Trinity Lutheran High School senior Luke Pollert said he has always been motivated to get his homework done and study hard.
His work ethic is one of the reasons the 18-year-old is the salutatorian for Saturday’s graduation ceremony.
Pollert ranks second highest in his graduating class with a 3.995 grade-point average and will deliver the salutatorian address.
“I’ll be giving a speech at the beginning of graduation, and I’m not nervous yet, but I will be,” he admitted.
The senior will graduate with his 32 classmates at 10 a.m. in the Bollinger Athletic Complex at Trinity Lutheran High School in Seymour.
Pollert was the only one from his senior class to have attended Lutheran Central School, a private school in Brownstown.
He didn’t let that stop him from making new friends at Trinity, some of whom are on the tennis team with him.
“I first played tennis when I attended Lutheran Central sixth through eighth grade,” he said. “We got to play with the Brownstown team because we didn’t have enough players to have our own team.”
Pollert continued to play tennis all through high school and is one of three team members at Trinity who received senior awards for the sport. The other two seniors were Henry Hall and Tanner Bauserman.
Tennis coach Kable Walton said Pollert always came through in the clutch, especially in close matches, and for that reason, he also received the most valuable player award last fall.
“Me and my doubles partner, James Thomack, won more matches, but our position gave us an advantage,” Pollert said.
One memory that stands out from being on Trinity’s tennis team is after they had a pretty tough home match.
“Every single person on our team lost, and we were waiting on JV player Nathaniel Bauman to finish,” he said. “Once he got done, we carried him off the court (in celebration) even though he didn’t win, and it was funny.”
During his time at Trinity, Pollert not only made friendships with classmates but also with teachers.
Pollert said his favorite teacher is Justin Vorthmann, who teaches in the math, science and engineering departments and is the National Honor Society adviser.
“He has been the most helpful teacher to me, and as for my favorite subject, I could be vague and say it’s math,” Pollert said. “But I’d have to say physics, calculus and engineering, and those are all Mr. Vorthmann’s classes.”
After graduation, Pollert plans to attend Purdue University in West Lafayette and major in agricultural engineering.
He has been in FFA all four years of high school and served as vice president this school year, and he also is a 10-year 4-H member.
“I brought in swine and field corn for 4-H every year except for this past year since we didn’t know if we were going to have the fair, and we didn’t,” he said.
Pollert lives in Vallonia, where he grew up on his family’s small farm. It’s the same farm that was worked by his grandpa and dad and now, his brother.
Life on the farm has definitely been a big part of the reason Pollert decided to study agricultural engineering in college.
“I’ve seen the transition from our old equipment to the new John Deere combine 60-foot planters,” he said. “That sparked my interest into becoming an ag engineer.”
Seeing that technology and how it now takes less than half the time it normally did to farm is pretty amazing, he said.
“As an ag engineer, I think I’ll focus mostly on machine systems,” Pollert said. “That would be testing new revisions on tractors and making sure they’re working like they should.”
He recalls some fun activities he has participated in while in high school, like Drive Your Tractor to School Day during FFA Week.
“I drove an articulated tractor to school this year and last year,” he said. “Articulated means it’s got four wheels and pivots in the middle, and some call them four wheel drives.”
He drove his tractor going up U.S. 31 to Seymour and said things got pretty interesting, as it was something people didn’t expect to see on their morning commute.
During FFA Week, there are activities that take place in the gym, too. Last year, there was a pedal tractor race, and this year, they had a cornhole competition that Pollert said was pretty fun.
Besides looking forward to college and getting his career started, Pollert is looking forward to meeting new people.
“I applied to FarmHouse fraternity at Purdue, so I’m hoping I get in,” he said. “Then I can make some new friends there like my brothers did, and half of their friends were in FarmHouse with them.”
Pollert said these last few weeks of high school have snuck up on him. Time has flown by, but he thinks he’s ready for the next chapter of his life to begin.
“I’ll miss seeing my friends every day because I think the majority of them are going off in various directions, so we’ll have to reunite at some point,” he said. “I’ve had a pretty good time in high school, but I’ll be moving on to college, and I’m ready for the new experience.”
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Name: Luke Pollert
Age: 18
Hometown: Vallonia
Residence: Vallonia
School: Trinity Lutheran High School
School activities: Tennis, FFA, National Honor Society and 4-H
Future plans: Attend Purdue University and study agricultural engineering
Family: Parents, Greg and Anna Pollert, brothers, Seth, Joshua and Caleb
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What: Trinity Lutheran High School graduation
When: 10 a.m. Saturday
Where: Bollinger Athletic Complex at Trinity Lutheran High School, 7120 N. County Road 875E, Seymour
Who: 33 members of the Class of 2021
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