Nominations opened this week for the 2018 Riverland Community College Distinguished Alumni Award, which recognizes contributions Riverland alumni make and increases the pride all alumni, students, staff and faculty have for Riverland, according to a press release.

The award is bestowed on an individual who attended Riverland and has distinguished themselves. Since 1979, 22 Distinguished Alumni awards have been awarded.

The awardees are 16 males and six females. Six had careers in education, seven in business, three in health care, three in law, two in the arts and one in ministry. Seven awardees have been elected to public office at a local or regional level.

The most recent Distinguished Alumni, Alice Holst, attended Winona State College for one semester and then Austin Junior College in 1964-65, studying liberal arts. She took individual classes from 1965 to 1969 and earned an Associate of Arts degree in 1969. Hoist is a graduate of AIB School of Banking at University of Madison and Blandin Community Leadership.

She began working for First National Bank, now known as USBank, in 1965.

Hoist rose through the ranks at USBank, starting as a mail girl and retiring 45 years later as the Austin branch president. Along the way she worked as a bookkeeper, teller, operations auditor, credit examiner, compliance and investigations auditor. She trained and managed colleagues in accounting, customer service, credit operations, credit integration and branch operations.

Her experience with bank mergers was invaluable during the 2003 merger of the Riverland Foundation and the Albert Lea Campus Foundation. 

According to the release, Hoist led by example on the foundation board, serving as a catalyst to set up at least four named scholarships.

Nominees for the 2018 award will be evaluated on a significant contribution to the achievement of Riverland’s vision, established and/or strengthened Riverland’s community partnerships and contributed to a community in a significant way.

The Distinguished Alumni recipient will be recognized at the Riverland Community College commencement event in May.

To be considered for the award, a nominee must have attended one of the following schools:

• Albert Lea Area Vocational Technical Institute

• Albert Lea/Mankato Technical College

• Albert Lea Technical College

• Albert Lea Technical Institute

• Austin Area Vocational School

• Austin Community College

• Austin Junior College

• Austin State Junior College

• Austin Technical College

• Austin Technical Institute

• Minnesota Riverland Technical College

• Owatonna Extension Center-Austin State Junior College

• Owatonna Higher Education Center

• Owatonna College and University Center

• Riverland Community College

The deadline to nominate someone is  4:30 p.m. March 1.  Late nominations will not be considered. Online nominations to www.riverland.edu/alumni are encouraged.