Mr. Eric Bjerkaas

First, my last name is pronounced byerk-us. (The name is Norwegian, so the j's are pronounced like y's.) Most of my students, however, call me Mr. B.

I have been teaching mathematics at LP since 2007 and, while not from the Illinois Valley originally, I did marry an LP alum and we are raising our four children in Utica.

My father was in the Air Force, so I lived in a lot of places growing up, from Massachusetts to the Azores. I graduated from O'Fallon Township High School in southern Illinois and promptly left the Midwest to attend Boston University on an Army ROTC scholarship. I was commissioned as an officer in the Signal Corp after earning my degree and was stationed in Germany for three years. After leaving the military, I eventually went back to school to earn a teaching degree.

While I appreciate mathematics, the best part of my job is helping students learn and succeed through their own hard work and persistence.