A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents [1 ed.] 9781617356490, 9781617356476

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A Century of Leadership Kappa Delta Pi Presidents

A volume in Research in Curriculum and Instruction Series Editor O. L. Davis, Jr., University of Texas, Austin

Research in Curriculum and Instruction O. L. Davis, Jr., Series Editor Narrative Inquiries of School Reform: Storied Lives, Storied Landscapes, Storied Metaphors (2003) edited by Cheryl J. Craig Deep Change: Cases and Commentary on Schools and Programs of Successful Reform in High Stakes States (2005) by Martin Forsey Schooled for the Future? Educational Policy and Everyday Life among Urban Squatters in Nepal (2005) edited by Gerald Ponder and David Strahan Explorations in Curriculum History (2005) edited by Sherry L. Field Wise Social Studies in an Age of High-Stakes Testing: Essays on Classroom Practices and Possibilities (2005) edited by Elizabeth Anne Yeager and O. L. Davis Exposing a Culture of Neglect: Herschek T. Manuel and Mexican American Schooling (2006) by Matthew D. Davis The Pursuit of Curriculum: Schooling and the Public Interest (2006) edited by William A. Reid and J. Wesley Null Measuring History: Cases of State-Level Testing Across the United States (2006) edited by S. G. Grant What Shall We Tell the Children? International Perspectives on School History Textbooks (2006) Stuart J. Foster and Keith Crawford Talent Knows No Color: The History of an Arts Magnet High School (2007) by Elaine Clift Gore War, Nation, Memory: International Perspectives on World War II in School History Textbooks (2007) edited by Keith A. Crawford and Stuart J. Foster Addressing Social Issues in the Classroom and Beyond: The Pedagogical Efforts of Pioneers in the Field (2007) edited by Samual Totten and Jon Pedersen An Awkward Echo: Matthew Arnold and John Dewey (2010) by Mark David Dietz Teaching and Studying Social Issues: Major Programs and Approaches (2011) by Samuel Totten and Jon Pedersen A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents (2012) edited by O. L. Davis, Jr. and Mindy Spearman

A Century of Leadership Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents edited by

O. L. Davis, Jr. The University of Texas at Austin and Mindy Spearman Clemson University

Information Age Publishing, Inc. Charlotte, North Carolina • www.infoagepub.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A century of leadership : biographies of Kappa Delta Pi presidents / edited by O.L. Davis, Jr. and Mindy Spearman. p. cm. -- (Research in curriculum and instruction) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978-1-61735-647-6 (pbk.) -- ISBN 978-1-61735-648-3 (hardcover) -ISBN 978-1-61735-649-0 (ebook) 1. Kappa Delta Pi (Honor society)--Presidents--Biography. I. Davis, O. L. (Ozro Luke), 1928- II. Spearman, Mindy. LJ121.K425C46 2011 371.8'50973--dc23 2011038823

Photographs that appear in this volume are from Kappa Delta Pi, International Honor Society in Education. Used with permission.

Copyright © 2012 IAP–Information Age Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, or by photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. Printed in the United States of America

CONTENTS Prologue: Continuing the Creation of our Future O. L. Davis, Jr., and Mindy Spearman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix 1. W. W. Denton (1915-1917): Establishing a National Organization Vanessa M. Villate. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 2. Frank E. Thompson (1917-1919): Expanding the Society O. L. Davis, Jr. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 3. William C. Bagley (1919-1924): The Founder and Spirit of Kappa Delta Pi Wesley Null. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 4. Thomas Cooke McCracken (1924-1948): Committed to the Profession of Teaching Paula K. Greene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 5. William McKinley Robinson (1948-1950): A Steward for Rural Education and Life David Callejo Perez . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 6. Frank L. Wright (1950-1953): Leader Over New Horizons Matthew D. Davis and Joshua M. Walehwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 7. Katherine Vickery (1953-1958): Female Visionary Cheryl J. Craig . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 8. John J. Harton (1958-1964): Steady Hand at the Helm O. L. Davis, Jr. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 9. Gerald H. Read (1964-1966): International Educator Marcella L. Kysilka . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 10. Esther J. McKune (1966-1968): A Determined Woman Marcella L. Kysilka . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

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11. Wippert Arnot Stumpf (1968-1970): Turbulent Times Ron Knorr . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101 12. Lorrene Love Ort (1970-1972): Valuing Artistic Creativity and Academic Excellence in Educators Sherri R. Colby . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 13. Frank E. Marsh, Jr. (1972-1974): Sowing Seeds for Future Growth Mark Dietz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 14. A. Keith Turkett (1974-1976): “Ideals are Power” Stephanie van Hover, David Hicks, and John Baran . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 15. Clementine Skinner (1976-1978): Educator, Historian, and Activist Cynthia Hansberry Williams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 16. Richard Louis Judd (1978-1980): Creating a Foundation for the Future Elizabeth Smith Harrison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173 17. O. L. Davis, Jr. (1980-1982): Nurturing Scholarship and Honoring Excellence in Education Ron W. Wilhelm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183 18. Jerry H. Robbins (1982-1984): Modernizing the Society Brenda Wheat Whiteman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195 19. William Ross Palmer (1984-1986): Standing in Front of Lions Antonio J. Castro and Sarah B. Shear . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209 20. Marcella L. Kysilka (1986-1988): Leadership, Professionalism, and Society Management Edmund C. Short. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221 21. Bruce Jorgensen (1988-1990): Practical Leadership Jared R. Stallones . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231 22. John Petry (1990-1992): A Transformational Leader Karon N. LeCompte . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247 23. George L. Mehaffy (1992-1994): New Pathways Stephen S. Masyada and Elizabeth A. Washington . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257 24. Wallace D. Draper (1994-1996): Five New Plans Larry J. Kelly. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271

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25. Morgan Simpson (1996-1998): Hope and Opportunity Jamin Carson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279 26. Barbara D. Day (1998-2000): To Serve and To Lead Sherry L. Field and Michelle Bauml . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287 27. Janette Staton Rogers (2000-2002): Excellence In and Beyond the Classroom Robin Robinson Kapavik . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301 28. Blossom Snoyer Nissman (2002-2004): “Labels are for Jelly Jars, Not for Children” Dana Haraway and Barbara Slater Stern. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311 29. John Douglas Light (2004-2006): A Lifetime Educator Janet Hammer and Patricia Wiese . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321 30. Karen Nicholson (2006-2008): Valuing Contemporary Educators Angela Eckhoff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331 31. Pamela Kramer Ertel (2008-2010): A Quiet Leader Kelley M. King and Vivien Geneser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339 32. Nathan Bond (2010-2012): Journey Toward the Centennial Celebration Sarah Mathews and Denisha Jones. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353 About the Authors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365

PROLOGUE Continuing the Creation of Our Future C. SLEETER

O. L. Davis, Jr., and Mindy Spearman

Kappa Delta Pi, now in its Centenary year, emerged within the context of rapid expansion of American schooling in the early decades of the 20th century. Significantly, public education became a booming enterprise during those years. Enrollment in schools across the nation increased dramatically, primarily in cities, and efforts to increase the numbers of rural children who attended school for increased numbers of years also were successful. In addition, the availability of high school education for youth rapidly increased in response to the demand for post-elementary education. The educational course of this century, on the other hand, was not simply exceptional; its generally progressive reaches commonly exceeded its grasps. To help prepare adolescents for jobs after leaving high school was an acknowledged success in many communities; however, in many others, it has been judged to have eroded school concern for fundamental education in the conventional subjects as well as deprived students of sound, robust backgrounds in civic education. As American schooling increased its attractiveness in general during the past century, it misfired with respect to too many of its programs. Its efforts to “Americanize” immigrant newcomers to the nation remain a significant blemish on the American dream. However, the most obvious and brutal failure of American schooling was its denial of equitable and solid educational opportunities in the lives of its African American citizens. Their commonplace memories are filled with routine, systemic A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. ix–xiv Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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abuses … of being denied entrance into schools, of possibly attending school sessions in structures that otherwise would be called shacks, of being treated as ones without talent and promise, of having well-meaning, but ill-educated teachers, and of using the soiled and often-torn textbooks earlier used by white students in their studies. And more. And too much more. Within this intense ferment, two other ideas gained traction. The notion of industrial efficiency took school administration by storm. Spawned in the churning factory economy of the new century, drives for efficiency in the nation’s schools yielded mixed results, but many of its artifacts became commonplace. Clocks and bells signaled changes in the daily routine, in classroom organization, and curriculum content. Standardized testing—with “updated” forms and new emphases that assertedly measured many and varied student attributes from height to arithmetic achievement to mental abilities—quickly became a growth industry. Moreover, it has endured and expanded. Libraries and laboratories and gardens and sports centers seemed always to be auxiliary to the continuing power of grade-level and course textbooks. Efforts to measure teaching yielded check-lists, pupil evaluations, rating scales, and selfreports, but the “everyday-ness” of practice seemed always to frustrate advocacies of measurable teaching efficiency. And this frustrated and failed dream, a kind of dead person walking, continues to attract interest. More than perplexing, contemporary politics in the U.S. has revived the discredited and shameful slogans of early 20th century industrial efficiency. Disputes about debt and taxes embody the utter illogic of the contemptible notions of “inputs” and “outputs” in schooling. Students’ test scores cannot logically be converted into teacher and school rankings. Only through profound misunderstanding and perverted misrepresentation of the relationship of teaching and students’ learning can politicians and pundits understand that “learning” as an “output” of the student and of the teacher and of the school. This same “efficiency” notion plays into political ploys to reduce taxes and, thus, to reduce or eliminate the level and quality of school offerings. Politically, public education is undergoing a siege largely unknown in American history. “Efficiency” probably will enjoy its reckless marauding in America’s schools, but it likely will not win the day. As Kappa Delta Pi Laureate Ralph Tyler remembered the impact of the 1930s depression on American schools, he often observed something like, “Strange as it seems, when the outlook for education looks bleak, educators seem to ramp up their practical inventiveness in all sorts of ways.” The KDP Centennial can be seen as an opportunity for the Society to promote this sense of hope. A second major concern of American schools early in the 20th century was the challenge to improve teacher education. An old and respected idea holds that teachers should know much more than just what they teach

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—whether to children just learning to read and count, to youth whose studies might include Latin and physics and geometry, and history, even bookkeeping, or also those would instruct teachers. Indeed, the idea that teachers, certainly instructors of high school youth, should possess university degrees became accepted desirability, if not a commonplace in the last century. By the turn into the 21st century, however, these ideas were blunted by a practical reality. Graduates of universities and colleges, public and private, were too few and, also, too weak to satisfy the expanding need for advanced studies and entrance into professions such as law and medicine. Nevertheless, numbers of university graduates were attracted to teaching, mainly in high schools, but public education’s demand for university educated teachers simply could not be met. Differentiated salary schedules enabled high schools to attract available university graduates as teachers and mainly to deny applicants without university degrees from eligibility. Possession of a high school diploma and/or a pass on a county teacher’s examination came to be standards for elementary school teachers across the nation. Americans quickly recognized that their hopes for the education of their children required other means by which individuals might qualify for elementary school teaching. Probably the easiest and certainly the least expensive means was a system of county and local school examinations afforded to individuals who had completed an elementary program of study. This option, supplemented by required state, county, and local institutes, never was sufficient, but it put a patch on the need; moreover, it endured past the World War II years. A more acceptable means of teacher preparation, one that would attract the entrance of many bright high school graduates, particularly those who would like to teach in elementary schools, was the development of the American normal school. The programs in these institutions of higher education might have been somewhat less demanding and routinely less costly than university degree programs and, to be sure, its diploma or certificate would carry a lower prestige than did university programs that prepared teachers for high schools. But the idea claimed practicality and low costs as virtues. Thus, states began to establish normal schools specifically to prepare teachers for elementary schools and expanded offerings in order to prepare teachers for rural high schools. Although some states established normal schools in the 19th century, the number of such institutions multiplied during the first third of the twentieth century. Some of these normal schools became strong enough by the early 1920s that they took on a university organization and their names were changed to state teachers colleges and, within only a few years, these colleges offered accredited bachelor’s degrees governed by acceptable accrediting standards.

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And members of the Education Club at the University of Illinois in 1911 were aware of important developments in the improvement of schooling in their own and adjacent states. Each of these students sought qualifications to teach in high schools. A number of them already possessed a bachelor’s degree and more than a few were members of Phi Beta Kappa. They must also have been aware that higher prestige attended not only the possession of a university degree but, also, having been recognized as an honor student in the field of teacher education. So, they organized their club into Kappa Delta Pi, a Society that recognized high scholarship, and dreamed that, in time, it would have chapters at universities spread across the nation. That dream slowly became reality. Now, a century later, the Society continues to charter campus and professional chapters, not only in the United States, but in other nations as well. During that century, its chapters have initiated approximately 1,500,000 individuals into membership. Its internationally respected journals, The Educational Forum and Kappa Delta Pi Record, are complimented by books, guides, and special modules. Local chapters continue to be the heart of Society operations, but international leadership guides large-scale initiatives including regional conferences and the biennial convocation as well as special projects. The Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation, now 31 years old, continues to expand its notable scholarship program for both undergraduate and graduate students and has opened the way to launch initiatives that the Society, by itself, may well sustain. These events and programs are important and their expansion augers well for the future of the Society. Even more significant to Kappa Delta Pi during its first century as well as it enters its second century are a significant idea and a special group of educators. Kappa Delta Pi has not been and likely will not become a general membership group of educators. Rather, the Society always has invited to membership and initiated individuals who have amassed a high academic record in their collegiate studies. It is an honor society and it values high academic achievement. Membership is earned, not given or bestowed. To be sure, this concern for high academic achievement is general and includes achievement not only in courses that individuals have taken in the practice and theory of teaching, but their achievement in all the courses they have taken toward their degrees. In majors and minors or concentrations. In languages and history and classics. In physics and mathematics and computer science and speech. In painting and ceramics and other arts and in drama and violin and operatic studies. Kappa Delta Pi always has recognized that superior teachers must know well that which they teach to students. A Century of Leadership is a contribution to Kappa Delta Pi’s centennial observances. This book, as its subtitle notes, focuses attention on the 32

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individuals who have served the Society as its president during the first century of its existence. These individuals are marked by major differences as well as a shared and uncommon commitment to the Society. On the other hand, the office of president was slow to manifest diversity with respect to gender and even slower with respect to race. For almost half a century, the Society’s leadership seems to have been elected from handpicked individuals by a small group of insiders. Since that time, access to nominations and election increasingly appears to have become more open and sensitive to individuals’ gender, region of the country, type of institution, and nature of the candidates’ home chapters. Race, regrettably, remains relatively unattended. Leaders’ continuing visibility and scholarly contributions to the communities of educational research and scholarship appears to be another dimension of need. Still, as readers become acquainted with all of the former presidents of the Society across one hundred years, they likely will become fascinated by singular aspects of personality, wisdom, and character. Circumstances surely create as well as enfeeble dimensions of leadership. Economic depression and the heroic survival of schooling under financial duress appear to call for leadership quite different from that possible during economic good times and general prosperity. So, too, is it the case when public schooling has been lauded as essential to the well-being and future of our nation’s democracy as well as times such as the present in which public education is derided as especially unsavory, even anti-intellectual, cost inefficient, and especially unhelpful if not utterly destructive of the educational possibilities of children of poverty, of immigrants, and of long-term victims of racism. And the leadership of Kappa Delta Pi across the past century has responded to most such matters and led through these situations. Too frequently, however, in regard to some serious social and political situations, attention appears to have been minimal and uncommon or, even, absent. Serious and deliberative concern for such considerations, on the other hand, has appeared on unexpected occasions. The 32 former presidents of the Society clearly might have led differently in other times. That option was not theirs. They led during the only time they had. And, across that century, Kappa Delta Pi has survived and, for the most part, prospered. The book, however, is not history, nor is it a compendium of biographies. Appropriately, it is a collection of short life stories about the individuals who were elected by members to lead the Society. Through their work with their fellow officers, they helped keep alive the flame that called attention to the importance of highly qualified teachers in American schools, in the main, teachers whose academic credentials were very strong. These stories are important and they constitute the second major

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foray into the general history of the Society, the first being Alfred L. HallQuest’s Kappa Delta Pi, 1911-1936 (NY: Macmillan, 1938). Certainly, additional stories about other individual Kadelpians—other international officers and headquarters staff members, chapter counselors, members who are classroom teachers and administrators, and, of course, chapters— within the context of what might be called the Education Century and beyond also are important and are needed. Their life stories are very interesting and valuable to our increasing understanding of whom we are and how our Society becomes. They, along with a larger narrative history of the Society, merit serious concern and further illumination. And fundamental groundwork for such projects has been laid. The Kappa Delta Pi archives have been established at the University of Illinois. They are home to the official documents and publications of the Society, correspondence and other related materials generated and/or accumulated by the KDP headquarters staff, and to an expanding collection of oral histories, written reminiscences, and ephemera related to the development of Kappa Delta Pi. As these archives continue to develop, they surely will become essential ingredients for increased and deepened historical and contextual understanding. A number of elements of Kappa Delta Pi’s purposes and practices during its first century are illuminated in this book. Many others remain obscured, neglected, or unknown. Readers reasonably may discover keys to increased understanding and wonderment as they read and think about the lives of these former presidents, particularly about their contributions to the continuance and strengthening of the Society. One impressive key surely is evident. Their presidencies not only helped Kappa Delta Pi to continue to exist. They also fostered the fruitful creation of this honor society in education. And so also will those members and leaders who, succeeding these former presidents, enter confidently into Kappa Delta Pi’s second century.

