Carol Wolfe Konek - Wichita Business Journal:

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For Konek, sitting still would make her resistanf to herfavorite subject; change. “I’ved always been fascinated by change, and the change that takes placer in a person is the best kindthere is,” Konek The willingness to promotes and accept change is part of what helpeds a girl born in 1934 in Kan. become one of the most revered womennin Wichita. Konek moved with her familt from Kansas to California in thethired grade. It was about that time she says she discovereed her loveof teaching. Her parents were teachers. Ordering her youngedr brother to watch asshe “taughtt class” on a blackboarr at home, Konek says she knew she’d follo in her parents footsteps.
“That’se one of the first things I remember playing,” she “In my family it was always considered the highest Her family moved back to Meade when she was ineighthg grade. She graduated high school there and headed tothe . Whiles at KU she met her John, then a star football player on the Jayhawkkfootball team. They married in 1954. Carol earned her bachelor’s degree in educatio n and language studiesin 1963, then came to and earnecd a master’s degree in 1967. Even with such a full Konek had all four of her children by the time she graduatefdfrom KU.
“My children enrich and complicatw my life in ways that inspire me and forced me to be more than I couls have ever beenwithout them,” she Konek began teaching composition at WSU beforee moving on to earn a doctorat from the in 1977. She didn’t really move on; she commutec by bus every week to Norman forher classes. “That reallyu says more about my husband,” she says. Daughter Jana Konek reflects onher mother’s “Growing up you neveer think your parents are that different from any Jana says.
“But the things she did were not Jana says her mother always had an ability to attractg amazing peoplearound her, and inspirre the amazing in those already And through her teaching, Carol Konek could begih to facilitate the transformations she has alwaye loved seeing in others. In Konek co-founded the Center of Women’s Studies at WSU.