Greg Gancarz
Editor
Aaron Walk is a history instructor at Parkland, where he has been teaching for the last 15 years, beginning in the spring of 2003.
Walk is originally from Mattoon, Ill. where he graduated from high school in 1992. Walk says that growing up, he did not realize that he would eventually become a professor of history but says that his grandparents, who lived through the Great Depression and World War II, instilled in him a fascination with the subject from a young age.
“My grandma, in specific, spoke about the depression quite often. She was also a big fan of Franklin Roosevelt. She kept a framed presidential portrait of Roosevelt on the bookcase with the other family pictures. I used to think he was a relative at one point. She was, like a lot of individuals at that time, very fond of him,” Walk said.
Walk’s grandfather was part of the Allied liberation of the Aleutian Islands in Alaska during the war. Afterwards, a career on the postal rail service ensured that his grandfather would see much of the postwar country.
“The things that he would see, the things that he would experience… Really just being around those two, hearing those stories, that really kind of piqued my interest. But growing up, I never would have thought that I would be doing this,” Walk said.
In his youth, Walk says he was greatly interested in playing music. Playing the bass guitar, which Walk still does to this day, was a skill he says he began getting serious about when he was about 16. Walk currently plays in a band that plays cross-over country, a genre Walk describes as “newer country with a degree of rock.”
Walk pursued his first degree, an associates, at Lakeland College in Mattoon before moving on to the University of Illinois at Springfield for his bachelor’s.
“It actually took me a while to get through. Today, I would’ve been labeled an ‘at-risk student.’ I didn’t have a declared major. I really didn’t have a firm idea of what I wanted to pursue in college,” Walk said. “I never did drop out of school but I didn’t necessarily persist. It literally took me seven years to complete my bachelor’s degree.
Like many Parkland students, Walk went part-time for a number of semesters and worked to support himself. He would eventually receive his master’s from Eastern Illinois University. Today, he is currently working to complete a second master’s degree, this time, in college student affairs.
Walk originally worked in special education before coming to Parkland in 2003. Although he only started out at Parkland teaching one or two classes, Walk is now teaching a wide range of courses including US government and political science.
“I haven’t taught political science here in a couple years but I have in the past. But history is what I will normally be teaching,” Walk said.
Walk’s most common courses are HIS 104 and HIS 105 which span the entire history of the United States of America, but Walk does have certain periods that he personally finds more fascinating than others.
“The era that I like to teach and study the most is the early Republican Era, that time in between the American Revolution and the 1820s when we were developing the nation and getting those ideals together,” Walk said. “Alexander Hamilton is one of my favorite historical figures to read and study about. I find him to be a very interesting individual. At the time, he was just very blunt and realistic. I think that’s what I like about him most. He was this straight-forward personality.”
Walk also has a fascination with the Reconstruction Era, the period immediately following the Civil War. Walk feels it’s a time period that can often get less than adequate coverage in classrooms.
“I think a lot of it has to do with time constraints…It was such a critical time and I feel like so many of the problems today are just products of the failures of that period,” Walk said.
When it comes to US presidents, Walk is partial to Franklin Roosevelt, a preference he partly attributes to his grandparents.
“The era he presided over, the Depression and World War II, being able to lead the country through both of those just shows the resolve that that individual had, and being able to overcome his own personal challenges, like losing the ability to walk. At a time when disabilities were seen as serious personal flaws, he was able to just brush it off and keep going anyway,” Walk said.
When it comes to his own personal leisure time, Walk says that he enjoys traveling in addition to playing music. One habit in particular is going to see baseball games in the cities he visits.
“Last year I went to Fenway Park for the first time and got to see the Cubs and Red Sox play. It’s really hard to describe if you haven’t been there. I actually really liked it a lot more than Wrigley, not that I dislike Wrigley, but Fenway just had this atmosphere that is hard to explain,” Walk said.
Walk says he is a St. Louis Cardinals fan but he still makes sure he grabs an authentic, on-field baseball cap from every stadium he sees a game at. His collection already boasts a great number of teams.