their class trip to Chicago and Madison. The week-long trip as one “with about 15 people you know, just like your own brothers and sisters, and the teachers are basically your parents. It was like a family vacation.”
Other opportunities to get off the island included weekend trips to play basketball and to see different parts of Wisconsin. “I’m not a very big kid,” Jordan said. “I wouldn’t be able to play varsity football, but we had the opportunity to play basketball. We got to go on trips every other weekend.” They played a couple of games on the island while protecting some time so that they weren’t “off island” every weekend.
For Jordan, time around home consists of hunting, fishing, and working hard to maintain a lifestyle focused on the outdoors. Because they are surrounded by water, almost everyone goes fishing, and everyone has a boat. “Outside of school, I always worked hard,” he said. “I paid for my first boat at 15.”
Inside of school, that same dedication was obvious. “I had to work very hard. What came easy to some didn’t to me.” By the time Jordan graduated, he had taken several college courses online through dual enrollment and established a year-long working relationship with the Washington Island Electric Cooperative. Most afternoons, he worked for the co-op to fulfill his work-study requirements and then worked with his dad and brother on the weekends.
In the fall, Jordan will continue his studies at the Northeast Wisconsin Technical College in the Electrical Power Distribution Program. He will attend school four days a week, returning to the island on Thursday nights to work for the co-op on Fridays, and with his dad on the weekends. Any other spare moments are reserved for fishing. He would like live and work on the island depending on job availability but is prepared to go “wherever the tide takes me” until then.