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As St. Olaf College concluded its 150th anniversary year, more than 1,600 alumni returned to the Hill for Reunion Weekend. The milestone event brought graduates across generations together to celebrate old friendships, revisit old campus haunts, and witness firsthand the ways their alma mater has grown and changed. 

For Jeff ’80 and Pam Cooper Thompson ’80, this year’s gathering marked their 45th reunion — and a chance to return after their 40th was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“Seeing classmates we haven’t seen in a long time, some not since graduation, has been really fun,” Jeff Thompson says. 

The weekend was packed with programming designed to celebrate the ongoing legacy of St. Olaf. Events included campus tours, faculty and staff talks, a silent disco, dinners and socials for celebrating classes, and the All-Alumni Worship Service. For the third year in a row, alumni enjoyed a transformed Campus Green with lighting, music, games, and a petting zoo for the youngest visitors. New this year was “Reunion Recess”, which offered participants an opportunity to take advantage of the many activities in the Skoglund/Tostrud complex, and “Haunted Hill,” a chance to hear ghost stories on campus. 

Over the weekend, alumni explored changes to campus, including the new residence halls, updates to the academic buildings, and the continued development of student-focused spaces. At the same time, familiar landmarks — like Old Main and Boe Memorial Chapel — offered moments of nostalgia and grounding. 

“We’ve been walking through the Natural Lands and checking out the old stomping grounds,” Gabriel Piacsek ’20 noted as he stood alongside his friend and classmate Jack Weldon ’20. 

“We’ve been stumbling into people that we used to know, and it’s been good to reconnect,” Weldon added. “I had a nice conversation with a gentleman who’s here for his 50th reunion, and it was interesting to hear his perspective of what’s changed compared to ours, just five years out. We only see small incremental changes, but it will be fascinating to see once we’re at our 50th.”

For some alumni, the weekend was an excuse to get-together with lifelong friends — some of whom met as first-year students living on the same floor. 

“We were all on the fourth floor in Mohn Hall,” says Sandy Werth Schrock ’85, who came to the reunion with a group of friends. “We all still see one another — we go to Florida together every February. We’re still in each other’s lives.” 

The group noted the ways in which the college has become more inclusive and diverse in the decades since they graduated. Others shared appreciation for new vocational opportunities, including entrepreneurship coaching and partnerships with companies in various fields.

“I think it’s really cool that there are more opportunities for kids to transition from school and college to life after,” Stephanie Ball ’85 says. “Two of us were econ majors, and at the time it didn’t encompass a business element, so it’s nice to see that there’s more of a business component now, which I would’ve liked.” 

Erik Riesterer ’00 returned to campus for his 25th reunion — his first since his 10th. 

“There’s a collective hive mind of stories here, that you kind of forget about when you’re away,” he says. “Somebody will have one little piece of a story, and someone else will have the next bit, and then it will jog your memory and bring back a flood of memories.”

For all those who made the trip back to the Hill, the weekend served as a celebration of shared roots and enduring connections. 

As Schrock puts it, “It looks a little different, but it’s still St. Olaf.”