Coffee with the Candidates: Election Information

Karen Springer is an Air Force veteran, a substitute teacher in the Yankton School District, an adjunct faculty member at Mount Marty University, the Quartermaster for VFW Post 791, and a pet sitter.

Karen served in the Air Force for 22 years. Her career field was personnel, which is equivalent to human resources. As she moved through her career into the senior enlisted ranks, she was provided different leadership opportunities. One of those opportunities was a 3-year special duty assignment as a first sergeant. In that position, she was a liaison between the enlisted force and the commander. She advocated for Airmen on topics like health, welfare, morale, and career progression, and walked them through administrative actions and punishments. She stood by them through the lowest points in their careers, and celebrated the happiest ones with them, too. The position required a lot of communication and a lot of trust. The motto of the Air Force First Sergeant is “people are our business,” and there are a lot of parallels between that position and being your state representative.

Her final duty station was in the Minneapolis military entrance processing station (MEPS) as the senior enlisted advisor. It was very similar to the first sergeant position, but now she had four other separate units to oversee, and she was authoring and enforcing policy that affected members from all branches of the service as well as federal civilian employees. She had to learn how to speak their different languages to effectively work with them. There are parallels here also–-learning to speak the language of different groups within District 18 to better advocate for you. 

One of her subordinate units was the Sioux Falls MEPS.  Earlier in her career, she’d been assigned to Ellsworth AFB, and she loved living in South Dakota. For the last 3 years of her career, her command team made quarterly trips to Sioux Falls, and every time Karen saw the “Welcome to South Dakota” sign, she felt like she was home. So, when she retired from the Air Force in 2014, Karen moved back to Rapid City.

In November 2017, Karen visited Yankton for the first time and loved it. She decided that Yankton was where she really needed to be. Nine months later, she moved here.

Post-retirement, she has worked in hospitality and retail, she sold homemade dog treats at the farmers market, and she was a proofreader at the Press & Dakotan. In her adjunct role at MMU, she currently teaches a business class to inmates at the federal prison.

Karen used her military education benefits to earn bachelor’s degrees in social psychology and business management, a master’s degree in management and leadership, and an MBA.  She believes in lifelong education and plans to enroll in a new degree program within the next year..