CHAPTER 1

W. W. DENTON (1915-1917) Establishing a National Organization Vanessa M. Villate

W. W. Denton 1915-1917

A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 1–10 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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As the first Grand President of Kappa Delta Pi, William Wells (“W. W.”) Denton led the organization during a very significant and challenging period of time. The main focus of the Society during this time was expansion and, although growth was slow during Denton’s tenure, decisions that were made provided a firm foundation upon which a national organization would grow. Denton was committed to the ideals of the Society, and unlike every subsequent president, he was not an education professor or a school administrator. Indeed, when his affiliation began with the Alpha chapter at the University of Illinois, Denton was a doctoral student in mathematics. That he dedicated himself to firmly establishing KDP in its early years demonstrates his strong belief in this Honor Society in Education. Denton’s involvement with Kappa Delta Pi began with the Alpha chapter at the University of Illinois, in its initial years as an organization. He was one of four initiates on December 13, 1911, just 9 months after the chapter’s establishment (Hall-Quest 1938). One of his newly initiated colleagues was Harold O. Rugg, then a doctoral student in education at Illinois, but destined to become one of the best-known educators in the Progressive movement, professor at Teacher’s College Columbia University, and author of a popular and controversial series of social studies textbooks. At the time, William C. Bagley was a Professor of Education at Illinois and served as a founding member and faculty sponsor. The involvement of such active and ambitious educators can be seen as auspicious for the development and promotion of KDP. During the initial years of Kappa Delta Pi, Denton assumed various leadership positions. Throughout this time, the Society’s efforts of expansion remained a central discussion, and within this goal, the question of including chapters at teachers’ colleges was recurrent. Denton was also instrumental in strengthening the central organization of the Society, and in particular, the establishment of a biennial Convocation. His first leadership role was as vice president of Alpha chapter, elected on May 22, 1912, at the same meeting at which Alpha chapter approved the petition of the Education Club of the University of Colorado at Boulder to become the Beta chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. At the October 17, 1912 meeting, the president gave a short address, suggesting some ways to emphasize the local side of KDP. Topping the short list was “give occasional programs.” A program committee was formed, with Denton as chairman, and the following month, it distributed an Outline of Proposed Programs for Monthly Meetings, 1912-1913 (Hall-Quest 1938, 99). At the April 11, 1913 meeting of Alpha chapter, Denton reported correspondence with educators at state universities in West Virginia, Kansas, Missouri, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Iowa, Washington, and Pennsylvania, as well as the University of Chicago and Leland Stanford Junior University (commonly referred to as Stanford University). He and others

W. W. Denton (1915-1917) 3

agreed that likely no opportunity existed for immediate establishment of a chapter at any of these campuses. Indeed, almost a century later, only two of these universities (Indiana and Michigan) have welcomed Kappa Delta Pi chapters. Another discussion focused on the possibility of expansion of chapters to strong normal schools, but a motion to expand in this direction did not pass. Nevertheless, this prospect was revisited across several years. In 1920, a chapter was installed at Kansas State Teachers College (Emporia, Kansas), the first of the nation’s teachers colleges to host a chapter of the Society. After serving as vice-president of Alpha chapter for the 1912-1913 academic year, Denton became president for the following year, 1913-1914. During this year, considerable attention of the chapter was given to the nature of Kappa Delta Pi, its constitution, membership qualifications, and organizational structure. The following academic year, 1914-1915, Denton was selected as a member of the executive committee. At the May 26, 1915 meeting of the Alpha chapter, installation of the Gamma chapter at the University of Oklahoma was announced. Now that the Society had grown to three chapters, planning was begun to hold a convention for a meeting of chapter representatives. Denton was elected to be Alpha’s delegate to the first “Grand Council” convention in Boulder, Colorado. The location was chosen in some measure because it was centrally located for the three extant chapters. At the May 1914 meeting, Denton was also elected president of the Alpha chapter for the 1915-1916 school year. Because of this action, as well as plans he was making to spend that summer in the mountains near Boulder, Denton was a natural choice to represent the Alpha chapter at the Society’s initial Convocation. The first Convocation of Kappa Delta Pi was held July 16 and 17, 1915, in Boulder, Colorado. Three delegates attended, one from each chapter: Denton from Alpha, Robert Burns from Beta (Colorado), and Eva Clifton from Gamma (Oklahoma). Their first order of business was to establish a national constitution, which the delegates believed should be a general governing document, leaving freedom for individual chapters to develop. The constitution provided for two “Grand Officer” positions. Subsequently, Denton, who had received his PhD degree three years earlier, was elected Grand President, with Burns to serve as Grand Recorder-Treasurer. At the time, Convocation was organized only as a time for the meeting of the Grand Council, which was composed of the Grand Officers, as well as one Council member from each chapter. GRAND COUNCIL PRESIDENCY (1915-1917) As the first Grand President of Kappa Delta Pi, Denton worked diligently to establish the Society and to increase its size and scope as a national

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organization. During the two years of his presidency, Denton encountered three main concerns: 1) expansion of chapters at other universities and, possibly, the establishment of chapters at strong normal schools; (2) honorary memberships; and (3) the purpose of KDP, especially in terms of standards for membership.

Expansion The most important concern of the time was expansion. Members believed that the creation of a Grand Council as a form of central organization would assist in such efforts (Hall-Quest 1938, 121). As an initial advertisement of the creation of the Grand Council, Denton and Burns sent a general announcement on November 6, 1915 to, as Denton suggested, “persons who give instruction in Education in those colleges and universities in the United States and Canada which would be ranked as high as our state universities” (Hall-Quest 1938, 122). The mailing was effective to the extent that they received numerous inquiries from individuals who sought information about prospective chapters. However, despite extensive correspondence with these prospective chapters, growth was slow. In a response to an inquiry from the Dean of Toledo University, Denton wrote in April 1916: “Kappa Delta Pi has grown slowly. The history of our attempts to extend shows that this is largely due to the fact that we have always held that the eligibility of both sexes is essential” (Hall-Quest 1938, 126). An important aspect of expansion was the debate about the establishment of chapters at normal schools. Because normal schools were considered inferior to state universities, many members had expressed opposition to the idea; however, in May 1917, the policy was reviewed after the President of the Illinois State Normal University (Normal, IL) inquired about the purpose and status of Kappa Delta Pi. Denton replied that, based on the qualifications for membership, the “stronger” normal schools were not excluded and that “there are five or six schools which I would be glad to see included among our chapters; also, that if a group of students at the Illinois State Normal University should care to apply for a chapter of Kappa Delta Pi, I would be in favor of granting a petition, provided it were vouched for by you. Of course, I cannot speak for the Grand Council as a body, or for the present chapters” (Hall-Quest 1938, 129). In another letter the following month, Denton wrote: Three or four years ago, Dr. Bagley suggested that invitations be sent to some of the stronger normal schools, suggesting the establishment of chapters of Kappa Delta Pi. The fraternity, however, decided to wait until we had

W. W. Denton (1915-1917) 5 become better known as a university organization. I noticed this idea still prevailing at the time our International Constitution was drawn up two years ago. It is possible that some of the members feel that way now. The Constitution was purposely worded so that the question need not be decided at that time…. Dr. Bagley is still favorable, or rather, enthusiastic about extension to normal schools…. My personal opinion is that all good things tend to propagate themselves without much organization or restriction. As it is, the scholarship-honorary character of the fraternity is very well protected, so well protected in fact that I fear we are more likely to be criticized locally for keeping standards too high rather than becoming lax. (Hall-Quest 1938, 130)

Denton and Bagley’s interest in including normal schools was shared by the Grand Council; however, some of the chapters did not approve of this move. Discussion continued between 1917 and 1919, as individual petitions were considered. Chapters at normal schools eventually began to be installed in 1920, with more rapid expansion in subsequent years. Despite the debate about allowing chapters at normal schools, the efforts at expansion during Denton’s presidency were not entirely unsuccessful, as Kappa Delta Pi doubled in size between 1915 and 1917. Chapters were established at the University of Texas on May 30, 1916; at Drake University on March 23, 1917; and at the University of Cincinnati on June 13, 1917.

Honorary Kappa Delta Pi Memberships Years after Denton’s tenure as Grand President, the Society created the Laureate Chapter in 1928 for special and honorary memberships at large, awarded to a restricted number of senior scholars in education. However, the question of honorary memberships began to be addressed during Denton’s presidency. Although the term was not used in the constitution until 1928, provision was made for such memberships by Alpha’s constitution as “any person who has won special distinction in education” (HallQuest, 1938, 153).

Aim of KDP and Standards Kappa Delta Pi was established as a Society to “foster intellectual achievement, not as an end in itself but as a professional trait dominant in successful teaching” (Hall-Quest, 1938, 149). Denton commented on this aim in February 1916, in reference to Alpha’s constitution:

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V. M. VILLATE This constitution embodies the same purposes for which Kappa Delta Pi was originally organized and at the same time leaves as much freedom as possible to the chapters in matters of organization, so as to meet local conditions. At all of the chapters the qualifications for membership are now actually higher than required by the constitution. While a grade of at least 85 (average) is required, as a matter of fact, we have elected only from a group averaging at least 90. At the University of Illinois the percentage of undergraduate members is just now very small, and, while the percentage is, I believe, higher at Colorado and Oklahoma, election to Kappa Delta Pi is regarded as a very high honor for undergraduates in all three institutions. All of our members (undergraduates) have been leaders in intellectual activities and have been elected to Phi Beta Kappa or Sigma Xi. The social phase of our meetings we have regarded as important but it has been incidental to our main objects, which are professional and intellectual. (Hall-Quest 1938, 149)

Although Denton was not an education professor, he saw KDP as an outlet for discussions about educational topics and believed in the important place of teachers within such a group. At the end of his presidency, in a letter to the Illinois State Normal University about the establishment of a chapter there, Denton further expressed his opinion about the nature of Kappa Delta Pi: Personally I have never been so much interested in the scholarship-honorary objects of the fraternity as in the fact that it constituted for me a sort of open forum devoted mainly to educational topics. Such a forum, to my mind, must necessarily prosper best under the management of students of superior scholarship. We certainly need these students. But I feel we would prosper still better when superior scholarship was combined with teaching experience. We need more teachers - some who never had courses in Education, for example, also some radicals and social reformers, who have heretical ideas regarding education. (Hall-Quest 1938, 130)

As the Grand Officers, Denton and Burns corresponded regularly. Although their most important goal was to expand the organization, they also discussed charters, the official seal and the Constitution. In the spring of 1917, their attention turned to planning the second Convocation. On January 27, 1917, Denton wrote to Burns: I think that an actual Convocation should be held if it can be done without too much expense, even if it had to be followed by considerable correspondence. Correspondence alone, I fear, might delay agreement for a considerable time, even over unimportant matters, especially since we have expanded by an increase of 60 percent and may even double to six chapters before the school year is over. I think it is not too early to begin making definite inquiry of each chapter for suggestions regarding the meeting place of the next Convocation. (Hall-Quest 1938, 127)

W. W. Denton (1915-1917) 7

After some consideration of various locations, they decided to hold the meeting again in Boulder, Colorado, as Denton planned to spend the summer there and it was Burns’ home. In the January letter cited above, Denton shared his opinion on the funding of delegates’ attendance at Convocation: If possible, I think we should hold these meetings without expense to the Fraternity, as a whole. On the other hand, it would seem more just to me that the Fraternity as a whole pay any necessary expense, and that individual chapters should not be called upon to pay the expenses of their delegates.

SECOND CONVOCATION (1917) The Second Convocation of Kappa Delta Pi was held on July 2 and 3, 1917 at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Five members were present: W. W. Denton, Grand President, and delegate from Alpha; Robert Burns, Recorder-Treasurer; Gladys Curtis, delegate from Beta (Colorado); L. N. Morrisett, Gamma (Oklahoma); and W. P. Burris, Zeta (Cincinnati). Delta (University of Texas) did not send a delegate. At this meeting, the delegates considered several topics and decisions were made on most of them. One of the more important was the creation of Kappa Delta Pi Record, with the Grand Councilman designated as its editor. The position of chapter reporters, viewed as assistants to the editor, was also created and assigned the responsibility of submitting to the Council the reports and information required by the Grand RecorderTreasurer. Although the first issue of KDP Record was not published until 1921, the establishment of the publication provided another source of visibility for the new Society and for increased record keeping by the national organization. Another significant decision at this Convocation was the establishment of a system of more systematic financing of the Society. An amendment to the Constitution required each chapter to submit to the Society’s headquarters one dollar for each active member. These annual dues were also viewed as a way to finance KDP Record. In addition, a charter fee of five dollars was authorized and the expense of installing a chapter was designated as a chapter responsibility. Similarly, delegates decided that the represented chapters should pay delegates’ expenses to Convocations. GRAND RECORDER-TREASURER (1917-1919) At the close of the Second Convocation, new national officers were elected, with Denton chosen to be Grand Recorder-Treasurer. This was Denton’s last involvement with Kappa Delta Pi. Denton’s most important

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role during this time was improving the record keeping of the Society. Before 1915, it was not a high priority, inasmuch as Alpha chapter directed most of the activities, membership was small, and expenditures were low. Most of the Society business was conducted simply through correspondence between the officers of the three chapters. However, by the end of 1917, with six chapters, careful accountancy had become necessary. Although increased record keeping was begun while he was Grand President, as the second Grand Recorder-Treasurer, Denton “applied in more detail the practises [sic] of bookkeepers of the time. He introduced a ledger system and cross references between it and the Journal” (Hall-Quest 1938, 187). Denton found the responsibilities of the position burdensome and, in letters to the Grand President, Frank Thompson, attempted to resign. However, after enlisting the help of his mother, he decided to continue in the position. Early in 1919, Denton began making arrangements for the Third Convocation. Similar to the planning of the first two Convocations, the selection of time and place was based on the summer plans of the Grand Council. Denton once again planned to spend the summer in Boulder and the Grand President, Frank Thompson, represented the Beta chapter. The meeting was held from August 14 to 16, 1919 at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Although Denton did not continue to be actively involved with Kappa Delta Pi following his tenure as the Grand Recorder-Treasurer, his dedicated efforts in the Society’s initial years helped it to grow and thrive. From his leadership role of the newly formed Alpha chapter through his contributions at the national level, Denton was instrumental in increasing the size of the Society, as well as its organizational aspects.

