Title: Associate professor in biology
How many years have you worked at Saint Mary’s? 28 years; I started at Saint Mary’s in 1997. I came to Saint Mary’s immediately after finishing graduate school. I stayed for all of these years because Saint Mary’s seemed to be a good fit for me. I loved the sense of community that permeated the campus.
What do you enjoy/have you enjoyed most about teaching? What I enjoyed most were the relationships I developed with the students — especially the interactions we had outside the classroom. I dedicated myself to Saint Mary’s. I served as a faculty mentor on four or more S.O.U.L. trips; I was a very active adviser for the Biology Club for many years, and this included taking the students camping at least twice each year. (My own kids still talk about these camping trips!) I had students come to my house for many appetizer parties, potlucks, and pumpkin carving parties.
How do you hope you are remembered/what will you most be remembered for? I hope I am remembered as a very caring but snarky professor who was dedicated to her students and was a good professor. I went into teaching because of a high school science teacher I had. She was a very sarcastic and snarky teacher. Most students hated her but I loved her because she treated us with tough love, and I believe we all became better people because of it. It also was very clear that she cared about all of us as people. This is how I tried to treat and teach my students! Unfortunately, she passed away before I ever expressed my appreciation for her. This still makes me sad.
What are you most proud of from your career? I think I embraced what it means to be Lasallian. My boys attended a small Catholic university, and thought they would have the chance to develop relationships with professors like I had with my students. That didn’t happen for them, and that is when they realized Saint Mary’s was special and that their mom was a special type of professor.
I probably gave too much of myself to Saint Mary’s, but Saint Mary’s was also good to me! I visited a Christian Brother-run orphanage in India and went to help the poor in Mexico through S.O.U.L. trips. I went to visit Lasallian universities in the Philippines twice! I visited Kenya because of Saint Mary’s (and even climbed Mount Kilimanjaro when I was there). I spent three weeks learning about being Lasallian in Rome through a mission development opportunity, and I love to travel, so these were all wonderful opportunities for me! And I really appreciated them! But my greatest accomplishment at Saint was probably my teaching ability and the relationships I developed with my students.
What are your retirement plans? I am spending time with my family and friends during my retirement and am doing as much traveling as possible! I bought myself a small camper for my adventures and spent some time in spring visiting the national parks in Utah.
What will you miss the most? I will miss the students and my wonderful colleagues! I loved the students; they were such kind and caring individuals. I appreciated the relationships I developed with them! I loved the colleagues I had over the years; they are/were wonderful people. I also appreciated the relationships I developed with some of the Christian Brothers — especially Brother John (Grover, FSC), Brother Frank (Carr, FSC), Brother Arnold (McMullen, FSC), and Brother Finbar (McMullen, FSC). I wouldn’t have retired except for my diagnosis of terminal brain cancer! I retired in a very quick manner because I had to have a biopsy in the fall because the cancer had grown back and I didn’t want to disrupt my students routines due to health issues. While having cancer sucks, it was nice to hear from a number of my former students around the time of the benefit. Thanks to Nikki Lemmer for organizing that! It was interesting because most students let me know that they appreciated all of the interactions we had outside the classroom, how they appreciated the high standards I set for them, and how great they felt when I finally called them out on things. They said that they knew I cared about them as individuals, and that meant a lot to me!
