Lakeland Mirror

Issue date: 2/1/07 Section: Features

Jason Irish sits leisurely in his office during his last week working for Lakeland.

Many people visit the Lakeland Web site every day. The Web site has undergone some drastic changes in the past few years and recently received an "A" rating by the National Research Center for College & University Admissions. After two years of making the Lakeland Web site great, webmaster Jason Irish is leaving Lakeland to work for Kohler Company.

He started working at Lakeland in the summer of 2004. Jason has updated and upgraded the Web site to help Lakeland College offer more information and services that have brought Lakeland into the forefront of college Web sites.

Even though Jason hasn't had any formal training in web programming, he has made a name for himself with his hard work and dedication. He is a perfect example of finding what you enjoy doing and making a career out of it.

We sat down in the campus center so Jason could refill his cup of coffee at the Daily Grind. "I guess we didn't need to meet here," he said when he showed up with a full cup of coffee. This was going to be a fun interview.

Jason grew up in Sheboygan "down by the water slide." I didn't know what he meant at first, but he explained that the water slide is by the park just before you enter Sheboygan from the north on highway 42. He chuckled as I recall where that is and tells me that is how he always describes where he is from.

Jason graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with bachelor degrees in philosophy and political science. "By acquiring those degrees, it taught me how to think more than anything else," he said.

While attending college, Jason got his first experiences creating Web sites. "I started by making a Web site for our dorms' party pictures," he said. "We were the only dorm at the time to have something like that."

The next step was making Web sites for rock bands that he played in. "We needed a Web site, so I made one to get our name out," said Jason. "As we went on, I just kept adding more stuff like music. I even helped run the Web site for a small independent underground record label."

As Jason was involved with all of these organizations, he found that the one thing he enjoyed most was building the Web sites.

In 2001, Jason and a few college friends started an online magazine called "A Common Sense." "It was the first user submitted online publication that I was aware of," he said. "We accepted poetry, fiction, photo spreads, editorials, just about anything. At our peak we had something like 500 contributing writers. It was huge."

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