Bakery owner gives back to community

Having volunteered to help boost Flathead Valley Community College for almost two decades, Nancy Gordley knows what a big role the college can play in the valley.

She also knows what a big role the valley can play in helping the college.

“It is just so intricate to the whole valley,” Gordley said. “It works its way into all of our lives.”

One of Gordley’s two grown daughters attended the college, transferring to finish a four-year degree.

In just the last 18 months, as the owner of the Great Harvest Bread Co. in Kalispell, Gordley has hired four students for part-time jobs. Some of them are studying in the college’s culinary arts program.

A 17-year volunteer member of the Flathead Valley Community College Foundation, Gordley was given the college’s Eagle Award in May for her “outstanding contributions” to the college and its mission.

“She’s been a really strong advocate for as long as she’s been involved,” said Jane Karas, the college’s president.

“Her focus has always been on how to help students be more successful ... She’s such a forward thinker, looking at ways to improve how we’re doing things and better raise funds to provide more opportunities for students.”

Gordley said she was honored to receive the award. “I was speechless, to be honest about it.”

Over the last two decades, the Flathead Valley Community College Foundation’s assets have grown from just $60,000 to more than $7 million.

“We’re all so proud of what has happened,” Gordley said.

More scholarships are available than ever before, with more than $1.1 million awarded to students in the last five years. Gordley set up one of those endowed scholarships in memory of her late husband, Jim.

“It’s just an extra $500 in their pockets to help them buy gas to get to school or buy clothes,” Gordley said of the scholarship. “But it’s amazing what even a few hundred dollars can do.”

Gordley led a “Building for Success” community fundraising campaign to come up with the last $1 million needed to build the college’s Occupational Trades Building, Arts and Technology Building and Early Childhood Center.

Now she’s helping raise money for the college’s Rebecca Chaney Broussard Center for Nursing and Health Science.

The college just broke ground on that facility. A $4 million gift from the Broussard family left the college with $1 million to raise — a share that already has been chiseled down to about $120,000, Gordley said.

“That’s where we’re focused right now.”

Gordley stressed she’s just one of many volunteers on the foundation’s board of directors and just one person in a large support network in the Flathead Valley.

“It warms your heart when you’re out there and see 80-year-old women helping us with events along with kids at the school,” she said. “I can’t take a lot of credit because there’s so many of us involved.”

GORDLEY, who is 61, moved to the Flathead from St. Paul, Minn., in 1989. She made the move with her two daughters who were in middle school at the time and Jim, who had taken a job with Semitool.

Gordley and her husband had vacationed here and fallen in love with the area.

When she’s not busy running Great Harvest or working with the community college, there are plenty of other things to work on.

Her home on 20 acres keeps her busy. She also might be out enjoying the Flathead’s natural splendor.

Gordley co-owns a couple of buildings in the valley, one of which she built with her friend Carol Scranton.

She runs a Whitefish business that provides concierge services with her friend Pat LaTourelle, who first got her involved with the community college years ago.

She also volunteers as vice president of the board of directors for the Alpine Theatre Project in Whitefish.

“I’m not one of those people who can afford to give millions of dollars, but I sure can work my tail off to help make things happen, to give the man-hours and whatever else I can do,” Gordley said.

“I always enjoy giving back, especially with the college. I know how instrumental it is for education and business.”

Gordley hopes to slow down some day, maybe pass on her Great Harvest franchise and spend more time with her grandchildren.

“But it’s kind of my nature to keep busy. And since my husband passed away it’s good to get up and go to work and do something. Life’s an adventure.”

Reporter Tom Lotshaw may be reached at 758-4483 or by email at tlotshaw@dailyinterlake.com.