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Illustration by Christopher Hernandez
Leaving a Legacy
Fisheries student looks to give back to MHCC with a sculpture
The Advocate
Before he graduates from MHCC this year, fisheries major Steve Collie plans to leave his mark on the college in a positive way.
Through self-exploration and experience, the 50-year-old student from Seattle wants to inspire future generations to follow their dreams and reach their full potential just as he has.
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Collie has been a student at MHCC since the summer of 2008 and ever since he went back to school, he has been driven to be successful and dedicated to obtain his associate of applied science degree in fisheries technology. In return for providing him an education and the skills to pursue his dream of being a marine biologist, Collie says he wants to give back to the college by creating a new and improved “water feature.”
“That’s what my hope is. I want to be able to give back to this college for giving me the opportunity to come out here and follow my dreams,” said Collie.
Asked about Collie’s project, Todd Hanna, fisheries instructor, said, “I know he’s just doing that because it’s more of a personal interest. He just wants to re-do that, which would be nice because when that was running out there, it was pretty nice,” said Hanna.
According to part-time fisheries instructor Jack Congdon, the water feature by the fisheries area has been inactive for the last six years due to leakage in the rubber lining behind the waterfall. As a result of the outflow of water and the demise of the horticulture program, which created the water feature, the college stopped maintaining it.
“I kept the filters out and cleaned them out and put them in storage, so that some time in the future, if somebody decides to do something with it, that they wouldn’t be out there destroyed by the weather,” said Congdon. “That’s basically what I did.”
What Collie plans to do about the unattended fisheries pond is temporarily move all the rocks, remove and add a new liner, clean/vacuum the leaves from the pond, and buy a new table outside next to the water feature. The fish sculpture will sit in the middle of the 18” deep pond, shooting out water, which will be accompanied by water coming down the waterfall, says Collie. The sculpture will be 30” tall, made out of aluminum, which he said will be “really shiny” and fishlike.
“Since I’ve been in fisheries, I figured I know a little bit about fish. I can make a fish sculpture),” said Collie. “I like doing arts and crafts, and camping stuff. I’ve been in ceramics up here for two years and learned how to throw pots and everything,” he said.
“What I intend on having it say on the bottom of my statue is ‘Donated, Class of 2010.’ That way, when every student comes in here and they see this water feature running, (they can) sit, have a nice afternoon, whether they’re just studying, relaxing, or taking appreciation of what’s going on. I want to give back to the college,” said Collie.
Collie said he grew up in an non-traditional lifestyle, moving around constantly, because his father was a game warden at national parks around the country.
“My parents were kind of hippies in a way. They also lived and enjoyed the alternative lifestyle,” said Collie.
After graduating from Green River High School in Seattle, Collie went to the University of Washington to pursue a major in engineering
Around the year 2000, Collie said he became disillusioned with his day job, and society for that matter, and decided to move to the Baja Coast in Jaucumba, Mexico, and lived in a nudist colony for four years.
“I lived on the beach in Mexico and just surfed everyday and enjoyed life,” he said.
Collie, however, had an epiphany and decided to leave Mexico because he wanted to be a better role model for his twin sons, who are now 16, from his previous marriage.
“One of my sons came down to spend the summer with me and he was checking out my lifestyle and he said to me ‘Dad, when I grow up, I want to be just like you.’ And I asked him, ‘What does that mean to you?’ He said, ‘I want to sit on the beach, get drunk everyday and tell the world to f*** off’ and I was like, ‘Uhh . . . this isn’t a very good role model for my son,” said Collie. “That was the driving force that said ‘All right, I’m a father now’ and I had been for years but never really participated. Now it’s time to show them (his sons) who I really am.”
After his son visited him in Mexico in the summer of 2004, Collie traveled back to Portland with his son and decided to lay anchor permanently in the city of bridges
“I came back up here and decided to be a better person. It’s kind of (like) what the Tim McGraw song says, ‘I was living like I was dying,’ literally, and I decided to be a better person, friend, parent, father, husband, student, anything I could to be a part of society again and that’s what leads me to where I’m at,” Collie said.
At that same time, Collie met his best friend/fiancé at a karaoke bar and it was mainly her inspiration that got him to go back to school. “My best friend told me I can do it and I should give back a little bit . . . and when I found out I can give back a little bit, I was hooked,” said Collie.
Ever since Collie started going back to school, he has maintained a 3.86 GPA and is on the president’s honor roll. “I attempt to put all that energy in my school work,” said Collie.
Another project Collie is working on is his fisheries field project, known as “Aquaponics,” a combination of aquaculture, the farming of fish, and hydroponics, growing plants without soil.
“I could have chosen an easier project for my field project but I like to push myself a little bit, so I came up with Aquaponics and I wanted to show that this does work. I wanted introduce other people to see (and think) ‘Hey, we can step out of the box a little bit and become better people all in all,” said Collie. “People are not educated enough to know that it does work or what it’s all about. People have heard of aquaculture and they know that growing fish works and people know that hydroponics works but introducing the two together, making them self-sustaining, is the key.”
Collie said other fisheries students are excited to help him out with his goal for the water feature.
“That’s how you get people involved is by one person starting out saying, ‘All right, I going to make a change’ and then other people see that that change happens and then they say, ‘All right, well, I want to try it. What can I do?”
Collie “It’s going to be cool. I’ll be able to come up here, hopefully in 20 years and then be able to say, ‘Hey, I did that.’ ”
Photo by Devin Courtright/The Advocate
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