PERSONAL AND PROFESSIONAL BACKGROUND Denton was born August 18, 1882, in Detroit, Michigan. His parents, Walter Bion Denton and Mary Wells, were both from Michigan. His father was a travel agent and members of the family belonged to the First United Presbyterian Church. Denton never married and had no children. However, his brother, George Bion, who was two years older than W. W. and a dentist and, later, an historian and English professor, had two daughters (Dyane’s Desktop). Denton attended Detroit public schools, graduating from Central High School in Detroit in 1901. For two years he worked as a stenographer and bookkeeper for a fire insurance agency before entering the University of Michigan, at which he completed his Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics in 1907. Entering graduate school in mathematics at the University of

W. W. Denton (1915-1917) 9

Illinois, he completed an MA degree in 1909 with a thesis, On the osculating quartic of a plane curve. He received his PhD degree in mathematics in 1912 with a dissertation, Projective differential geometry of developable surfaces. He was listed in the University of Illinois directory as an active member of Kappa Delta Pi, Gamma Alpha Graduate Scientific Fraternity, and Phi Beta Kappa Honorary Literary Society (Gamma of Illinois chapter). While a graduate student at the University of Illinois, Denton worked as a mathematics instructor. Moreover, he cooperated with Professor J. W. Young in writing Young’s Lectures on Fundamental Concepts in Algebra and Geometry. In the preface to the book, Young noted that Denton transcribed the lectures and revised the manuscript with “great enthusiasm and keen insight” (Young 1911, vi). Following the completion of his PhD degree in 1912, Denton continued working as a mathematics instructor at the University of Illinois until 1917. Subsequently, he taught for one year at the Worcester (Massachusetts) Polytechnic Institute. He then moved back to the Detroit area, his hometown, to teach at the University of Michigan. As an instructor of mathematics, Denton’s starting salary in 1918 was $1,400. The following year, it was raised to $1,800, and beginning in 1920, he was listed as an assistant professor of mathematics, with a salary of $2,500. He continued in this position until the 1933-34 school year, when he took a leave of absence, from which he did not return to the University of Michigan faculty (University of Michigan Board of Regents Minutes). Following his departure from the University of Michigan during the bleak days of the Great Depression, he was unable to find a new appointment in mathematics for six years. During these years, he directed the Detroit-Cass Freshman College and Detroit-Northwestern Community College, as well as teaching mathematics in these W.P.A. projects (HallQuest 1938, 256). Subsequently, he held short or temporary appointments: Assistant Professor of mathematics and physics at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana (1940-1941); Instructor at James Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois (1941-1942); Dean at Great Lakes College in Lansing, Michigan (1942-1947); Principal of Minden City High School in Minden City, Michigan (1946-1947) (University of Illinois Alumni Association). Beginning in September, 1947, Denton secured a position as Assistant Professor of mathematics at the University of Arizona. In 1959, he became the head of the mathematics department at Pikeville (Kentucky) College. He remained in this role until his death from pneumonia on January 22, 1961. His body was buried next to his parents in the Denton cemetery in Denton, Michigan (Dyane’s Desktop). His obituary, which appeared on the front page of the local Pikeville newspaper with the title “Dr. W. W. Denton claimed by death”, regrettably did not list his membership in Kappa Delta Pi, but did note memberships in Phi Beta Kappa and

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Sigma Xi honor groups. In addition, it stated that he was a Quaker (Appalachian News Express, 1961). Throughout most of his career, Denton was active in the American Mathematical Society. He was initially elected to membership in 1909. In the same year, he published an article drawn from his MA thesis in the journal of the Society. Across the subsequent 40 years, he attended a number of its meetings and presented papers at least twice. Denton was included in the 1944 edition of American Men of Science for his work in projective differential geometry and foundations of mathematics (Cattell 1954). Although Denton’s involvement with Kappa Delta Pi did not extend past the early years, his leadership was essential to the continued development of the Society and led the way to future expansion and success. Indeed, that he was not an education professor, Denton’s role as the first Grand President of KDP can be seen as a symbol of the larger meaning of scholarship emphasized by the Society. As a mathematics student and instructor, he was interested in high scholarship for teachers and in the open exchange of educational ideas. As such, he dedicated himself to firmly establishing KDP and expanding it from the initial chapter at the University of Illinois into a national organization.

REFERENCES Appalachian News Express (Pikeville, Kentucky). 1961. Dr. W.W. Denton claimed by death. January 26, page 1 obituary. Cattell, Jacques, ed. 1944. American men of science. Lancaster, PA: The Science Press. Dyane’s Desktop. Descendants of Ann B. (Watson), William Denton and Charles Ayres. http://www.dyanesdesktop.com/watson/ann/ann.html Hall-Quest, Alfred Lawrence. 1938. Kappa Delta Pi, 1911-1936. New York: The Macmillan Company. University of Illinois Alumni Association. Biographical record submitted in 1947 by W. W. Denton. University of Michigan Board of Regents. Proceedings. http://quod.lib.umich.edu/ u/umregproc/ Young, John Wesley. 1911. Lectures on fundamental concepts in algebra and geometry. New York: The Macmillan Company.

CHAPTER 2

FRANK E. THOMPSON (1917-1919) Expanding the Society O. L. Davis, Jr.

Frank E. Thompson 1917-1919 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 11–18 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Emergence of Kappa Delta Pi into a national organization involved Frank E. Thompson as a central figure. As crucial as he was to the Society’s very continuance and growth, however, he has been little remembered. A professor of education at the University of Colorado, he served as Kappa Delta Pi’s second Grand President during the WWI years of 1917-1918. Certainly as important as was his service as President of the national Society, his enthusiasm and actions must be credited to his leadership in the development of Beta chapter, the first chapter away from the Midwest and the second chapter following the University of Illinois’ Alpha chapter. Until the chartering of Beta chapter, any suggestion that Kappa Delta Pi was a “national” organization was, at best, a dream. Thompson, Director of the University of Colorado’s College of Education, received a letter in December, 1911, from Alpha chapter officers, likely signed by W. W. Denton, the Society’s first Grand President. It inquired about the possible interest of University of Colorado officials in the establishment of a chapter of Kappa Delta Pi, the honor society in education earlier developed at the University of Illinois. In late January, 1912, Thompson replied that University of Colorado students and faculty were very interested in the new “national” society. Within the next three months, Thompson led the organization of a petitioning group of thirteen students and three faculty members. The charter for Beta chapter was approved by the Alpha chapter on May 22, 1912. The dream that Kappa Delta Pi would become a national organization became a reality, even though that reality was fragile. And Frank E. Thompson had been the key individual in this development (Hall-Quest 1938). Professor Thompson’s involvement with Beta chapter was not casual. A charter member, he was an activist. He served on the chapter’s membership committee and occasionally gave talks at the twice monthly meetings of the chapter. His abiding interests in the rugged region in which the University of Colorado was sited likely influenced the long-running Beta chapter tradition of Spring initiations at a beautiful Rocky Mountain venue away from campus (Hall-Quest 1938; Rice 1978). By 1915, only Gamma chapter at the University of Oklahoma had joined chapters at the University of Illinois and the University of Colorado as units of Kappa Delta Pi. Expansion was exceedingly slow, but the fledgling national Society was alive. Grand President W. W. Denton called for representatives of each chapter to meet in a National Convocation during the 1915 summer. Denton planned to vacation in the area during that period and Beta chapter officers lived in Boulder. Thus, only the representative of the University of Oklahoma needed to travel to the meeting. The site was so convenient that subsequent decisions were made to hold both the second (1917) and third (1919) Convocations on the Boulder campus. By the time of the 1917 meeting, chapters had been installed

Frank E. Thompson (1917-1919) 13

at the University of Texas (Delta), Drake University (Epsilon), and the University of Cincinnati (Zeta). Although the sketchy minutes of the 1917 meeting do not reveal Thompson’s participation in the Convocation sessions, he probably was quite active behind the scenes. Minutes of the meeting record only his election to the Grand Presidency of the Society for the next biennium. Thompson’s presidential term encompassed the United States’ active involvement in World War I and in its immediate aftermath. Enrollment in higher education dipped perceptively during the war and attention to projects related directly to the war assumed the privilege of place on campuses across the nation. Nevertheless, like his predecessor, Thompson wrote letters to his fellow chairpersons of education at other universities to encourage their interest in the establishment of a KDP chapter on their campus. His inquiries, however, yielded little more interest than did those sent by his predecessor, W. W. Denton. Encouragement of the development of a network of chapters of an academic honor society in education during these times simply was a very difficult sell. Only one new chapter was installed during Thompson’s term. It took root at Purdue University. His disappointing experience in his efforts at chapter development surely influenced a radical change in his stance on Society expansion. Since he had developed his initial interest in Kappa Delta Pi and, like members of Alpha chapter, Thompson believed that chapters of the Society should be installed only at universities. Normal schools and teachers colleges, he had believed, should develop their “own particular species of fraternity”. At this time, substantial sentiment in higher education recognized the rather low level of academic quality of most normal schools. Largely unobserved, however, was that the stronger normal schools slowly began to utilize the pattern of university organization for their growth and, with added faculty and resources, the stronger state normal schools became accredited state teachers colleges and granted recognized academic degrees (Hall-Quest 1938). Another influence on Thompson’s changed position about Society expansion must be attributed to founder William Chandler Bagley and Thompson’s successor as president of the Society. At the time of the founding of Kappa Delta Pi, Bagley had been Dean of the College of Education at the University of Illinois. However, in 1917, Bagley accepted the professorship of teachers college administration at Teachers College, Columbia University. There, he began to influence directly the graduate studies of many individuals who were or would be faculty members and administrators in the nation’s teachers colleges. He strongly supported a Society expansion policy that would plant Kappa Delta Pi chapters on the campuses of strong, degree-granting, single-purposed teacher education institutions (Hall-Quest 1938; Kandel 1961; Null 2003).

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By the 1919 Convocation at which he presided, Thompson had reversed his earlier position on expansion. In fact, at this Convocation, he guided to passage a proposal that Kappa Delta Pi should receive petitions for chapters at the nation’s teachers colleges. Without question, this action made possible rapid expansion of chapters within the next decade. Within the next year, Kappa Delta Pi chapters were installed at Colorado State Teachers College (now the University of Northern Colorado), Kansas State Teachers College at Emporia (now Emporia State University), and Teachers College, Columbia University. Direction and momentum of Kappa Delta Pi’s expansion into a viable national honor society in education was set. Particular highlights of the 1919 Convocation included excursions to Glacier Lake and Arapahoe Peaks. Thompson undoubtedly planned and led these mountain trips. As an avid mountaineer, he had founded the local Colorado Mountain Club and led the first Arapahoe Peaks climbs. A reasonable sense of his intense interest in the outdoors in the spectacular Rocky Mountains is apparent from “Give Me Again”, a poem that he wrote the first stanza of which sets his tone: Give me again the pack Filled with the needed things but none to spare Give me the skimpy roll of blanket on the back, Give me the heart to make a clean attack, To dash sweat from the eyes without a care. Give me to wash my mind in God’s clean air. Give me again the pack. (Thompson 1922b)

Thompson continued to participate in activities of the Beta chapter and in the national Society. Six years after the establishment of Beta chapter and two years following his presidency, he wrote a short but penetrating article about what he called the Society’s objectives (i.e., fidelity to service, to humanity, to science, and to toil). “A vow,” he wrote, “is an organization of meaning which must be reorganized again and again. We must be careful that our vows do not become empty words or rather they do not work some kind of mischief by becoming the signals for impotent sentiment and empty effusions.” Understanding “humanity” as an ideal, a kind of “genteel sentiment”, Thompson claimed that it seldom brought to mind “a vast complex of human beings, all helping or hindering one another in the clarification and statement of the human idea … men must now knit themselves together into man—into humanity…. Fidelity to humanity calls for stalwart, even though tactful, opposition to false or

Frank E. Thompson (1917-1919) 15

slushy opinion and unfailing adherence to and exposition of sound and virile opinion” (Thompson, 1922a). He was the Beta chapter delegate to the 1921 Convocation in St. Louis. At that meeting, his efforts resulted in a requirement that every chapter elect a faculty member as counselor/sponsor. Subsequently, his efforts at the 1924 Convocation led to the passage of two important proposals, provision for the local election of honorary members and the establishment of a $50 fee for the installation of a new chapter. Thompson attended his final Society Convocation in 1925 at which Bagley and others praised his early leadership of Kappa Delta Pi. He apparently left Society activities when he resigned from the University of Colorado faculty in 1925. His tenure at Colorado had been productive as it had been turbulent. Born September 29, 1871, in DuQuoin, Illinois, Thompson’s childhood and adolescence were spent in California’s San Francisco Bay area. The adventurous spirit and whimsicality that he developed in those years remained as constant companions throughout his life. He was almost 30 years of age when he gained an AB degree in 1901 from Leland Stanford Junior University. Although details of his life during these years are unavailable, he reasonably may have alternated campus studies with teaching in California schools, a common practice by many teachers of the period throughout the United States. That he excelled in his academic accomplishments was acknowledged by his selection to membership in the Stanford chapter of Phi Beta Kappa (Waldrop, pers. comm.). Thompson’s solid academic record plus his likely experience of several years of teaching helps explain his appointments to teacher education positions at Stanford and, subsequently, to the prestigious California normal schools at San Francisco and San Diego. He obtained a fellowship for graduate study at Teachers College, Columbia University, but he did not complete the requirements for a masters degree. Nevertheless, in 1907, Thompson was appointed a Professor of Education at the University of Colorado. Professor Thompson clearly was an activist, not only with respect to his ideas about education and campus controversies, but also in his personal life. Married in 1898, he and his wife had four children, three boys and a girl. The family often hiked and camped together along trails in the Rockies that Thompson had explored. Across years, he converted the family’s simple five bedroom and bath home into a thirteen room, nine level “castle” with two plumbing and seven heating units. During the period that he lived in Boulder, his daughter recalled that he would work in his garden, go climbing or fishing or improve the family’s home rather than to write articles or reports on matters about which he talked (Waldrop, pers. comm.).

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Not only did Thompson serve as Director of the university’s College of Education, he also developed its teacher placement service, one of the first in the nation. As might be expected, he accepted the tenets of the emerging progressive education movement that were derived, in part, from modern studies in psychology and in anthropology. He was an active member of several professional associations and served on the Executive Committee of the National Society of College Teachers of Education in 1914-1915. Thompson’s academic writing, although a rather small corpus, mirrored the dominant progressive positions in teaching and educational administration of the times. They included attention to economy of time in teaching and rating, placing, and promotion of teachers (Thompson 1915). Quite remarkably, Thompson not only taught courses in education. He also offered courses in psychology and, beginning in 1912, he routinely offered each year two courses in anthropology, “General Anthropology” and “Ethnology”. During the 1915-16 academic year, these anthropology courses enrolled 26 students. Thompson apparently never conducted research in this field and never wrote articles that explicated his understandings (MacCurdy 1919; Chiszar and Wertheimer 1988). Reputedly quite popular with students, Thompson was recalled as a brilliant scholar, also as a controversial member of the faculty. He “irritated” some colleagues and, especially some of the state’s superintendents of schools by his brusqueness. As well, he was known to have irritated Kappa Delta Pi national officers. He was reported to be sometimes tardy in forwarding reports and, at least once, he wrote quite sharply to Mabel Payne, the Society’s Recorder-Treasurer. She wrote to another officer, “I didn’t like it very well and told him so; so if you hear of a divorce in our family you can be assured the grounds will be cruelty.” (Hall-Quest 1938, 414, 423) His advocacy of early progressive practices also must have contributed to his being viewed as controversial. One early colleague recalled him as “ahead of his time” and another remembered him as “delighting students” in his “way out” instructional processes. His educational foresight, commonly recalled by associates, was attested by his involvement in several state and national associations, particularly in Kappa Delta Pi on the Boulder campus and nationally, as well (Hopkins, Houston, pers. comm.). In 1920, after only 13 years on the faculty, Thompson resigned his position in the College of Education, reportedly under pressure from some of Colorado’s influential superintendents of schools. The university president obviously valued Thompson’s affiliation with the institution and, removing him from the arena of controversy, appointed him as the University of Colorado’s first full-time Professor of Anthropology in a newly created department and, as well, separated psychology from education.

