Reilly's Ramblings

A man is in his office at the Krone Advising Center on a busy, November Wednesday afternoon. He is at his desk working on what’s going to be on his schedule for the next day.

His name is Alex Watters, and he is a first-year adviser at Morningside College and a member of the city council in Sioux City, Iowa. His regular schedule is full every day between city council duties and his responsibilities in Morningside College.

An interesting fact about him is that he graduated from Morningside College then came back and became an adviser to help out students who are coming out of high school and entering the college world.

He also said that he graduated with a major in political science and global history.

He came to Morningside on a golf scholarship. I asked him what his golf handicap was and he said that it was a plus three to plus four. He said that it “wasn’t as good as I wanted it to be.”

But what makes him a unique individual is that he is in a motorized wheelchair. He sustains a spinal cord injury that was pinched and wasn’t severe. The damage from the injury made his spine become bend seriously like a banana and will stay this way for the rest of his life.

This injury hasn’t stopped him from doing what he wants to do in life. He was to be able to live his life to the fullest every single day.

One of his students, Hailey Barrus, talks about his personality as a first-year adviser.

“He’s a super cool guy and easy to talk to.”

One of his co-workers, Kate Miltenberger, who is also a first-year adviser at Morningside College talks about how she sees him as a co-worker on a day-to-day basis.

“He’s lots of fun. He has a smile on his face and a song in his heart. He always gets the mood up in the office when everybody is tired and stressed.”

He recently was in the city council election in November and won. He is now serving his first full term as a member of the city council. The length of a city council term is four years.

He talks about how he balances the city council and Morningside College duties by making sure that everything in his schedule and order when it comes to times in a day.

He said that you have to have “patience, time management, and be able to schedule what you need and can do for the day.”

Being a part of Morningside College and a member of the city council means that an average day is a very busy one for Alex. He only gets six to seven hours of sleep, but he says that “six to eight hours is the sweet spot for me.”

With the busy schedule on his plate, that means he doesn’t have a lot of free time on his hands. He said, “I do the best I can to have free time and have it whenever I can.”

Barrus also spoke about how she sees him handling his schedule as a student.

“He’s a very busy person but doesn’t make me wonder about it very much because he handles it so well.”

Miltenberger also talks about how he can do more than a lot of people.

“He wants to be as active as he possibly can.”

For Alex, there is not a goal at the end of the day for him. He says, “There’s always going to be something.”

Being on the city council and a first-year adviser at Morningside College, Alex Watters will always have something going on for the next four years. But Alex hasn’t decided yet if he wants to go for reelection in the next city council election. He said, “That’s a bit too early to know and who knows what the future holds.”