Grigsby vows open-minded manner

Stan Grigsby likes to entertain ideas.
“A friend once told me I can maintain a level of uncertainty longer than most people,” Grigsby said. “I don’t know that he meant it as a compliment.”
Grigsby did.
“The mark of an educated mind is one that can entertain an idea without accepting it,” he said.
He hopes his open mind serves him well as he vies for a seat on the USD 257 Board of Education. Voters will choose between Grigsby and Jen Taylor in the April 7 general election. (A profile on Taylor appears elsewhere in today’s issue).
Grigsby sees his ability to listen to others in a thoughtful debate before coming to a decision.
“That’s who I am,” he said. “That’s how I try to do things. To say I’m totally unbiased is untrue. We’re all biased. But I understand my biases.”

GRIGSBY GREW up in eastern Kansas, but lived elsewhere much of his adult life before returning upon his semi-retirement.
A Prescott native, he earned a degree in physics at Pittsburg State University before moving on to Colorado State University to work on his master’s degree in atmospheric physics.
Uncle Sam came calling soon thereafter — he attended college in the height of the Vietnam era — and Grigsby earned his commission as a Naval meteorologist. He remained with the Navy after completing his initial obligation, in order to complete his master’s degree.
Grigsby’s Naval career kept him immersed in computers, including several high-tech weapons systems, including President Reagan’s famed Strategic Defense Initiative, referred to by many as his “Star Wars” Initiative.
“I was involved in the Navy aspect of it,” he recalled.
Grigsby eventually retired from the Navy to work as a consultant for several companies and spent a year with Volunteers in Technical Assistance, a non-profit group dedicated to finding ways to introduce technology into developing countries.
 He eventually resumed work as a consultant for a company in Virginia that helped serve “Historically Underutilized Business” or HUB Zones, which led him back to southeast Kansas; Allen County, to be specific.
Allen County was designated as a HUB Zone, so Grigsby came to the area to begin the foundation work to set up a potential business here. Unfortunately, the company responsible for working with Allen County failed to follow through on its promises.
“We had it set up the first year, ready to go,” Grigsby recalled. “We were ready to submit the paperwork, but they didn’t want us to.”
Allen County subsequently lost its HUB status, but by then Grigsby had become involved with the community and found it an optimal place to reside full time. He moved to Iola permanently in 2010. His wife, Donna, a Moran native, joined him in 2012.
“Rural America is very strong,” he said. “It’s pretty clear that schools are at the heart of that.”
Finding retirement a bit too slow for his taste, Grigsby opened a computer repair shop in downtown Iola last summer.
“This little business is just a way to keep myself going with computers,” he said. “Primarily, we restore computers infected with viruses of various sorts. We bill ourselves as computer repair, but primarily it’s software restoration, software repair.”

GRIGSBY VISITS frequently with teachers, patrons, parents and anyone else concerned about USD 257’s future.
“It’s easy to throw up our hands and say ‘we don’t have enough money,’” he said, “but we have what we have, and we have to be good at how we use it.
“My view of the education system is that teachers are at the top of the list,” Grigsby continued. “If you provide support for your teachers, the teachers will do the right job for the students. They just need to have the resources.”
That said, “there’s no question we’re in a budget constraint environment,” he said. “I’m doing a lot of learning, a lot of reading. The learning curve is pretty steep.”
Cuts should be as far away from the classroom as possible, he stressed.
One of Grigsby’s early concerns is ensuring all students are ready to enter society upon graduation, either with college or elsewhere.
“We tend to educate for people going to college,” he said, “but less than half of our people go to college. I want to make sure that other half, the ones not going to college, are prepared for life. It’s no secret our workforce isn’t quite what we would like for it to be, either to build businesses here or attract businesses here. We have plenty of talent. Our kids are bright enough. We have a good place to live. Properly equipped, we can compete with anybody.
“Some are saying, ‘what in the world are you doing?’” he continued. “It’s a thankless job. But a lot of people, frankly, are pleased I’m running. They see somebody with a different background. Most people have not moved away from here and come back. Most of the people on board either have been involved as an educator or married to an educator. I don’t see that as a bad thing. But I see that as probably fixing the view in one direction.”