Frank E. Thompson (1917-1919) 17

Thompson apparently thrived in this appointment. Friends have reported that he remarked that he was the only professor for whom the university had created a new university department. Within two years, he personally offered thirteen courses in his new, one-person department. Thompson had no formal academic background in anthropology, not even one course. Obviously, on the other hand, he had become knowledgeable about the field through personal study and extensive mountaineering in the Rockies. His satisfaction with his new appointment, on the other hand, must have been undercut by what must have been continuing turbulence in his personal life. Only five years into his new post and at age 53, Thompson not only resigned from the university, he left his family, and moved across country. He became educational director of the Hoffman School for Individual Development in New York City. This school was a private endeavor and charged substantial tuition. Thompson hoped that he could implement in this school many of the ideas about appropriate education that he had been developing. However, according to his daughter, he left the school after only about six weeks because he had no firm plans for the school, only amorphous ideas. This break with his past was completed when he moved to a rural New Jersey area, built a cabin in the woods, and began to write what his family recalled as “the book” (Walsrop, pers. comm.). Apparently, this book was the one about which he talked endlessly with his family, but never began until many years later. His daughter remembered that Thompson often said to listeners that if a person had just one big idea in a lifetime, one was “a good average.” In his case, his “big idea” had to do with what he called the “occupations of man(kind)” (pers. comm.). He insisted that some ten or maybe a dozen primary occupations should constitute the foundational studies in education. His daughter remembered the “occupations” of making a living, socializing, playing, languaging, eating, exercising, and sex. Almost as a footnote, she commented, “I would be hesitant to say that he was the first to advocate that period in Education when children were encouraged to follow their natural inclinations as to what they wanted to do—and the basic 3R’s began to neglected,—but certainly he was of that school” (pers. comm.). He stayed in his New Jersey cabin only a few years before he moved to Healdsburg, a remote California town north of San Francisco. There, he continued to dictate “the book”, a thousand pages of manuscript related to his ideas about the proper aim and content of education in culture, until he abandoned the project late in life. Following the death of his wife in 1933, Thompson married for the second time only months later. In his 99th year, Thompson died on November 2, 1969.

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Thompson was active in Kappa Delta Pi for just one decade during its struggling, formative years. A chapter counselor during that period, he also served the Society as Grand President for two years and helped set its course for its sure expansion into a truly national honor society in education. His decision to sponsor a chapter in Colorado extended the Society beyond the Midwest. Proud of his involvement in Kappa Delta Pi, he was the only president in the Society’s history who did not hold a graduate degree. Nevertheless, he championed high academic scholarship for teachers at a critical moment in the rapid and substantial expansion of schooling, particularly secondary education, in the United States.

REFERENCES Chiszar, David, and Michael Wertheimer. 1988. The Boulder model: A history of psychology at the University of Colorado.” Journal of the History of Behavioral Sciences 24 (January): 81-86. Hall-Quest, Alfred Lawrence. 1938. Kappa Delta Pi, 1911-1936. New York: The Macmillan Co. Hopkins, L. Thomas. 1976-77. Oral history interviews with O. L. Davis, Jr. Oral History in Education Collection, Briscoe Center for American History, The Universityof Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78731. Houston, Clifford. 1979. Correspondence with O. L. Davis, Jr., Oral History in Education Collecton, Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78731. Kandel, Isaac L. 1961. William Chandler Bagley. New York: Bureau of Publications, Teachers College, Columbia University. MacCurdy, George Grant. 1919. The academic teaching of anthropology in connection with other departments.” American Anthropologist 21: 52. Null, James Wesley. 2003. A Disciplined Progressive Educator: The Life and Career of William Chandler Bagley. New York: Peter Lang. Rice, Chandos Reid. 1978. Oral History Memoir. October 5. Oral History in Education Collection, Briscoe Center for American History (Austin, TX). Thompson, Frank E. 1915. Typical experiments for economizing time in elementary schools. In Minimum essentials in elementary school subjects--standards and current practices. The fourteenth yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education, Part 1, edited by S. Chester Parker, 28-36. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Thompson, Frank E. 1922a. Kappa Delta Pi and its objectives. Kappa Delta Pi Record 2(March): 7. Thompson, Frank E. 1922b. Give me again. (poem) Trail and Timberline 44 (May): cover page. Waldrop, Frances E. Correspondence with O. L. Davis, Jr., 1979-1980. Oral History in Education Collection, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78731.

CHAPTER 3

WILLIAM C. BAGLEY (1919-1924) The Founder and Spirit of Kappa Delta Pi Wesley Null

William Chandler Bagley 1919-1924 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 19–30 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Kappa Delta Pi would not exist without William C. Bagley. Because of Bagley’s tendency to resist taking sole credit for the successes he experienced, he avoided the title “father” of Kappa Delta Pi. He preferred to give the credit to two of his students at the University of Illinois, Truman Lee Kelley and T. E. Musselman. Imagining that KDP would have been created by students without the encouragement of their professor, however, is all but impossible. Bagley wanted and saw the need for a society like KDP to exist, and he found the resources at the University of Illinois to make that vision a reality. For these and other reasons, bestowing the title of founder of Kappa Delta Pi to William C. Bagley is more than appropriate. Anyone familiar with the first fifty years of KDP recognizes the unequalled significance of Bagley to the Society’s creation and early growth. As Thomas C. McCracken, Executive President of Kappa Delta Pi from 1924-1948, wrote in 1947, “The idea or ideals on which Kappa Delta Pi was founded were so much in evidence in the life of William Chandler Bagley that as the years of the Society lengthened, he became the representative in whom the members of Kappa Delta Pi saw the ideals of their Society in action” (McCracken 1947, 139). In many respects, Kappa Delta Pi became the community personification of Bagley’s personal character. In addition to founding KDP in 1911 at the University of Illinois, Bagley served as the Society’s third Executive President from 1919 to 1924. He remained a member of the Executive Council following his presidency by serving as Executive Counselor for four years and then as Laureate Counselor for an additional eighteen. His dedication to expanding and strengthening KDP never ceased. He served on the Executive Council for an additional eighteen years. No figure is more essential to understanding why Kappa Delta Pi came into existence than Bagley. Some attention to his biography provides unique insight into Kappa Delta Pi’s mission and why the Society was so essential to Bagley’s vision of teacher education. William Bagley began life as a Midwesterner. He was born in Detroit, Michigan, on March 15, 1874. His father was a hospital administrator, and his mother remained at home to raise Bagley and his older sister Ruth. The family moved to Weymouth, Massachusetts, for a short time while Bagley was a child, but they returned to Detroit where he graduated from that city’s Capitol High School in May of 1891. He then had a choice to make about where he wanted to attend college. His sister already had enrolled at the University of Michigan. Instead of following her path, however, he chose to attend Michigan Agricultural College (today’s Michigan State University) in East Lansing. As a somewhat peculiar choice, Bagley, at least at this time in his life, wanted to become a farmer, despite the fact that he had no experience farming and his family

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had no land. Nevertheless, he began his undergraduate career at Michigan Agricultural College (MAC) in the fall of 1891. Bagley recalled a deeply rewarding experience at MAC. Perhaps influential on his later vision for teacher education, Bagley received an education at MAC that integrated the liberal arts, the sciences, and professional preparation. Even though the professional preparation he received was in farming, Bagley was impressed with how humanities subjects like poetry and literature were anything but neglected in an institution dedicated to preparing farmers. Some of his fondest memories from MAC were not only his classroom experiences with teachers who could make poems like Paradise Lost come to life, but also in the time he spent working on farms around East Lansing learning to plant and grow crops. When Bagley graduated from MAC in 1895, however, the country was in the midst of an economic depression. He had no land or money. He was a farmer without the means to farm. He began to search for what he could do, and teaching came immediately to mind. Later in life, Bagley would regret viewing the teaching profession as a potential “stepping stone” like he did at this time, but the reality is that Bagley first entered teaching because he was unsure of what else to do. His sister Ruth is the one who helped him land his first teaching position. After completing her undergraduate degree, Ruth taught for two years and made some connections with Michigan school administrators. She connected these administrators with her brother, and Bagley was offered a position to teach at a one-room school in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan near the tiny logging towns of Garth and Rapid River. Thus, Bagley began his first teaching job in August 1905 with approximately eighteen students ranging from age seven to sixteen. Bagley immediately fell in love with teaching. He knew that teaching was his future. He enjoyed the challenge of trying to interest students in a full range of subjects and at different levels due to their age differences. He became fascinated with the field of psychology that was beginning to provide insights into how to make teaching more effective. He inquired about various graduate schools, which eventually led him to begin a Master’s degree at the University of Chicago during the summer of 1896. He enjoyed the courses, but eventually decided to transfer to the University of Wisconsin in Madison, at which he completed his Master’s degree in 1898. He continued to teach while taking courses in Madison during the summers. He taught for a total of three years in Michigan, experience that was no doubt crucial to the rest of his work in the field of education. While completing his Master’s degree at Wisconsin, Bagley worked with two professors who were quite influential on his career. The first was a psychologist named Joseph Jastrow, and the second was an educational philosopher named Michael Vincent O’Shea. Bagley remembered both of

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them as highly professional men who produced excellent scholarship and were dynamic teachers. Jastrow eventually directed Bagley’s Master’s thesis, which was a study of the relationship between mental and physical characteristics of elementary school children in a small school in Madison. Bagley was such a strong student that O’Shea and Jastrow encouraged him to continue his studies, which he did after landing a scholarship to begin a PhD program in psychology at Cornell University. He began as a doctoral student at Cornell in the fall of 1898. During his three years at Cornell, Bagley received a strong education in cutting edge psychological research. His advisor, however, set him on a path that was rather different from the direction that the rest of psychology was headed, at least in the U.S. Professor E. B. Titchener was a “structural” psychologist who studied consciousness, whereas the rest of American psychology was headed in the direction of behaviorism. Bagley, nevertheless, had a good experience, produced a fine dissertation, and graduated from Cornell with his PhD degree in May of 1901. This is the point in Bagley’s career when we begin to see the spirit of social service that is so evident in the mission of Kappa Delta Pi. Bagley took a rather unlikely path after completing his doctoral degree. He had just graduated from a prestigious institution with the highest degree attainable, yet he chose not to pursue a professor position as his advisor Titchener would have preferred. He did not wish to pursue a life of pure research in a lab like other graduates of Titchener’s program. Instead, Bagley accepted a position as an elementary school principal in St. Louis, Missouri. He wanted to work with children. He wanted to help teachers. He wanted to use the knowledge he had gained to serve the field of education. He remained in St. Louis, however, for only the 1901-1902 academic year. In the spring of 1902, he made yet another decision that demonstrates his commitment to teaching, service, and teacher education. In August of 1902, Bagley began a position as a professor of educational psychology at the Montana State Normal School (today’s The University of Montana Western) in Dillon, Montana. Like all normal schools, Montana State was created for the single purpose of preparing elementary teachers for public school service. Bagley was immediately thrust into life as a teacher educator. He enjoyed this life of educating teachers very much. He would remain a practicing teacher educator and a scholar of teacher education for the next forty-four years. His growth as a professional in the field of education grew considerably during the four years he spent at Montana State. He became a widely popular teacher, he lectured throughout the Rocky Mountain region, and he published numerous books and articles. His first major book, The Educative Process, was published in 1905. The work was met with widespread acclaim and became a

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popular textbook for introductory education courses throughout the nation. When Bagley left Dillon in the summer of 1906, perhaps the most important ingredient that Bagley took with him was the spirit of teacher education. He was captivated by the idea of an entire institution of higher learning dedicated to teacher preparation. He became convinced that the best way to prepare teachers was to integrate subject matter and method and to combine theory and practice in the way that the normal schools (and later the teachers colleges) were attempting to do. Perhaps for these reasons, Bagley chose to move to another normal school in the fall of 1906, but this time one that was much more wellknown than Montana State. Bagley, now with a family that included an infant son, moved to Oswego, New York, where he accepted a position as a professor at the nationally-famous Oswego State Normal School. Once again, at Oswego, Bagley worked with a faculty and administration that prepared elementary teachers for public school service. He also served as the principal of Oswego State’s laboratory school, where most of the Oswego students completed their practice teaching within elementary classrooms. He enjoyed this work, but Bagley’s reputation as a growing star in the field of education continued to rise. His opportunities began to multiply. As the field of education grew and the need for more teacher education programs grew along with it, universities (as opposed to normal schools) began to establish programs to prepare teachers. One of the main differences was that the universities created programs to prepare high school teachers, whereas the normal schools (at least for a time) remained focused on elementary teachers. The University of Illinois was one such institution that wanted to find a way to prepare high school teachers. Edmund Janes James, the university’s president, decided that Bagley was the right person for the University of Illinois. He offered Bagley a position as professor of education, which Bagley accepted in August of 1908. Bagley’s change from teaching at two normal schools to beginning his professorship at the University of Illinois cannot be overemphasized. He went from two institutions dedicated solely to teacher education to a growing research university that was not completely sold on the idea of preparing teachers for public school service. He had to convince many people at Illinois that what he was doing was a good idea. The Department of Education that he joined existed in name, but it had no students and no building. Including Bagley, it had three faculty members. Bagley’s job was to build the teacher education program and the department of education at the same time. He succeeded remarkably well at both tasks. He soon became Director of the Department of Education and later Dean of the School of Education once the department had grown into a school.

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Bagley attracted students, he found resources, and he inspired confidence in the field of education at Illinois and more broadly. It was within this milieu of trying to recruit high achieving, academically minded students into the teaching profession that Kappa Delta Pi was born. Bagley had to find a way to get the university’s best students to choose the profession of teaching over other careers such as engineering, law, and medicine. These three professions had already established, or would soon establish, professional associations to promote their fields, and Bagley immediately saw the need for the teaching profession to do the same. He had begun to talk with students about the idea when, in 1909, the University of Illinois was invited to establish a local chapter of another organization that had been created in the field of education: Phi Delta Kappa. Bagley’s group of students submitted the necessary paperwork in 1910 to become an official chapter of PDK, but the national PDK leaders rejected their application because they included women on their list of members. This turn of events, as might be expected, enraged the Illinois group, including Bagley. He thought the idea of creating a professional association for teachers and choosing not to include women was nothing short of ridiculous. Bagley and his students immediately began to make plans to create their own Society, which would be different in many ways, including the fact that women would be encouraged to join. Truman Lee Kelley and T. E. Musselman were the two students whom Bagley identified as most instrumental in the creation of KDP’s first (or Alpha) chapter. They worked with Bagley to write a charter, produce bylaws, prepare an initiation ritual, and recruit new members. First established as an official organization on March 8, 1911, KDP’s Alpha chapter began with only a handful of students, but Bagley immediately saw the possibility, and need, for them to expand what they were doing by working with other institutions. Perhaps the most important distinction in this regard has to do with the fact that KDP is an honor society. Bagley insisted that KDP recognize scholarship by serving as an honor society that would only admit students who had proven themselves academically. He frequently distinguished between a mere professional association and an honorary one. KDP must remain honorary, Bagley maintained, if it is to fulfill its reason for existence. Another founding goal of KDP was to provide an opportunity to foster the “spirit of social service” that Bagley believed was crucial to the future of the teaching profession. Scientific inquiry was another principle written into the foundation of KDP. Bagley believed that KDP could serve as a means through which objective scholarship on effective teaching practices could be disseminated through journal publications, Convocations, and regular meetings of local KDP members. All of these goals began to be realized during the early years of the Alpha chapter. The

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chapter grew each year and was replicated for the first time in May of 1912 when the College of Education at the University of Colorado responded to the Alpha chapter’s invitation to create a chapter there. Beta chapter was approved by the members of the Alpha chapter on May 22, 1912. The foundation for KDP had been laid. Bagley remained at the University of Illinois until 1917. During the nine years he spent at Illinois, he secured funding from the Illinois state legislature to build a laboratory high school, he established a PhD program that graduated its first doctoral students, and he continued to publish scholarship that added to his growing national reputation. Whether or not the University of Illinois was the best fit for Bagley, however, remains an open question. His passion was teacher education. Moreover, he was most passionate about building support for the teachers colleges that made teacher education their single purpose. He eagerly accepted the opportunity to further this work in 1918 when he was invited to join the faculty of Teachers College, Columbia University, as a professor of normal school administration. Although the title of “normal school administration” is antiquated now, what it meant was that Bagley held the nation’s most prominent post in the field of teacher education. By accepting this position, he became the nation’s unofficial “dean” of teacher education. In practice, what Bagley’s new professorship meant was that he now had the opportunity to work with graduate students at Columbia’s Teachers College who would then become the leaders (both professors and administrators) at teachers colleges throughout the country. This opportunity at Teachers College provided him with a path to strengthening teacher education nationwide, something he could not do as a professor at the University of Illinois. He no doubt saw many opportunities to expand the reach of KDP nationwide once he moved to New York City and began to operate on a national scale. Now a Teachers College professor, expanding Kappa Delta Pi was precisely one of the main goals Bagley set out to achieve. He began at Teachers College in the fall of 1918, and it took only two years for the Teachers College chapter, called the Kappa Chapter, to be established. By the time Bagley began his service as Grand President of KDP in August of 1919, seven chapters had been created. During his two terms as Grand President from 1919 to 1924, Bagley achieved many goals, including the establishment of twenty-six additional chapters. The institutions at which these chapters were founded included teachers colleges, state universities, and agricultural colleges (McCracken 1947, 139). Few periods of growth have been more rapid than the five years of Bagley’s presidency. As McCracken noted when he was reflecting on KDP’s early years, “It was during these years (Bagley’s presidency) that the success of Kappa Delta Pi as an Honor Society in Education was assured” (McCracken 1947, 139).

