From Palmer to Princeton, Job Corps alumnus inspires

PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY — Alaska Job Corps alumnus Matt Parker has come a long way since he was a student in Sitka — he’s now a computer technician at an Ivy League school.

Alaska Job Corps Center Business Community Liaison Barbara Hunt said her connection with Parker recently was “just kind of accidental,” though alumni often keep in contact with the center. This time, staff were looking into programs on the East Coast for some of their students when they got wind of Parker’s position as the IT manager and analyst for Princeton University’s Economics department.

“It makes me very happy,” Hunt said, of reconnecting with successful alumni. “It makes the job worthwhile.”

While Parker’s story is maybe less full of struggles and challenges than some, the man had significant barriers to leap.

Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Parker grew up in Sitka from age 4 until he was 15 or 16 years old. When he was 12 or 13, his parents “got kind of religious” and started going to the Seventh-day Adventist Church there. It wasn’t difficult for him to accept, only a bit frustrating — since Adventists meet on Saturdays, Parker had to quit his karate classes.

“That was the adjustment for me,” he said. “There wasn’t really a change in understanding. We weren’t going to church and then we were.”

He attended Sitka Adventist School with just 12 other students when he was in eighth grade, then moved to Palmer and attended Colony High School, with close to 1,200 students.

“It was a bit of a shock, needless to say,” Parker said.

After his sophomore year, Parker’s parents decided to send him to an Adventist school in Washington state, realizing that it would be less expensive for their son to live in Washington and be housed and fed and schooled by the church there than to live at home and attend the private religious school of their choice. That school had about 350 students.

Upon graduation, Parker had anticipated attending college, until his parents told him they couldn’t afford it.

Neither could he, at the time.

“I thought ‘well, I don’t wanna take on $100,000 in debt,” he said.

So he went to a temp agency to look for a job, and ended up at Northern Adjusters in the Dimond Mall taking dictation and writing up workers’ compensation claims, since his typing speed was above average. He commuted into Anchorage with his dad for a while, but soon realized it wasn’t for him, and $10 an hour wasn’t going to sustain him on his own.

He worked various jobs for a few years, once at Builder’s Bargains in Wasilla and a summer or two as a commercial fisherman, but nothing stuck.

Then a friend he made in Washington moved to Anchorage and told him about Job Corps, a federal program with the explicit goal of getting students trained for a profession.

“We get students trained in whatever it is they need and put them out there so they’re not just employable but they’ve got basically a career,” Hunt said.

So Parker, one of his sisters and his friend, Jason Miller, decided to give it a go together.

“It was a team join,” Parker said.

Parker said he also was having a “what am I doing with my life” kind of moment around that time, and after breezing through some basic skills classes at Job Corps, was allowed to enroll in the Computer Technology program.

While he didn’t remember the general classes being “taxing,” Parker found the challenge he had been looking for in classes specific to his chosen vocation. He and Miller began a healthy competition with each other to accomplish as much as possible, and were soon interning at the Matanuska Telephone Association as the first two Job Corps students to do so.

Once they passed their final test for A+ certification, essential for a career in Information Technology, they had a choice to make — go to college, or go to New Jersey.

Parker said there weren’t many options for computer-based degrees at that time, so he and Miller opted to apply to Edison Job Corps on the East Coast.

“You pretty much have to be the best of best to get into the comp trade there,” Parker said, referring to the state of New Jersey and surrounding areas.

Parker and Miller proved themselves worthy. They interviewed, were accepted into the program, and Job Corps paid to send them across the country.

When they arrived, the instructors were surprised to see the young men had already finished their A+, and put Parker, Miller, their friend Randy Morgan, and another fellow in a separate room to study on their own.

Once again, competition ensued — there was no lack of drive.

“We were pretty motivated, competing against each other to see if we could pass as many tests as possible,” Parker said. “(We thought) ‘hey, we’re never gonna have this opportunity again.’”

Parker ended up taking six tests out of a total seven possible for aspiring computer technicians before his time at Job Corps was up. He spent a year taking business classes at Middlesex Community College while working as a systems administrator at Edison, then spent a year as an IT guy at a public school in the area.

It was during that time that he received a call from a woman asking if he wanted to work as a tech specialist at Princeton University.

“I was, of course, excited about the position so I came out and interviewed and the rest is history,” Parker said.

Parker is now a full-time IT manager and analyst for the Economics department at Princeton and has a bachelor’s degree from Western Governors University, which he obtained while working and finished in 2010.

“Princeton hired me with (just) a high school diploma,” Parker said. “My certification from Job Corps made the difference.”

Parker said he’s considering pursuing a master’s degree and will probably stay on the East Coast to obtain that — he doubts his Puerto Rican wife, whom he met at church while working at Edison, would appreciate a move to Alaska.

Parker now lives in Monmouth Junction, New Jersey with his wife Laurie, 4-year-old daughter Eviana and 2-year-old son Dean.

Contact Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.