Recent RCTC alum Delanie Wanek knows what it’s like to start over. The current Des Moines Area Community College Mortuary Science student has also been a cosmetologist for the past decade. Wanek’s interest in mortuary science began when she was 17 after visiting a job fair.
“I asked my mom…’Mom, am I a weird kid if I want to work in a funeral home?’” Rather than pursue mortuary science, though, she went to school for cosmetology. Wanek found that she enjoyed it enough to make a career of it.
Ten years, one marriage, and a pandemic later, Wanek still felt a pull to mortuary science. “After ten years, I was like, let’s go try something that I think would be beneficial to me and beneficial to others.”
“You always have an excuse not to do something,” Wanek says, citing bills and a need for stability as her reasons not to return to school. “We moved here, to Minnesota, and I was like, you know what? No more. No more excuses.”
Immediately following her husband’s graduation, Wanek applied for RCTC and has had no regrets.
“The people at RCTC…they were all super nice! They were so helpful, and very accepting, they wanted to know you.”
To transfer to a mortuary science program, Wanek needed 15 more credits, which she finished at RCTC last fall.
In the process, she found solace in acting. She starred in RCTC’s fall production of Lions in Illyria and is once again taking center stage as the titular character in RCTC’s spring production of The Curious Savage.
Wanek’s parting advice to those considering higher education: focus on transferring credits and attending technical schools.
She also stresses the importance of finding balance within school and life.
“Gauge what you think you can do at the time that you are now, not ten years from now, not ten years ago.”
Make sure to come see Delanie Wanek in RCTC’s Theater Department production of The Curious Savage by John Patrick, running April 11, 12, 18, and 19 at 7 pm, and April 13 and 20 at 2 pm. Tickets are $12.00 for adults, $10.00 for seniors and non-RCTC students, and free for RCTC students with valid student ID.
story and photo by Jessica Cormican