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Even though Bagley’s term as President ended in 1924, he remained deeply involved in all aspects of the Society, including Teachers College’s local chapter as well as decision making at the national level. As mentioned previously, he served continuously on the Executive Council until his death in 1946. He was instrumental in the creation of a Laureate Chapter that would recognize nationally prominent scholars who had furthered the ideals of Kappa Delta Pi. Perhaps one of his most important contributions in this regard was his insistence that KDP never discriminate on the basis of gender, race, or religious identity. In the late 1920s, Bagley argued passionately for the inclusion of African American scholars into the Laureate Chapter, a move that was resisted by more than a few KDP members. Through his influence, however, Bagley won the argument and was deeply proud of the fact that KDP counted individuals such as George W. Carver (a prominent African American) and Father George Johnson (a prominent Catholic) among its members. Another insight into Bagley’s character can be seen in the way he became a member of the Laureate Chapter. Certainly as accomplished as other Laureates, Bagley had resisted his being inducted into this prestigious group. Several attempts were made during the early 1920s to nominate Bagley for membership, each of which he shot down in one way or another. He found it odd that he would be inducted into a group that was part of a Society many people saw him as founding. The only way the Executive Council could get Bagley into the Laureate Chapter was to nominate him when was absent from a meeting of the group in Dallas. He was then informed that he had been elected unanimously into membership of the Laureate Chapter only after the fact one year later in 1928. As a result, Bagley became a member of the Laureate Chapter, but not without some crafty maneuvers on the part of the Executive Council. This episode demonstrates the kind of leadership Bagley sought to provide for Kappa Delta Pi, as well as the spirit he hoped the Society would embody. The title of “Laureate Counselor” is one that remains somewhat mysterious to KDP members. Bagley is the only person known to have held the title. “Laureate Counselor” is probably an honorary title that Bagley held as he worked with the Executive Council during the years following his induction into the Laureate Chapter. Another way in which Bagley played a pivotal role in the expansion of Kappa Delta Pi was with regard to finances. Bagley’s two terms as Executive President not only brought unprecedented growth in chapters, but it also saw KDP’s bottom line grow increasingly strong. When Bagley took over in 1919, KDP, as a national group, had $267.15 in its bank account. Through careful management of resources, restructuring of dues, and the growth of chapters, Bagley handed over a balance of $6020.42 five years later (McCracken 1947, 141). For any society, that is a rather significant

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percentage growth. During the twenty-two years of regular meetings of the Executive Council and the Biennial Convocations that took place during his lifetime, Bagley missed no more than five meetings, and most of these were because he was out of the country or ill. Perhaps one of the most notable of such events was the 1938 Convocation held in Atlantic City. Late in his career, Bagley became known as an “essentialist,” a somewhat unfortunate title that too frequently ignores the work on teacher education that is the heart of his career. For the 1938 Convocation, Kappa Delta Pi invited John Dewey to deliver the group’s keynote lecture. Billed as a “restatement of his philosophy of education,” Dewey’s address was set to reorient, and perhaps in some respects shock, those of his “disciples” whom Bagley believed had misinterpreted Dewey’s work. Bagley and his group of essentialists just so happened to release their essentialist “manifesto” on the same day when Dewey was scheduled to deliver his address entitled “Experience and Education”. Because one member of the essentialist group leaked their document to the press, the 1938 Convocation turned into a media spectacle that was even covered by Time and Newsweek (Null 2007). Because of a few unfortunate remarks to the press by Dewey and William Heard Kilpatrick, Bagley gained a reputation as someone who rejected all aspects of “Progressive Education”. The truth, however, is much more complex (Null 2003, 2008). Bagley should be remembered for his tireless advocacy of liberal education for all through high-quality teacher education. He shared many points of agreement with those who labeled themselves Progressives, but he also had concerns with what Progressives believed, concerns that he voiced in a strong, yet respectful way. This one event in Atlantic City by no means defines Bagley’s career, but it should go down as one of the most exciting biennial Convocations in KDP’s history. The 1938 Convocation also resulted in the publication of Dewey’s Experience and Education, which is viewed as one of Dewey’s most important contributions to the field of educational philosophy. The mature years of Bagley’s professional life were marked by many successes, including the expansion of KDP into a Society with thousands of members throughout the nation. In addition to his constant presence at KDP gatherings, Bagley continued a professional career that included his role as editor of School and Society, his service as a popular teacher at Teachers College, and his work as an author of a continuous stream of books and articles. During his career, he authored or co-authored more than thirty books and published more than four hundred articles and/or editorials. His critique of what he called “educational determinism” in the mid-1920s brought him national recognition as someone who undercut the racist implications of work being done in the field of intelligence testing by professors such as Carl C. Brigham. Although seldom read today,

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Bagley’s Education and Emergent Man, published in 1934, is a significant contribution to educational philosophy, a book that Bagley considered to be his most concise statement of his educational philosophy. His “An Essentialist Platform for the Advancement of American Education,” is an insightful document not only for educational policymakers, but also for scholars in the fields of educational history and philosophy. In the essay, Bagley shows the challenges that America faced during the 1880-1930 time period when the nation expanded the idea of providing a high-quality education to all children. Bagley not only discusses this history, but he also outlines policy changes he thinks need to be made in order to achieve the goal of liberal education for all (1938). There were also challenges that Bagley faced, some of which he found nearly impossible to overcome. The most important of these was the question of what to do about the teachers colleges. Bagley believed that the single-purpose teachers college environment was the best way to prepare teachers. He firmly believed that departments from the various academic disciplines (for example history, mathematics, and biology) should be deeply involved in teacher preparation. To Bagley, the fact that these departments existed within an entire institution that was dedicated to the single purpose of teacher education was essential not only to the future of the teaching profession, but to the survival of democracy as well. He tried, by using his influential professorship at Teachers College, to help teachers colleges maintain their single purpose and not marginalize teacher education. He ultimately failed in this attempt. Every teachers college in the nation eventually transformed into a multi-purpose university that considered teacher education only one of its many reasons for existence. Bagley complained and argued against this trajectory, especially during his final years, but his arguments, as they say, fell on deaf ears (Bagley 1945a, 1945b, 1946). He could not figure out how to resolve the issue of helping teachers colleges rise in status, yet remain dedicated to their single purpose as institutions for teachers. The one institution, however, that has remained true to Bagley’s vision for promoting and strengthening the teaching profession is Kappa Delta Pi. Perhaps because he wrote founding documents such as the ritual and the mission, Kappa Delta Pi will always have classroom teachers as its primary reason for existence. Teachers, so to speak, are Kappa Delta Pi’s most cherished alumni. In May of 1944 just two years prior to his death, Bagley reflected on the first third of a century of KDP’s existence. He noted how the Society was born at a “propitious time” when the study of education was expanding and the nation was in need of an increasingly large number of teachers. The culture was ripe for KDP to grow. He identified the most important contributions KDP had made to American education. He started with the fact that KDP had decided to hold up

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academic ability, scholarship, and character as the three primary ingredients in making good teachers. This focus was unique then, and it remains so today. Next, he argued that KDP had provided the teaching profession with a means to promoting professional pride, professional morale, and an esprit de corps that only comes through an appreciation of the role teachers play in a democracy. Further, he identified such efforts as the Biennial Convocations, the creation of the Laureate Chapter, and the establishment of publications such as The Educational Forum as essential steps that would continue to contribute to the growth and strengthening of the teaching profession for many years to come (Bagley 1944). He correctly identified the most enduring initiatives that KDP had begun. The Executive Council of KDP perhaps summed up what Bagley meant to the Society best. Following his death in 1946, an entire issue of The Educational Forum was dedicated to Bagley. When reflecting on Bagley and the thirty-six years that had passed since the Alpha chapter came into existence, the Council wrote, “As a staunch friend of young people he always held steadfast to the aims and purposes for which Kappa Delta Pi stands…. As a friend of teacher education he strove without ceasing to raise the level of the teaching profession. His interest in educational standards and the welfare of both teacher and student brought to the Council energetic leadership in and support of endeavors for better teacher preparation and a higher quality of instruction” (Bagley 1947, 133-134). These principles, given birth by Bagley almost a century ago, continue to guide not only today’s Executive Council, but also hundreds of chapters across the U.S. and in several foreign countries as well. None of these chapters would exist without the vision, spirit, and work of William Bagley.

REFERNCES Bagley, William C. 1934. Education and emergent man: A theory of education with particular application to public education in the United States. New York: T. Nelson and Sons. Bagley, William C. 1938. An essentialist’s platform for the advancement of American education. Educational Administration and Supervision 24:241–256. Bagley, William C. 1945a. Again: The denaturing of the professional schools of education. School and Society 62:135–136 Bagley, William C. 1945b. Another professional school for teachers loses its professional identity. School and Society 61:372 Bagley, William C. 1946. Further data on the enrollment in professional schools for teachers. School and Society 63:406. McCracken, Thomas C. 1947. William Chandler Bagley and Kappa Delta Pi. The Educational Forum XI:139

30 W. NULL Null, J. Wesley. 2003. A disciplined progressive educator: The life and career of William Chandler Bagley. New York: Peter Lang. Null, J. Wesley. 2007. William C. Bagley and the founding of essentialism: An untold story in American educational history. Teachers College Record 109:1013-1055. Null, J. Wesley. 2008. William Bagley versus Arthur Bestor: Why the standard story is not true. The Educational Forum 72:200–214.

CHAPTER 4

THOMAS COOKE MCCRACKEN (1924-1948) Committed to the Profession of Teaching Paula K Greene

Thomas Cooke McCracken 1924-1948 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 31–42 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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The measure of choosing well, is, whether a man likes and finds good in what he has chosen. —Charles Lamb

Thomas Cooke McCracken chose well. Call him a pragmatist, an essentialist, a professional, a lover of beauty, a man of propriety, a life-long promoter of educational excellence and service, a conservative—he was a man who chose well. The fourth Executive President of Kappa Delta Pi, with a twenty-four year tenure in that role, McCracken led the Society from its small honor fraternity roots in the Roaring Twenties into a sturdy oak that stretched across the nation after World War II. McCracken’s involvement with Kappa Delta Pi began in 1923. He was the founding counselor of the Omega Chapter at Ohio University—the twenty-fourth chapter in the Society. A year later, at the 5th Convocation in Chicago, McCracken was elected as Dr. Bagley’s successor for Executive President. Kappa Delta Pi was twenty-six chapters strong in 1924. When McCracken retired from the Presidency in 1948, chapters had increased to one hundred fifty-four, nationwide. His tireless work in meeting with potential candidates, visiting institutions considered potential sites for chapters, encouraging scholarly events, developing social contacts to enhance Kappa Delta Pi’s involvement in professionalizing teaching, and maintaining the needed balance between local chapter autonomy and a strong, focused center helped to create his vision that Kappa Delta Pi “be a forward-going Society and prove itself worthy in the upbuilding of the great profession of teaching” (Hall-Quest 1985).

EARLY YEARS The personal history of T. C. McCracken is sketchy. So much of his life is linked directly to his professional activities; so many of his scholarly endeavors are linked directly to the practical aspects of his work. Certainly, he was influenced by the dramatic changes that took place during the Progressive Era: urbanization, industrialization, and the centralization of power. He was born January 5, 1876, near Bellefontaine, Logan County, Ohio. His daughter, Alice, described his young life as a struggle: coming from a poor background, he worked his way through school and often had to drop out to wait tables or wash dishes to make enough money to return to his studies. At eighteen, with a high school diploma, McCracken began his teaching career in rural Ohio schools. He taught from 1894 to 1901 before entering Monmouth College in Illinois at the age of twenty-five.

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While at Monmouth, McCracken served as an assistant in the Mathematics Department; he was also a member of the Eccritean Society, a literary organization that promoted debate and public speaking at the college. He graduated cum laude in 1904. From its inception in 1853, Monmouth was one of the first higher education institutions in the country to admit women. Although it is public record that McCracken’s future wife, Lillian Belle Holgate, was from Monmouth, it is unknown where, how, and when they met. After receiving his bachelor’s degree in 1904, McCracken taught Latin and served as the Head of the Preparatory Department of Monmouth. He became principal of Monmouth High School and served as an administrator for three years. In 1909, he was at Harvard, earning his AM degree in 1911. He began his doctoral study at Harvard in that year; it would be seven years of intermittent doctoral study and full time work before he would earn his Ph.D. degree in 1918. Two years into his PhD program, McCracken worked as the Research Secretary for the Women’s Municipal League of Boston. The year 1913 was a productive one: McCracken married Lillian, daughter Alice was born, and the Handbook of Opportunities for Vocational Training in Boston was published. McCracken was the editor and co-author with The Women’s Municipal League. This handbook was a comprehensive practical guide to vocational schools—including normal schools—for both sexes and all ages in Boston proper and the settlement areas. One section, addressing the need to train “handicapped” children, provided insight into McCracken’s ideals of educating all: The public is beginning to realize that there is a place in the work of the world for well-trained boys and girls who are handicapped, and the cooperation of all employers of labor is asked for in extending opportunities to such well-trained children, that they may be self-supporting, useful citizens, with a courageous, normal attitude toward life. (T. C. McCracken 1913)

Also heading west in 1913, McCracken joined the University of Utah for a year as Assistant Professor of Education. He left to become Dean of the Graduate School at Colorado State Teachers College (now University of Northern Colorado). For eight years, from 1914-1922, he taught various courses in the education department and helped organize graduate programs. For two years, he was a member of the Board of Control for Child Welfare. While at CSTC, he wrote an article in support of a community co-op plan that offered college students the opportunity to earn course credit for serving in leadership roles in their town. Examples included teaching Sunday School, leading boys and girls clubs, and aiding other community services that involved teaching. This is a prime example of

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service learning in 1917! The plan was successful and helped both the college and the community benefit. The first four years of McCracken’s tenure at Colorado State Teachers College were also spent completing his PhD at Harvard. His 1918 dissertation—The State Board of Education—is available in the Harvard Archives and in the Gutman Library. While at Harvard, McCracken served as a South End House Fellow and was honored as an Austin Scholar at Radcliff. McCracken, with wife and daughter, returned to Ohio in 1922. Accepting the Dean’s position in the College of Education at Ohio University, Athens, he taught courses in research, school administration, current educational thought, and vocational guidance. He became the university’s first Provost in 1936 and continued as Dean and Provost until his retirement in 1946.

KAPPA DELTA PI YEARS Having chartered the Omega Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi in 1923, McCracken continued as Chapter Counselor at Ohio University during his entire twenty-four years as Executive President of Kappa Delta Pi. This continuity was strong testament of his devotion to chapter involvement on the local level. Over two decades of minutes of Executive Council meetings and reports of the Executive President at Convocations provided numerous examples of McCracken actively supporting the expansion of chapters throughout the nation and providing sustained Executive Council contact with all chapters to support the aims and purposes of the Society. Growth of chapters presented multiple challenges. Inquiries and petitions for membership into Kappa Delta Pi skyrocketed in the 1920s and the Executive Council, headed by McCracken, began meeting semi-annually to discuss eligibility of potential chapters, standards of admission of both undergraduate and graduate students, and the financial stability of the Society itself. At the 1928 Convocation in Boston, delegates decided that institutions with petitioning groups must have “as entrance requirements a four-year course in an accredited high school, or its equivalent, and which maintains a department of Education requiring the full time of more than one professor” (Hall-Quest 1985). Twenty-six Kappa Delta Pi chapters, in 1924, came from land-grant colleges, endowed institutions, normal schools, state universities, and municipal universities. By 1945, these numbers had increased to 141 chapters from land grant colleges, municipal universities, private colleges, state colleges, private universities, state universities, private teachers colleges, and public teachers colleges, which provided the vast majority of chapters.

