Ernie Schiller: Teacher, volunteer, art broker

Ernie Schiller is a well-known figure in Lee Country and SE Iowa, as well as NW Missouri, Eastern Ill., the University of Iowa and Iowa State University, Washington D.C., Nepal, the list goes on. He taught science at Central Lee High School for 34 years and was Teacher of the Year his final year of teaching. He was on the County Board of Supervisors in Lee County for two terms, operated a greenhouse east of Donnellson, with his wife Cheryl — a music teacher at Harmony — and has rubbed shoulders with the likes of the Bush Administration, Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Bill and Hillary Clinton. When politicians come to Iowa, many of them want to talk to Ernie about education and earth-science issues. Born in poverty, he graduated from Iowa State University with a degree in horticulture, and introduced Norman Borlaug to a packed crowd at CY Stevens Auditorium in Ames just after Borlaug received the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in wheat production and the “green revolution.”

In the second grade Ernie's teacher put a magazine on his desk and said, “Today we have a new tallest mountain, Sargarmatha, which has become known as Mount Everest, in a country called Nepal.” They pulled out a globe and looked really hard, because Nepal is a tiny country about the size of Iowa, right beside India. Young Ernie asked what Nepal was like. The teacher turned the page and there was a Nepalese family working in a rice paddy, on the side of a mountain, up to their knees in mud. Even at that young age, Ernie understood poverty. When his wife and he were married, he told her that if they ever had enough money, he wanted to go to Nepal.

In 2014, Ernie was asked to escort five teenage girls from the U.S. to India to study. There was no pay, but his airfare was provided. Remembering his childhood dream of visiting Nepal, Ernie used the opportunity to travel to nearby Nepal. While in Nepal, being an educator, he visited five elementary schools. There were no windows or doors on the buildings and the kids had nothing. Ernie was embarrassed by his own clothes. But the kids were bright and eager to learn. Ernie made arrangements to come back in 2015 and help teach English and science.

But the earthquake happened in 2015 and everything Ernie had seen on the mountains was gone where 9,000 people died in 30 seconds. Now the Nepalese really needed Ernie's help.

Ernie set up a Go Fund Me account (gofundme.com/2f2mgsek) on Facebook to raise money and in 2016 returned to Nepal with 500 lbs of supplies. He slept on a wooden plank with an inch thick pad for a mattress. Another person from the U.S. joined him, a doctor, and for seven-and-a-half weeks they did education and medical treatment.

Ernie returned home in time for Thanksgiving and, feeling down, told his wife he was never returning to Nepal. God had different plans. The word spread and other people wanted to do volunteer work in Nepal. A 501(c)(3) non-profit organization (Rebuild Nepal Education Foundation) was set up to raise money. Several more trips to Nepal took place.

Then Ernie heard about the art. A Nepalese art teacher named Sujan Tamang was painting stunning watercolors of the people of Nepal, Mt. Everest and various landscapes. If you've ever heard of Wendell Mohr, a famous watercolor artist from SE Iowa and Des Moines (now deceased), there are a lot of similarities with the “wet-on-wet” look of Wendall Mohr's paintings and Sujan Tamang's.

To make a long story short, Ernie Schiller has arranged an art exhibition of Sujan Tamang's artwork, as well as many of Sujan Tamang's art students (in Nepal art is taught like science in the U.S.), at the Ft. Madison Area Art Association, 825 G Ave. in Ft. Madison, for the month of August with 100 percent of the proceeds for the sale of this artwork go directly to the Nepalese.

Ernie Schiller is 71 and retired. He never thought he would fight for human rights in a country halfway around the world. But like Sujan Tamang's watercolors that softly blend together, Ernie fell in love with the country and children of Nepal. His life work may still be before him. For more information about educational mission work in Nepal go to rebuildnepaleducation.org.

Contact Curt Swarm at curtswarm@yahoo.com