Mark Christopherson: Set up for success

In a way, Mark Christopherson ('86 mechanical engineering technology) is a lot like UW-Parkside in that he is very familiar with the entire region the campus serves. Christopherson was born and raised in Kenosha. When his parents moved to Racine in 1976 he attended J.I. Case High School. After high school, Christopherson chose a university right in the middle. "Parkside was convenient, just the right size and had a really nice campus," he said.

Today, Christopherson owns Reinicke Athens Inc., a general contractor based in Athens, Ga., serving Fortune 500 companies. He has guided the construction firm through a successful decade with sales increasing more than 150 percent in the last 12 years.

"Parkside affected my professional career by setting me up for success," Christopherson said. "I was always challenged to excel by the faculty and staff. My experience at Parkside has helped me make the right decisions along the way."

The Parkside environment also proved beneficial. "The atmosphere at Parkside was different than I imagined it might be at other colleges," he said. "Many nontraditional students made Parkside a much more serious student body, in my opinion, particularly in the night classes."

The serious tone of the classroom helped created a more focused learning opportunity. And because Parkside is a smaller campus, it was easy for students to get to know one another, Christopherson said. "It was very easy to get to know a lot of people and to have direct involvement with different professors and their staff.

"Parkside has an extraordinarily friendly environment, which is conducive to learning while at the same time being a lot of fun."


AT A GLANCE:

Graduated: 1986
Job: President
Company: Reinicke Athens Inc.

ABOUT THIS STORY:

Story Status: Archived
Publish date: 2/15/2008

MORE UW-P NEWS:

All current news releases
News archive
Ranger Today home

Bookmark and Share