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Presiding over ten Convocations—the 1944 biennial event was cancelled because of the difficulties in traveling during World War II— McCracken both proposed and witnessed many of the changes that created the Society of today. Early in his presidency, “The Grand Council,” the original governing board of Kappa Delta Pi, became the Executive Council and a Convocation-Delegate Fund was created. Throughout his tenure, McCracken helped maintain and protect this fund to defray delegate expenses for future Convocations. In 1928, at the seventh Convocation, McCracken proposed the creation of the Kappa Delta Pi Lecture Series. This action marked the first step toward a growing policy of the Society, to provide a means for contributing to a body of literature that would lead to Kappa Delta Pi publications. McCracken asked that “only men and women of wide reputation (be) invited as lecturers; the manuscript of the lecture would become the property of the Society and would be published as a volume in a series representative of education” (Hall-Quest 1985). An important discussion was held at this Convocation to permit more than half of the delegates to be students—rather than the majority of delegates being a body of faculty members, as was then in effect. A growing list of inactive members brought renewed energy to the question of creating alumni chapters. Also, lifetime memberships were created. By far, however, the boldest action taken at this seventh Convocation was the discussion on the acceptability of all candidates, regardless of race, creed, or color, provided they met the standards of acceptance for Kappa Delta Pi. By 1928, several southern state chapters had been installed. Legally, these southern universities were segregated, enrolling only non-black students. Northern state institutions were enrolling black students who earned honor status. McCracken and the Executive Council did not oppose black membership but realized the potential difficulties of seating a black delegate near a southern delegate at Convocation, whether male or female. Duke University faculty delegate, Dr. A. M. Proctor, stood on the floor and declared that he was opposed to any discrimination on the grounds of race in an honor society. The other southern delegates agreed. This Convocation went on record to provide every effort to welcome any and all black delegates, protecting Kappa Delta Pi’s democratic principles. Indeed, the Society’s own constitution—from the beginning—had no racial, ethnic, nor gender restrictions on membership. As Executive President, McCracken was intimately involved in Kappa Delta Pi’s growth and direction; in fact, he was president for almost onequarter of its history and he served on the Executive Council longer than any other person. In its early years, the Society conducted its biennial Convocation at the same period of time and site at which the American Association of School Administrators and other leadership organizations

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met. McCracken arranged both annual dinners and Convocation banquets. He secured speakers and issued invitations—planning lovely ceremonies and meals. Throughout his presidency, he reported on the installation of chapters, presiding over many installation ceremonies himself. He and other Executive Council members planned for research studies to be sponsored by Kappa Delta Pi, stimulated local chapters in their work by visiting and writing letters. McCracken reported on joint meetings with other educational groups like the National Education Association. He prepared rituals for initiating members into alumni chapters. In 1925, McCracken wrote the invitation to John Dewey—the first nominee to the Laureate Chapter—to join as a charter member of a prestigious group of men and women who had attained eminence in education. Two notable lectures, The Sources of a Science of Education (1929) and Experience and Education (1938) were presented by John Dewey; the first and still significant title is forgotten in the history of American education, but the second title has been reprinted numerous times and in a number of languages. During his presidency, McCracken wrote invitations and follow-up letters to all nominees for the Laureate Chapter, including George Washington Carver, the first black member of the Laureate chapter, so honored in 1942. McCracken envisioned the Laureate Chapter as the nucleus for research interests of Kappa Delta Pi and as a more solid foundation for increasing the professionalization of teaching. After moving to Ohio in 1923, McCracken became a member of Athens’ First Presbyterian Church, serving as President of the Board of Trustees in that first year. While Dean of the College of Education, he created the Bureau of Appointments, Extension Division, and the Service Bureau at Ohio University. He was also President of the Ohio State Teacher Association’s Teacher-Training Section from 1925-1926, President of the Ohio College Association from 1926-1927, and a member of the General Advisory Committee of the Ohio Department of Education from 1927-1934. In 1928, McCracken co-authored Occupational Information in the Elementary School with Helen Etta Lamb, a Critic Teacher at Northern Arizona Normal School (now Northern Arizona University). This handbook made an important distinction between vocational education—training for the occupational world—and vocational guidance. The latter movement included the study of occupations, discovering what children wanted to do to earn a living, the value of self-analysis along with other analyses that included IQ test scores, teachers’ marks, educational tests, vocational tests, physical tests, and social conditions. The study of opportunities available for both vocational education and employment, job placement, and follow-up were integral parts of the vocational guidance movement. McCracken and Lamb suggested, “It is much better to serve the children and youth in light of the best available information than to leave them

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inexperienced and largely uninformed to meet the necessities and vicissitudes of the selection of, preparation for, and entrance into life’s occupations without assistance” (Thomas Cooke McCracken 1928). Their intent was to provide occupational research—varied and impartial—to children early in their elementary school years, to make the transition from school to occupational life with greater ease and efficiency. Their concern was that too many children were leaving school before the age of fourteen because they had to work or their parents wanted them to work, mostly in unskilled positions. McCracken wanted children to have tools to make more informed decisions—to choose better. A year later, in 1929, McCracken was elected President of the local Athens Rotary Club; he had been a charter member. Also in that year, after the stock market crash, Ohio University avoided faculty layoffs by drastically reducing salaries. The highest paid professors took the greatest cuts, McCracken included. His fiscal conservatism was well documented in Executive Council notes during the next decade. The Kappa Delta Pi treasury grew as the Society expanded during the 1920s and remained sound during The Great Depression. During the 1930s, McCracken continued to provide leadership roles in education and in Kappa Delta Pi. From 1930-1935, he served on the Committee on Standards of the American Association of Teacher’s Colleges. For eight years, he was a member of the National Committee on Education for the Camp Fire Girls movement; perhaps, his daughter, Alice, was involved in a local group. McCracken also served as President of the Ohio Association of Presidents and Deans in 1938. Kappa Delta Pi officially changed from a “Fraternity” to a “Society” in 1932. This change of name and status was important to McCracken. He wanted to distinguish Kappa Delta Pi as a coeducational honorary society— the only one of its kind in the United States. At Convocation that year in Washington, D.C, McCracken added a Fellowship Hour on the evening of the first day and a sightseeing bus trip through the capitol and Mount Vernon. He believed that social intercourse should be an integral part of the Convocation program. What better place and time to promote more casual interaction among delegates than the nation’s capitol in 1932? The 25th anniversary of the founding of Kappa Delta Pi was celebrated in St. Louis at the eleventh Convocation in 1936. McCracken introduced the first alumni chapter with delegates attending from Jacksonville, FL. The extensively revised constitution was adopted and The Kadelpian Review was renamed The Educational Forum and expanded into a general literary educational magazine. McCracken also expanded a more relaxed socialization policy by providing a luncheon that included spontaneous skits and songs performed by delegates.

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McCracken’s Executive Report at this Convocation represented many of the words and sentiments he voiced throughout his long term as President. He spoke of the importance of setting aside a portion of the national initiation fee to help defray the costs of attending Convocation; he called attention to the duty of delegates to be present at every meeting and “to give his best thought to all of its deliberations” (Hall-Quest 1985). He spoke often of broadening educational opportunities for childhood and youth and believed that every chapter should hold tight the aims and purposes of Kappa Delta Pi. In his report, he reminded delegates: I personally am deeply concerned with trends in attitudes toward public education now in evidence among the people of the United States. There is grave danger that the enemies of the public schools may tear down foundations upon which, during decades of struggle, we have been building our opportunities in education. We as teachers and as members of Kappa Delta Pi believe that every child should have adequate educational opportunities for his development. We will desire to use our influence to uphold all that is basically good in education including the preparation of efficient teachers…. It is my hope that Kappa Delta Pi may be able to maintain itself as an agency which is far-reaching in its educational influence—an influence which is exerted not so much by its national administrative organization, however, as by the personal consecration of its many members to the high ideals of the Society. (Hall-Quest 1985)

In his continuous mission to encourage Kappa Delta Pi members to hold the highest standards in their schooling and lives, McCracken also lamented: Civilization has brought ugliness into our environment and into the lives of both the rich and the poor. Members of Kappa Delta Pi whose lives are consecrated to the teaching of youth should as far as possible eliminate that which is offensive and encourage that which is beautiful and refined. It matters little whether this is in action, dress, thought, or speech…. Occasionally a chapter permits thoughtless rudeness to become a part of its activities. Sometimes a chapter needs to observe more carefully the more nearly subtle evidences of refinement and culture. Courtesy to members and all others should be an unfailing characteristic of every Kadelpian and of every chapter. (Hall-Quest 1985)

Ending his report, McCracken remarked that he was grateful for the spirit of friendship and civility that he witnessed during the previous two years. He pointed out the need for “the truly professional and the really artistic” in the teaching profession—a recurring theme in all of his speeches and writings.

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The decade of the 1940s brought new ideas and challenges. In 1939, McCracken held the first open meeting of visiting Kappa Delta Pi members with the Executive Council during its formal meeting. This practice continued in 1941, bridging the distance a bit between the National Society and local chapters. McCracken’s wish to publicize the fact that Kappa Delta Pi was not a sorority, not a club, but a prestigious honorary educational organization, was finally granted in 1942; “Kappa Delta Pi” officially became “Kappa Delta Pi, An Honor Society in Education.” The onset of World War II brought new challenges. Referring to the 1942 Convocation held in San Francisco, McCracken described how the trains that delegates traveled on were blacked out and how the windows in the hotel rooms were painted black. An attack by a Japanese submarine on Santa Barbara occurred during Convocation. McCracken recalled, “Those were stirring days when the future presented many problems not easily understood. They were pointed toward war, toward construction at highest possible speed. We were sending our youth to perform what seemed to be impossible and unthinkable tasks” (A Friendly Greeting and a Call to Service 1946). In the same 1946 letter to Kappa Delta Pi members, McCracken promised Executive Council financial support to bring delegates and alternates to Convocations in the coming years. He believed that there was need for larger attendance “in order that a double inspiration might be carried to the chapters, an impetus that will make itself felt through the next college year” (A Friendly Greeting and a Call to Service 1946). He spoke of a spirit of friendliness and wholesomeness and reiterated that the Society was constantly striving for the finer and better things in the teaching profession, a profession that McCracken deemed “a calling in which the truly professional and the really human are so much needed” (A Friendly Greeting and a Call to Service 1946). Although McCracken was concerned with the tremendous reduction in active members because of the war, Kappa Delta Pi actually added eighteen new chapters since the 1942 Convocation and received petitions for additional new chapters. Also during the 1940s, regional conferences and joint local chapter meetings were encouraged because of the difficulty traveling during war time. Previously, all of the Executive Council meetings, annual dinners, and Convocations were held at prestigious hotels. In 1943, for the very first time, an Executive Council meeting was held at a residence— McCracken’s Elmwood Place home in Athens, Ohio. Granted, this was considered one of the finest homes in the area; Alice recalled many formal parties and celebrations at the house during her father’s tenure at Ohio University. But the war effort included canceling the 1944 Convocation, providing funds for delegates and alternates to attend regional conferences, selling overstocked Kappa Delta Pi publications for scrap paper,

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and pooling general fund expense money to encourage more officer and member attendance at Convocations. In 1947, McCracken presented a plan for an in-country teacher exchange in honor of the recently deceased Dr. Bagley.

RETIREMENT YEARS The Board of Trustees at Ohio University accepted McCracken’s resignation on February 1, 1946. He was immediately named Dean Emeritus. At the time, Ohio University President Baker stated, “One of the most difficult problems any university president can face is replacing his deans upon whom he depends for the operation of various divisions of the university. This general proposition is particularly true in the case of my colleague, Dean McCracken, who for many years has been an influence in his own immediate field and in university-wide circles as well” (Ohio University Post 1946). A colleague, Dr. Azariah Boody Sias, Professor of School Administration and Director of Teacher Training, added, “Dean McCracken is recognized as one of the outstanding educators of the state of Ohio” (Ohio University Post 1946). McCracken was honored at a dinner with 125 guests. How apropos that the menu included roast turkey, mashed potatoes, and apple pie ala mode—a feast that offered fellowship in “Thanksgiving” mode. The songs` played, “Then You’ll Remember Me” and “Without a Song,” were both Victorian pieces that spoke to McCracken’s own sense of sensibility and beauty. Ohio University announced that it would sponsor a series of lectures—The McCracken Lectures—in honor of its recent retiree. McCracken continued his service in Kappa Delta Pi as Executive President for one more term. Delegates to the 1948 Convocation elected him to an informal position as Executive President Emeritus—a non-voting, advisory member of the Executive Council. Over the next eleven years, McCracken attended all but one Executive Council meeting. He was elected member of the Laureate Chapter in 1949. Although his health precluded him from writing a requested formal history of Kappa Delta Pi, he did provide a synopsis, “Forty Years of Kappa Delta Pi,” at the Annual Dinner in 1951. He spoke of the purpose and scholarly activity that evolved over four decades; he was especially proud of the growth of Kappa Delta Pi—chapters in all states but Montana, Nevada, and Vermont; 85,000 members initiated since 1911. His report concluded: The real miracle of Kappa Delta Pi, however, is performed in the chapters. The chapter is the training ground where the principles in which the Society believes become a part of the student’s thinking and of his philosophy of

Thomas Cooke McCracken (1924-1948) 41 education and life. It is in the service which the members later give to their students and to the cause of education that the meaning of Kappa Delta Pi will be exemplified. On this Fortieth Anniversary of the founding of Kappa Delta Pi, an Honorary Society in Education, let us reaffirm our faith in its purposes. Let us agree that one of the greatest of its influences will be to widen the horizons of teachers and broaden their human understanding of peoples and their different cultures with the expected result—better educated teachers. Kappa Delta Pi will contribute to a higher quality of citizen leadership when higher ideals for teacher preparation bring about better teaching. (T. C. McCracken 1951)

On March 9, 1961, McCracken died at home in Athens, after a long illness. In 1963, Ohio University renamed the College of Education building, McCracken Hall, in his honor. A year later, Lillian and Alice McCracken presented the university with a portrait of its beloved Dean and Provost to hang in the lobby of McCracken Hall. Mrs. McCracken remarked, “To those of you who did not know him, he was a man of greatest gentleness, keen sensitivity and sincere sympathy. His life needs no eulogy” (McCracken 1964).

FINAL THOUGHTS Kappa Delta Pi’s Executive Council and Convocation attendees spoke of McCracken’s “wise judgment, his open-mindedness, thoughtfulness, and genuine executive abilities. They will always remember, too, his insistence upon beauty in the appointments at the Society’s functions, his poise and charm as a presiding officer” (Dr. McCracken Retires at Ohio University 1946). His involvement in educational leadership roles throughout the Progressive Era, the Great Depression, and World War II years verifies his commitment to elevating teaching from an occupation or quasi-profession into an honorable profession, with educated, refined, and dedicated teachers – prepared to meet the ongoing needs of children of all ages. Certainly, McCracken’s long-term commitment to Kappa Delta Pi confirmed the reality of the need for a special agency—co-educational, service oriented, honor-based, steeped in scholarly pursuit, with central and local importance—to grow and glow with teaching and learning endeavors. Like the house he had built in 1929 in Athens—an asymmetrical English Tudor Revival style with a steep roof—McCracken remains an example of refinement, practicality, sustainability, and historic value. Now, one of the finer houses in the Historic District, The McCracken House has continued to provide a lovely home for university provosts and other leaders in Logan County. McCracken chose well. He led that others might do so, too.

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REFERENCES A Friendly Greeting and a Call to Service. The Educational Forum. May 1946: 506c506e. Dr. McCracken retires at Ohio University. 1946. The Educational Forum Supplement, 10(3): 384d & 384e. Hall-Quest, Alfred Lawrence. 1985. Kappa Delta Pi: 1911-1936. Lafayette, IN: The Copy Print Shop. First published in 1938 by The Macmillan Co. McCracken, Thomas Cooke. 1951. Forty years of Kappa Delta Pi. Lafayette, IN: Kappa Delta Pi. McCracken, Thomas Cooke. 1913. The women’s municipal league of Boston. Handbook of opportunities for vocational training in Boston. Boston: The Women’s Municipal League. McCracken, Thomas Cooke and Helen Etta Lamb. 1928. Occupational information in the elementary school. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. Ohio University Post (Athens, Ohio). 1946. Dr. McCracken resigns Feb.1. January 11.

