After 14 years of leading the athletics department at Central College, Al Dorenkamp will retire as Athletics Director at the end of the 2011-12 academic year. A 1975 Central graduate, Dorenkamp earned All-America distinction for the Dutch football team, serving as captain of the 1974 squad that won the college’s first NCAA Division III Championship. During his time as Athletics Director, he has seen Central’s student-athletes win four more NCAA National Championships, 13 individual titles and 46 Iowa Conference crowns.

Among his numerous accomplishments and duties, Dorenkamp also initiated numerous improvements to the athletic facilities at Central College, and started Central’s Athletics Hall of Honor in 2002 to recognize achievement and service before and after college by student-athletes. His wife, Jo, will be stepping down as well. A 1974 Central graduate, she is the college’s postal services coordinator. Central College president Mark Putnam says a search for Al Dorenkamp’s successor will begin later this spring.