Katherine B. Persson was appointed to fill the vacant EMCID Director position 4 in 2013. Since then, she was elected to serve two more terms in 2016 and 2020. Katherine and her husband, Andrew, are long-time residents of Splendora, having moved there in 1978. Their three children graduated from Splendora ISD and attended Lonestar College-Kingwood.
Katherine believes in community advocacy and stewardship. My parents often said, “Talk is cheap. Put your time and money where your mouth is.” If you want things to get better, you have to get involved. That is why I served as a Splendora ISD Trustee for 16 years (eight years as the chair,) and served as a director and chair for the Greater East Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce Board and the Lake Houston Chamber.
Katherine Persson
Secretary
I have also served on the Splendora ISD Land and Facilities Committee since 2019 and helped chair the 2022 Splendora ISD Bond political action committee, promoting the passage of a bond to build new schools to meet the demands of a fast-growing community.
The decisions EMCID directors make affect the quality of life for us as residents. We want nice places to eat, shop, and play. We want our children to have both educational and employment opportunities to live independently and contribute to their communities.
Katherine’s career has been in education. She retired in 2020 as the president of Lone Star College-Kingwood. Persson was the founding biology faculty member when Lone Star College-Kingwood opened in 1984. While she loved teaching, setting up a biology department, and creating the first biotechnology associate degree in the state, after eight years she was enticed to enter the administrative ranks.
After serving as vice president, Katherine left her beloved college and community in 2006 to become the president of the Portland Community College Rock Creek Campus, an experience she truly loved. A few years later, the opportunity to apply for the presidency at the college she helped start arose. When she retired 12 years later, at the end of 2020, she was the longest-serving college president of Lone Star College-Kingwood and led the institution through recovery after Hurricane Harvey devastated 80 percent of the campus. Fourteen months after the campus facilities reopened, she worked with colleagues throughout the college system as all synchronized efforts to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Because of their Harvey experience, her campus and employees had a smooth transition into the many changes the pandemic brought. Also, because there was no publication to help her college recover from the Harvey devastation, she wrote Overcoming Disaster: What Colleges Learned from Catastrophe to Recovery. All proceeds from the book go to the LSC Foundation.
Besides spending time with her family, Katherine is an avid gardener. She is a certified Montgomery County Master Gardener and a native plant and antique rose enthusiast.