CHAPTER 5

WILLIAM McKINLEY ROBINSON (1948-1950) A Steward for Rural Education and Life David Callejo Perez

Wm. McKinley Robinson 1948-1952

A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 43–57 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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In choosing how best to represent William McKinley Robinson’s (18931976) life as a public intellectual, practitioner, and advocate for rural education, the chapter emphasizes his work and life as embodying the story of education in the United States during the first half of the twentieth century. Robinson’s personal and professional life personified Herbert Kliebard’s, The Struggle for the American Curriculum (1987)—a rationalization of the different and somewhat competing trends in educational history that have shaped the curriculum of American schools and universities—and in turn American lives. William McKinley Robinson was born on June 29, 1893, in rural Wauseon, Ohio (west of Toledo). In his last semester of high school his Superintendent Calvin J. Biery gave him a copy of How To Study and Teaching How To Study by Frank Morton McMurry (1909), and suggested that upon graduation he should sit for the teacher’s exam given by the school board. In a letter written years later (March 1918) to his wife, Robinson wrote that he was told to return again next term because he was too young (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). After passing the licensing exams, his first teaching position was in a one-teacher rural school in the Amish Mennonite community in Fulton County, Ohio where he earned $40 a month after passing the teacher exam. After a successful year, he visited the children’s homes to learn about them and include their lives in the curriculum and teach “from what they knew best.” Robinson later explained in a 1963 radio interview that he was offered the Assistant Principal position in Wauseon, Ohio at the elementary school (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). Conditions for his employment included attending State Normal College in Ypsilanti, Michigan (Eastern Michigan University) in 1912. After receiving initial teacher education, Robinson attended Hiram College where he received a BS in Science in 1916. At Hiram he worked as an assistant in General Chemistry (1915) before his graduation. He continued to attend the State Normal College at Ypsilanti, Michigan during the summers to prepare for teaching and supervision. His former superintendent who was now the chair of Bowling Green State University’s (BGSU) Department of Rural Education (one of the four created in Ohio to train rural teachers—Miami, Ohio, and Kent State were the others) recruited him after graduation. After he was hired at BGSU, he was named organizer and teacher for the BGSU’s Westhope Model Rural School for the preparation of rural teachers, which was a laboratory school for the university (1917). While working there he was first published in the Ohio Teacher, where he wrote about the experimental Westhope school (Robinson 1917). In March 1918,he enlisted in the U.S. Army where he trained in Chicago and Georgia being honorably discharged nine months later as Ordinance Sergeant. He was named director of the Elementary Division of the Americanization School

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of the Ordinance Division at Camp Hancock—one of the only integrated Officer Training Schools in the Army (Black Heritage Society of Washington State). Because of his work at BGSU’s Westhope School, an experimental school for “rural children,” Teachers College Columbia University faculty who had been working with a similar school in Orleans, Vermont contacted him. Robinson began his Masters in 1917 at Teachers College Columbia and moved to Orleans (12 miles from the Canadian border) to be Superintendent in 1919. That year, he asked his girlfriend from Hiram College to marry him (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). In 1920 he wed Cornelia, who was born in Marietta, Ohio. He was Superintendent in Orleans until 1922. In a personal letter to a colleague explaining why he left the district, he wrote that the commitments where “like those of a pastor in a small town” (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). Encouraged by Mabel Carney to study rural education and be an advocate for human rights, Robinson and his wife enrolled at Teachers College. According to Myles Horton, Mabel Carney also influenced Septima’s Clark’s interests in “rural problems” (Mellen Charron 2009). While studying at Columbia, Mabel Carney invited Robinson to a party where he met May E. Francis, a populist republican running for the newly created Iowa Department of Public Instruction. In the notes he wrote for an interview that never occurred (he passed before it was to occur), Robinson remembered about the event: “I sat next to a gal, who was running for a new office in Iowa, State Superintendent of Instruction, who thought my ideas on using data and surveys to measure schools were interesting.” Robinson continued, “She said if she won, she would give me a job.” He concluded, “She won and I received a telegram from her with a job offer” (William McKinley Robinson Collection). She became the first woman to win a statewide office in Iowa (and at the time the only female Superintendent in the U.S.), and employed Robinson to supervise the newly created 389 consolidated schools (Reynolds 1999). In an interview conducted in 1963, he tells the talk show host that his only demand to May Francis was that his wife be his secretary (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). Even after taking this job and the ones that followed in Washington, DC, and at Western Michigan University, Robinson continued attending Teachers College, Columbia University, from which he earned his MA degree in 1923 in Secondary Education and Administration of Small and Community Schools and his PhD in 1936. During the 1920s he also became a member in Kappa Delta Pi and Phi Delta Kappa. While in Iowa, Robinson became interested in the use of measurement to assess student learning in the consolidated schools. Through the office of Public Instruction Robinson used $500 in state aid as a reward for districts that adopted the evaluation system and used it for accreditation and measurement of

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learning (Reynolds 1999). Although a sociologist, he partnered with psychometricians in his work at Iowa and, also, later in his career with the U.S. Office of Education and National Education Association (NEA) to use surveys and instruction data to measure learning and as a foundation of how to “train rural teachers.” His work related to surveys and rural schools addressing learning that addressed teacher preparation became the biggest contribution made by Robinson to rural education. At Western Michigan University, he and Paul V. Sangren used measurement and ethnography to conduct one of the most intensive studies of rural life and education in Ionia County, Michigan (Sangren 1928, 1929). His work in Iowa led Mabel Carney to recommend him for the position of Rural Specialist of the newly created Department of Rural Teacher Training in the Office of Education in 1924. He accepted and held that appointment until 1927, as well as Professor of Elementary Education (Summer Sessions) at George Washington University (1925-1927). A part of his assignment he visited Normal Schools across the United States. In an interview for Western Michigan University’s Western Herald, Robinson commented that he visited every Normal School in the U.S. except for a few (September 1960). During this time, he also authored several influential reports, including Preparation of Teachers for Rural Schools (U.S. Department of Interior 1927b), Biannual Survey of Education in the U.S. (U.S. Department of Interior 1926), and Education in the United States (U.S. Department of Interior 1927b). During his visits, he wrote his wife that it would be important that he take a position at a school with a Rural Education Department at which he could carry out his “professional training and experience … of rural life and education” (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). He believed that Dwight B. Waldo, founding President of Western State Normal School (now Western Michigan University), was excited about being a national leader in rural education. Paul V. Sangren (WMU President 1936-1960) was already doing measurement studies with rural schools, and that he could build on the work of Ernest Burnham, a pioneer in rural education, who served in the Department of Rural Education from 1904 to 1940. He decided take a faculty position at Western in 1927 for a salary of $4500 a year. Robinson and his family liked their move to Kalamazoo, Michigan. He was employed as Chair of Rural Education, replacing Paul V. Sangren. At this time, the Department of Rural Education was not only the core teacher education program but also the core program at the university. He was charged with making the program a national leader in rural education. One of his firsts tasks was to study why students chose rural education. In March 1928, he reported to the faculty that rural teachers, like urban teachers, choose rural life because of interest. In order to be effec-

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tive Robinson joined the State of Michigan PTA, subsequently serving on its Board for 31 years. He also chaired the National Committee on Recruitment, Program Preparation and Retention of Rural Communities and led the Rural Education Department of the National Education Association for ten years. Even today, rural education struggles with the definition of rural life. In several articles, Robinson stateed that rural life is more complicated than farming and that the notion of uniqueness of rural life is a detriment to its complexities. He was a sought after speaker nationwide because of his work in the U.S. Bureau of Education. He regularly was invited to Harvard as a speaker on rural education. During his first year at Western, he traveled to the NEA in Washington D.C. to discuss rural education, and specifically his interest in internationalizing rural education. Robinson believed that all rural teachers shared a common bond regardless of nation or state (Robinson 1954). He was a driving force in bringing international scholars to Kalamazoo, beginning in 1928, when he invited teachers from Mexico to spend the summer at Western. During his first five years at Western, Robinson concentrated on his graduate work at TC, Columbia University, while also becoming involved in social projects (he was involved in the Community Chest of Kalamazoo, becoming President in 1935). A lesson learned from his work in DC, Robinson held that rural schools depended on the university for connections to practice (Robinson 1933). In 1928, the Western faculty began regular visits to the schools before the semester began and then a second time during the year. The Department also created a study group to address rural life through research projects. Results of these projects as well as news about education, physical science, farming, social sciences and social life were broadcast on Western’s Radio Hour on WSYC, twice a week at 1:15pm (National Committee on Education by Radio 1931). Early success included increased connections among alumni which led to the establishment of the alumni newsletter in 1931. Six years later, the use of in-service and field placements for teachers with alumni teachers in the field created what he believed to be a “real life” experience of working in a rural community while keeping teachers connected to Western (U.S. Office of Education 1940; Robinson 1940). Along with his wife, he joined the Evening Current Events Club, founded by city leaders in 1895 to discuss social issues affecting Kalamazoo. Politicians, business leaders, clergy, community leaders joined faculty from Kalamazoo College and Western Michigan to meet monthly. In the 1960s, Robinson wrote a letter to the Kalamazoo Gazette stating that the Club did not make any decisions affecting politics after years of questioning membership and discussions at the gatherings (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). Involvement in community was core to the lives William Robinson and his wife Cornelia, who became the third woman elected to office in the city of Kalama-

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zoo, as a City Commissioner in 1948 (City of Kalamazoo Public Library, Commission Papers), and the first woman to be reelected in 1951. Cornelia Robinson was born in 1897 and met Robinson at Hiram. After marrying in 1920, she also received her Master’s from Teachers College, Columbia. Soon after arriving in Kalamazoo, she established a public health program for women and children. During his tenure at Western Michigan, she covered his classes when he traveled to speak. Between 1927 and 1960, Robinson traveled ten to twelve times each semester for speaking engagements, three to five times to meetings in Washington, DC, and two to three times to Lansing, Michigan. Cornelia co-sponsored the brown bag luncheons by Beta Iota Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi (installed in February 1929 by Robinson), the banquet for Rural Life, and worked on the alumni awards with her husband. She provided much of the energy behind the WSYC broadcasts that were created to promote radio for educational, cultural, and political education (National Council of the Radio 1931) and was instrumental in bringing to Kalamazoo Harold Rugg in 1932 and Hollis Caswell in 1939. The Robinsons participated as a couple in most events, not only in his endeavors, but also in her involvement in Kalamazoo and state politics. His dedication to rural life and education, and social causes is summarized when he stepped down as Chair of Western Michigan’s Department of Rural Education in 1960 by a press release from the NEA that stated, “His ideas and ideals have prevailed beyond description or proper evaluation here. Suffice it to say that nobody else in his generations of service has made more superior contributions” (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). In 1961, he received a Lifetime Membership in the NEA’s Department of Rural Education for his work. After their son’s death in 1933, McKinley Robinson returned to Columbia to finish his dissertation, Practices and Trends in the Preparation of Teachers for Rural Elementary Schools in the State Colleges and Normal Schools (1936). In 1936, he received a PhD degree from Teachers College Columbia University in Sociology and Education. While working on his dissertation, he became the Director of Western’s Summer School Program. During the summers, the university ran summer sessions for teachers and administrators looking to finish degrees, to earn credits for licensure, and to improve practice. In 1935, the summer school focus was on social studies, specifically on how social studies could help rural communities during the Depression to maintain a sense of place. Robinson brought Roy Hatch from Teachers College, Montclair, NJ, to lead discussions and sessions on social studies curriculum, teaching the Constitution, Middle School and Secondary History, Sociology and Civics (William McKinley Robinson Collection A-517). The following year Harry A. Overstreet, from Harvard University, came. He was a specialist on Citizenship and Adult Education.

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The focus on Adult Education was crucial for the rural communities in the area. Also, it was an arena on which Robinson worked on for several years, especially the role of play, home life, teacher training, and parent-teacher relationships in rural education.1 Overstreet and Robinson met through the PTA, at which Overstreet wrote extensively for the PTA about citizenship. Overstreet was later accused of being a socialist for his writings on and about citizenship and socialism. Along with writing for the PTA, Overstreet and Robinson worked together when Robinson was Chair of the NEA’s Rural Education Society (Robinson 1941). Cornelia A. Robinson (1897-1977) and William McKinley Robinson had what can be described as a professional and public relationship and marriage. However, few were privy to their private lives, because so much of their time was lived in public. They traveled extensively in Europe (1928-1929), Mexico and Canada (1931-1932), Africa (1934), and Asia (1937). Robinson worked on increasing extension classes for rural populations in western Michigan, northern Ohio, and Indiana. As Director of the Summer Program, he increased offerings for teachers. One of the great concerns was getting rural teachers to return to college and become prepared in new practices—including safety education, physical education and civic engagement after World War II (Robinson 1938, 1945). Robinson and Cornelia would return to South Africa in 1950 for the World Federation of Education Association, during which time he was President of Kappa Delta Pi and Chair of the Department of Rural Education (NEA). He was instrumental in inviting John Dewey to the world education conference. Upon their return, Robinson and his wife begin to speak about a legacy to their community which culminated in the donation of their estate to Western Michigan University in 1976 as an endowment upon their death. The Robinson House and the estate provide scholarships to teacher education students at Western Michigan today. If only one measure of Robinson’s contribution to education, it was his service to rural education. He was Chair, President or Vice-Chairman of the NEA’s Department of Rural Education, Rural Life Committee, NEA Educational Policies Commission, National Parent, Inc., National Safety Council, and National Council of the YMCA, even as he was a leader of the same organizations at the state level. Between 1928 and his retirement in 1960, he traveled the country. He lectured about rural education to most State Teachers Colleges in the Midwest and Northeast. He also was Professor in the Department of Rural Education and Sociology at the University of North Carolina, the University of Colorado, and from the newspaper and personal records, he gave 700 talks and lectures on rural education throughout his career. The one event that stands out in light of his work with social justice as a consultant on rural education for apartheid South Africa for more than 10 years.

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His relationship with Kappa Delta Pi began early on at Western Michigan University, when he made the chapter there a key component of rural education. He attempted to bridge the practitioner-researcher gap through recruitment, placement, and retention of students who would be teachers in rural areas. In fact, he brought the Kappa Delta Pi chapter to campus and for more than 30 years, Cornelia and William Robinson oversaw luncheons, guest speakers, award banquets, and annual conferences related to the Beta Iota chapter. Much of his work in teachers’ journals addressed the impact of research on practice, his use of radio as a medium speaks to his increased attention to outreach. Kappa Delta Pi is the centerpiece in recruiting students, continued alumni involvement, and connection to the rural schools (Robinson 1943). He was an early proponent of using surveys and data to gather information for planned change, improving safety and health to improve rural life. He was also an early proponent of curriculum reform, writing several manuals for curriculum change in rural America. Suggestions for Organizing and Conducting a Parent Teacher Conference (Robinson 1940a) and Rural Youth (Robinson 1940b) were widely used until the 1960s, and his radio broadcasts were syndicated, beginning in 1948 (Western Herald February 1948). At Western Michigan, one of his main goals was to increase student representation and activism is social, political, and academic endeavors in the institution, regionally and nationally. He was a proponent of having students serve on the interview process for hiring, advisory boards, and curriculum development. In a 1940 article, he wrote that a successful rural teacher education program needed to involve Superintendents, teachers, pre-service teachers, and professors in the education, continuing education, and practice of teachers (Robinson 1940c). He increased pre-service teacher participation in rural communities along with faculty to gain an understanding and appreciation of the community. Committees were formed and reports were shared to improve practice. At the core was increasing the efficacy of teachers in rural education and investing in them as students by enrolling in programs that were of high quality, field based, and were research was used to make curricular decisions. Thus, for Robinson, the rural teacher needed to be a consumer and advocate of reform. These principles and practice would drive Robinson’s tenure as Kappa Delta Pi’s Executive President from 1948 to 1950.

