FAIRMONT– Amber Diekmann is the newest staff member at Goldfinch Estates in Fairmont. She came on board last month as the new activities manager.

While originally from Fairmont, Diekmann has spent the past decade living in the Twin Cities. She moved home this past summer with her young child.

“I wanted to be part of a smaller community where people know each other. It feels safe here,” she said.

The new position is a bit of a change of Diekmann. She has a master’s degree and has spent the past 15 years doing social work.

“I’ve worked managing group homes and I worked for Dakota County for nine years,” Diekmann said.

After moving back home, she spent a brief time with Martin County but said she found she didn’t want a job that required as much paper work. Rather, she wanted to be working with people where she could see the impact of her work first-hand.

“I thought this would be the perfect job because I can find out what they want and what’s best for them,” Diekmann said of working with residents.

Diekmann said she’s always enjoyed working with the aging population and interned at Lakeview Methodist Health Care Center while she was in college. She shared that her grandfather was also a resident at Goldfinch and that she spent time volunteering at Goldfinch while in high school.

She also said that during her years as a case manager, she worked with people from ages 2 to 90.

In her new role, she’ll be working with both residents in assisted living and residents on Goldfinch’s memory care side.

“The memory care unit has a lot of the same type of needs at times when people are developmentally delayed,” Diekmann explained.

Her background in social work is unique and something that past activity directors at Goldfinch haven’t had. While only in her first week, Diekmann is looking at the programming. She said she’s meeting with other departments to try to find out what’s working and what’s not working. She also plans to meet with members of the residents council.

Diekmann plans to take a person-centered planing option, which is a process for selecting and organizing the services and supports that an older adult or person with a disability may need to live in the community.

“I want to look at what people want to get them engaged. If there’s an activity planned that no one wants to go to, how is that helping them?” she said.

With her office on the memory care side, Diekmann said she especially wants to work on getting the individuals there engaged in activities.

“If somebody can do it and wants to do it, let’s help them do it. Of course we need to make sure they’re safe, but if they want to sweep we should have a broom there so they can sweep,” she said.

While assisted living communities and nursing homes have been greatly impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic over the past few years, with things hopefully calming down, Diekmann said they’re looking at starting some of the programs residents were able to partake in in a pre-Covid world.

“We’re looking at getting volunteers in here and how we can help get individuals here out and volunteering. That’s really meaningful to a lot of people,” Diekmann said.

She said she’s also considering how to get school children safely inside to do activities with residents and potentially have students come in at prom, which is coming up next month.

Residents typically get a monthly calendar with all of the activities listed for each day of the month. The previous activities director created a calendar for the month of April, but Diekmann is looking for new activities and programs to bring in beyond that.

In her new role, Diekmann said she’s hoping to make people’s lives better. She pointed out that for some, this is their only community.

“I want them to feel like they have what they need and not that they’re bored. I want them to feel like they enjoy waking up and having something to do or the option to go out into the community and so something,” she said.

When it comes down to it, Diekmann just wants to offer what residents are interested in.

“I want to give them options,” she said.