Knolls Vista principal is retiring in June

MOSES LAKE - After almost 40 years of teaching students in Idaho and Washington as well as remote villages in Alaska, Knolls Vista Elementary School principal Mike Riggs will retire in June.

But Riggs says he has plenty to keep him busy.

"It means I'll have the opportunity to do some things I want to do," Riggs says.

Gardening, traveling to Mexico and Alaska as well as continuing teaching are all on Riggs' schedule. In the past, Riggs taught classes for Heritage, Big Bend Community College and Eastern Washington University in curriculum, educational issues, psychology and more.

"Most classes have worked toward students obtaining their master's degree in education, and I really enjoy teaching those classes," says Riggs.

Riggs grew up in Wenatchee and began his teaching career as a para-educator after graduating from Washington State University.

In 1973, Riggs says he served as a student teacher in the same building he now works in as Knolls Vista's principal.

During the 1970s, Riggs taught third and fourth grades in Twisp before moving on the Moscow to teach sixth grade. Then, in 1981, Riggs moved up to Kake, Alaska, and taught at a traditional Tlingit tribe village.

"The first year in the village was really unique," says Riggs, "It was a very remote village in the sense that the ferry came once a week or you could charter a plane."

With a 50 percent turn-over of staff from year to year, Riggs says he spent holidays with lots of different teachers.

"The native cultural experience was a totally different pace than our own, but they value education very highly, too," says Riggs.

After renting a shipping container and bringing everything they owned, Riggs soon found out that with no lawns in town, a lot of the things he'd brought weren't really necessary.

"I used maybe one third of all the things I brought," Riggs says.

The second year, Riggs says he bought a pickup truck with a camper and remembers the numerous trips on old Alaskan logging roads he took with his family.

"There were lots of adventures like being in the camper when there were bears outside," Riggs says. "And there were always lots of fish."

Riggs has taken trips back to Alaska for the past two summers and plans to do so again this coming summer.

While here in Moses Lake, Riggs enjoys biking and is an active member of the Trails Planning Team, which works to create walking and biking paths around town.

"The goal is to develop recreational foot and bike trails but also to provide practical transportation," Riggs says.

"Part of the key is that I really want to remain in this community," Riggs says. "My wife and I feel very much at home here. The quality of life here far exceeds anywhere else."

Riggs has served on the Big Bend Community College Foundation board as well as a chairman and committee member for the district Boy Scouts.