Every day students attend schools without knowing the meaning behind their schools’ names.
“When I used to go to Jerstad all the time, I would see that they have some murals up,” said 2025 Case High School graduate Jayden George of Jerstad-Agerholm’s namesake. “But these kids aren’t going to stop and read a mural and look at all these big words. They need something they can see right in front of them to understand what their school is named after and how much honor their school brings to the community.”
So, George decided to do something about it by taking advantage of the fact that he volunteers at Racine’s Veterans Center and Legacy Museum, and also works as a Youth Apprentice for the Racine Unified School District’s Academies of Racine.
“I offered one of the Academy Coaches an option to do a capstone project with the 8th grade students to research this topic,” George said.
Jerstad-Agerholm K-8 is named after two Racine-born war heroes, both of whom received the highest distinction, the Medal of Honor, for their heroic actions during WWII. Major John Jerstad was a pilot and played a key role during many events of the war and received his medal posthumously for his bravery and leadership. Harold Agerholm served as a private first class in the U.S. Marine Corps during WWII. His heroic actions also made him a recipient of the award.
“Further down the road, I ended up going to Jerstad-Agerholm at least once a week to help the students do research, and help them develop an exhibit for the future of other students,” George said.
The 8th grade students helped with tasks like drawing out the veterans’ uniforms, the battle ships of the time and the planes that were in use. The students also helped with making phone calls and doing research to find the information they needed. In addition, they also had the opportunity to present their project to members of the community. A lot of the kids mentioned that they had no idea their school was named after war heroes and one of their favorite parts of the project was learning about them.
Ralph Cedillo was the 8th grade capstone class teacher for the group and said the most rewarding part of the project was the community engagement.
“The kids really got hands-on experience and they really took charge of the experience, and it was outside of classroom work, so it was really exciting,” Cedillo said. “The support we get from the school is really great. Principal Paproth (Jerstad-Agerholm’s directing principal), Mr. Alex DeBaker (Executive Director of Academies & Transformation - The Academies of Racine) and everybody in the community just really collectively worked together, and that was really exciting and fun.”
To Principal Paproth, it is important that the students know the history of the building and where the names came from.
“We have some more pictures and some other signage and it’s just helping our kids understand why the school is named after them, and have some pride in these two gentlemen,” he said.
“Before, they might have thought it was just a project, but now that they are going to see it, they might think it’s a little more than that,” George said. “There are still students who are going to show up today, to show off what they did, and kind of see the importance.”
The permanent display is sure to leave a lasting impact on students for years to come.