Bernier attended St. Joseph High School in Santa Maria, California where he was primarily a pitcher. He did not receive any scholarship offers from any four-year schools and chose to begin his college baseball career at Cuesta College. At Cuesta, Bernier started every game at shortstop and set school records in walks in a single season and in a career. Bernier continued his college career at Oral Roberts where he had a .332 career batting average and was named to the Mid-Continent Conference First Team as a senior.