Kappa Delta Pi Presidency He was nominated for the Kappa Delta presidency in 1948 to replace T. C. McCraken who had been the Society’s Grand President for 24 years and had decided to step down because of health. In 1948, the Convoca-

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tion asked Robinson, who had served as National Executive Counselor since 1942, if he would be willing to serve as President. In the March 1949 meeting of the Executive Council, T.C. McCracken asked that because of his health and condition he not be asked to write a formal history of his tenure. Instead, the Executive Council and McCracken agreed that “jotting down from time to time such things he felt would be valuable as source material for future history” (Kappa Delta Pi 1949, p. 247). Robinson was interested in educational policy, and like Lyndon B. Johnson valued the role of national politics to impact local change (Peters 2010). As Executive President of Kappa Delta Pi, Robinson focused on research, internationalization, uniformity of chapter procedures, and preparing Kappa Delta Pi for the post-World War II era. Robinson believed Kappa Delta Pi needed to recruit members when they were students, involve them in the organization, and guide them in their practice. His concerns for representation of students at Convocations and on the Executive Council were addressed in 1950 with the creation of the Office of Student Counselor at the Spring Mill Convocation. To celebrate his Executive Presidency, a celebration of the anniversary of the founding of the Western Michigan chapter led to the largest pledge drive in the university’s history with 54 new Society members and 134 Western students attending the National Convocation. In the July 1948 Kappa Delta Pi Executive Council meeting he emphasized that students should be invited to the Convocation, introduced to opportunities and program activities, and that Convocation attendance should include more students and not so many counselors. Robinson agreed to cover expenses for a representative of the Society to be present at installations of institutional presidents at which Kappa Delta Pi had a chapter because “such representation at the institution were thought to be beneficial to Kappa Delta Pi now or later” (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes July 1948, p. 235). Robinson believed that Kappa Delta Pi should increase its revenue by reprinting John Dewey’s works (in the United States and internationally), creating the Charles Bagley Teacher Exchange, research awards, international chapters, membership of large teacher education institutions, and creation of standards for teacher education programs. Some of these ideas became reality but not for a number of years later. In 1948, Robinson approved the printing of 10,000 circulars for members to emphasize the role of research in teacher education (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1948). His idea—similar to his work on rural education—was to create a national standard for Kappa Delta Pi. Today, it might be called call it “branding.” Included in his “branding” concept was increased communication between chapters and the Kappa Delta Pi Executive Council. He appointed a committee to have paperwork ready by 1949 to begin the Bagley Memorial Teacher Exchange which he believed would enable

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practitioners from across the country to learn about national practices in teaching. In the November 1949 issue of The Educational Forum, Robinson wrote that on campus members begin to think about applying for the Exchange once they have had the “three years of professional experience” (Robinson 1949d, p. 128c). The new research award (the amount was raised to $500 in 1949) championed by Robinson was intended to “encourage the younger participant” who is “in his initial stage of research.” (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1948, p. 239). In his first article in The Educational Forum, Robinson writes “without a sense of moral obligation and the ability to translate thoughts into action, high scholarship may be not only futile but destructive” but when “combined with an awareness of commensurate responsibility and the ability to translate thought into action, high scholarship gives promise of leadership and distinctive contribution” (Robinson 1949a, p. 256c). The discussion about research within Kappa Delta Pi was whether to invite “professional researchers” or “to encourage the young amateurs” (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1948, p. 239). In 1949, Robinson encouraged local chapters and to stimulate research and to encourage members to submit their research to the Kappa Delta Pi Educational Research Awards in order to “stimulate educational research at an early age as well as to recognize outstanding contributions to education” (Robinson 1949d, p. 128c). Throughout his career (Robinson 1940c), was always concerned about the quality of teacher preparation. In 1948, he assigned Executive First Vice President Katherine Vickery and Executive Second Vice President Frank L. Wright to study and create a high but inclusive national standard for Chapters that would satisfy larger institutions (e.g., the universities of Michigan and Minnesota) while not penalizing small liberal arts colleges, and to contact large universities to consider their development of Kappa Delta Pi chapters on their campuses (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1948, p. 240). In his final message as Executive President in March 1950, Robinson wrote members that as the “largest honorary society in education,” Kappa Delta Pi should encourage “high professional, intellectual and personal standards within the profession” (Robinson 1950, p. 384c). Concurrently, Robinson spoke to members about using the Bylaws to “measure its programs and projects planned for the year (Robinson 1949d, p. 128c). A third project he championed in 1948 was giving 200 subscriptions of The Educational Forum to persons outside the U.S. especially “occupied Germany” and China (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1948, pp. 241-242). He dedicated the May 1949 Executive President Message to this topic where he encouraged unity among Kappa Delta Pi members and emphasis on the U.S. as part of a larger world concerned with education. He encouraged members that as “potential leaders in education for this next generation [you] may find your challenge” in creating a “genuinely co-operative effort

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… on the local level,” and “applied on the international level” (Robinson 1949b, p. 284c) and that “every chapter of Kappa Delta Pi should devote at least one program a year to some aspect of the work of UNESCO” and include foreign students within “your own campuses” (Robinson 1949c, p. 504c). In the Kappa Delta Pi Minutes (March 1949), Robinson and McCracken asked the Executive Council, Regional Counselors, and chapter leaders to integrate international students into the chapter. As well as a vision for Kappa Delta Pi , Robinson worked closely with McCracken to standardize the practice of Kappa Delta Pi publications. Several of the projects included creating an efficient communication mechanism from KDP to local chapters—to have prompt votes on important matters (KDP Minutes 1949, p. 246)—and to create effective decision making procedures such as changing By-laws to allow Chapters to vote on business and changes between Convocations, involving local chapters in decision making and expanding Kappa Delta Pi by directly contacting persons on campuses and encouraging applications for new chapters, and improving the quality of professional teacher education by scrutinizing members and chapters. Robinson fostered several key practices including visits to local chapters by Executive Council members to stimulate expansion and to observe practices. He worked with the Laureate Counselor in “discussion of the aims and broad principles involved in Education and the Society’s work” at regional meetings (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1949, p. 247). In order to improve the impact of publications, McCracken and Robinson suggested that the Editorial Board meet yearly and focus on the message of the Society. This practice could be classified as a nationalizing of Kappa Delta Pi that not only included journals, but re-printing of the Constitution, By-Laws, Manuals, and the Circular of Information for Initiates to all local chapters and active members (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1949, p. 248). Another interesting tool for nationalizing the organization was the awarding of an honor key to outstanding members. William M. Robinson’s steadfastly believed that Kappa Delta Pi would only grow and prosper if students were more involved. He and the Executive First Vice President, Katherine Vickery established a committee to investigate student representation on the Executive Council and to increase participation at the Convocation (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1949, p. 249). Included in this was the commissioning of materials—including brochures dealing with how to run a successful chapter, recruiting new members, and other information—published by the Kappa Delta Pi Executive Council that would ensure the Society’s growth and practices. In working with the Recorder-Treasurer, Robinson asked for and received permission to hire secretarial help at Kappa Delta Pi and upgrade typewriters and other office equipment. In his notes preparing for a 1960 Western Herald interview (Wil-

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liam McKinley Robinson Collection A-517), he writes that secretarial help is key to the growth and well-being of organizations. Robinson’s last year as Kappa Delta Pi Executive President saw the birthing of his ideas, including integration. The bylaws were changed to increase national control, to emphasize membership requirements and to remove “race from the detailed petitions required of chapters” (Kappa Delta Pi Minutes 1950, p. 254). Robinson also backed a petition for an alumni chapter in the Fresno area, only if “persons from the entire valley be eligible for membership in the chapter” (Ibid, p. 254, Weiler 1998). In his last act as Executive President, Robinson oversaw the motion to set aside $75,000 and to create a committee to establish a permanent headquarters for Kappa Delta Pi (including a building) and an endowment for such headquarters (Ibid, p. 256). Robinson refused a second term as President of Kappa Delta Pi, although he remained active in the organization and served as advisor of the Beta Iota Chapter at Western Michigan until 1960. With the help of Kappa Delta Pi, he brought Haitian officials to observe rural schools in the U.S. Beginning in 1950, Robinson, slowly refocused his work from public national service in rural education and toward local and regional service in Kalamazoo and rural Michigan. This move also coincided with the increased visibility of his wife as an elected official. Intellectually, Robinson returned to his discipline of sociology, focusing on its role in teacher education (Robinson 1958) and social theory in teacher preparation (Robinson 1954). For William McKinley Robinson, home was Kalamazoo. There, he and his wife created a life of public service. He lived his life in the public sphere and was impacted by—while also impacting—social changes in the first half of the twentieth century. Robinson was in a rural community, attended and taught at rural schools, and spent more than 40 years working in rural education as a teacher, administrator, bureaucrat, professor, and Executive President of Kappa Delta Pi. He believed that policy, standards, internationalization, and research would provide an increased professionalism in the teaching profession. As a public intellectual, practitioner, and advocate for rural education, Robinson was “an individual who significantly affects the thoughts, feelings, and/or behaviors of a significant number of individuals” (Gardner 1996, p. ix).

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The author wishes to thank Sharon Carlson, Director; Lynn Houghton, Curator; and John Winchell, Archives Curator at the Western Michigan

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University Archives and Regional History Collection for their help in working with William McKinley Robinson Collection.

NOTE 1.

Much of his focus emerged when he was the Chairman of the NEA Committee on the Economic Status of the Rural Teacher ad as National Chairman of Rural Service for the National Congress of Parents and Teachers.

REFERENCES Black Heritage Society of Washington State. n.d. Special Exhibition: People of Honor. http://www.blackheritagewa.org/collections/men_of_honor.asp. Gardner, Howard. 1966. Leading minds: An anatomy of leadership. New York: Basic Books. Kappa Delta Pi. 1948a. Minutes of the meeting of the executive council of Kappa Delta Pi. Hotel Madison, Atlantic City, NJ: February 26. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Kappa Delta Pi. 1948b. Minutes of the meeting of the executive council of Kappa Delta Pi. Athens, OH: July 24 and 25. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Kappa Delta Pi. 1949. Minutes of the meeting of the executive council of Kappa Delta Pi. Hotel Bellevue-Strafford, Philadelphia, PA: March 28 and March 29. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Kappa Delta Pi. 1950. Minutes of the meeting of the executive council of Kappa Delta Pi. Spring Mill Inn, Mitchell, IN: March 25-27. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Kliebard, Herbert. 1987. The struggle for the American curriculum, 1893-1958. New York: Routledge/Falmer. Mellen Charron, Katherine. 2009. Freedom reacher: The life of Septima Clark. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press. Morton McMurry, Frank. 1909. How to study and teaching how to study. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Library. National Committee on Education by Radio. 1931. Education by radio: A bulletin to promote the use of radio for educational, cultural, and civic purposes. Washington, DC: National Committee on Education by Radio. National Education Association Department of Rural Education. 1937. Bulletin of the department of rural education. NEA: University of California Press. National Education Association. 1938 Research bulletin. (Washington, DC: NEA, 1938), 4.

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National Education Association Committee on the Economic Status of the Rural Teacher. 1939. Final report. Washington, DC: NEA. Peters, Charles. 2010. Lyndon B. Johnson. New York: Times. Reynolds, David. 1999. There goes the Neighborhood: Rural Consolidation at the grass Roots in Early twentieth Century Iowa. Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa Press. Robinson, William M. n.d. Notes for interview on career. William McKinley Robinson Collection (Collection A-517). Western Michigan University. Robinson, William M. 1917. The Westhope model rural school, Bowling Greene, Ohio. The Ohio Teacher: 485-487. Robinson, William M. 1927. Bibliography in certain aspects of rural education. Bulletin, 56(10). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. Robinson, William M. 1933. Report of the national chairman, rural service.  Educational Method: A Journal of Progressive Public Schools 13: 55. Robinson, William M. 1936. Practices and trends in the preparation of teachers for rural elementary schools in the state colleges and normal schools. Unpublished Dissertation Columbia University. Robinson, William M. and National Education Association Committee on the Economic Status of the Rural Teacher. 1937. Rural and urban schools. Washington, DC: NEA. Robinson, William M. 1938. Home play in rural areas: A program outline for rural parent-teacher associations. Chicago: National Congress of Parents and Teachers. Robinson, William M. 1940a. The rural PTA: Suggestions for organizing and conducting a parent-teacher conference. Chicago: National Congress of Parents and Teachers. Robinson, William M. 1940b. Rural youth. Chicago: National Congress of Parents and Teachers. Robinson, William M. 1940c. In-service training of rural teachers. The Phi Delta Kappan 23(4): 145-148. Robinson, William M. 1941 National Congress of Parents and Teachers, National Congress of Mothers Proceedings (1941): pp. 109, 162, 318. Robinson, William. M. 1943. Various activities conducted by the department of rural education, Western Michigan College of Education during the sixteen year period, 1927-1943. Memo to President, Western Michigan College of Education. William McKinley Robinson Collection (Collection A-517). Western Michigan University. Robinson, William M. 1949. Greetings from the executive president. The Educational Forum 13(2): 256c. Robinson, William M. 1949. Message from the executive president. The Educational Forum 13(3): 384c. Robinson, William M. 1949. From the executive president. The Educational Forum 13(4): 504c. Robinson, William M. 1949. Greetings from the executive president. The Educational Forum 14(1): 128c. Robinson, William M. 1949. From the executive president. The Educational Forum 14(3): 384c. Robinson, William M. 1954. Preparing teachers for rural schools. The Phi Delta Kappan 36(1): 29-31.

William McKinley Robinson (1948-1950) 57 Robinson, William M. 1958. Introductory rural sociology in teacher-education institutions. Rural Sociology 21-22: 169-171. Sangren, Paul V. 1928. The need for more adequate measures of achievement in silent reading. The Journal of Educational Research 17(5): 365-371 Sangren, Paul V. 1929. The need for more adequate measurements of achievement in arithmetic. Mathematics Teacher 22: 1-13 U.S. Department of Interior Bureau of Education. 1926. Biennial survey of education, 1924-26. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. U.S. Department of Interior Bureau of Education. 1927a. Education in the United States of America. 75(5). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. U.S. Department of Interior Bureau of Education. 1927b. Preparation of teachers, Bulletin 36. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. Weiler, Kathleen. 1988. Country schoolwomen: Teaching in rural California, 18501950. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press. Western Herald (Kalamazoo, Michigan). 1948. WSYC broadcasts on rural education syndicated. February, cover page. Western Herald (Kalamazoo, Michigan). 1960. Interview with William McKinley Robinson. September, cover page.

CHAPTER 6

FRANK LEE WRIGHT (1950-1953) Leader Over New Horizons Matthew D. Davis and Joshua M. Walehwa

Frank L. Wright 1952-1953 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 59–64 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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In the spring of 1950, Kappa Delta Pi delegates at the Kappa Delta Pi Biennial Convocation in Spring Mill State Park (Mitchell, IN) elected Frank Lee Wright as the Society’s sixth Executive President. Wright was a fitting choice to lead KDP into the second half of the 20th century. His election foreshadowed new institutional and regional affiliations from which future Society presidents would emerge. By 1950, the Society had grown to 167 chapters and some of these were now at private research-oriented universities. Washington University in St. Louis, at which Wright had been teaching for over 25 years at the time of his election, was one such elite institution. He was the first Society president to teach at this burgeoning institutional type. As well, Wright’s home city of St. Louis, Missouri, was known as the “Gateway City.” Routinely understood to be the gateway to the West, Wright’s home of St. Louis, when looking forward to the KDP future, also should be seen as the gateway to the American South. Many subsequent presidents would teach at southern colleges and universities while president of Kappa Delta Pi. However, none had done so before Wright. However, Frank Wright, like all four of his predecessors as president, was a consummate school man. He had strong credentials in rural school teaching, school administration, and university teaching. Thus, he straddled both the new and the old as he led Kappa Delta Pi into the second half of the 20th century.

EARLY LIFE AND CAREER Kansas’ heartland nurtured Frank Lee Wright’s early years. He was born on 16 March 1884 in Bronson, Kansas. After graduating from high school, he taught in rural Kansas schools for two years before entering full-time study at Kansas State Normal School (now Emporia State University). A very able undergraduate student, he served as an assistant in Mathematics and the Director of the Normal program at Emporia High School. Upon graduation with his A.B. degree in 1910, he moved to Bucklin, Kansas, and assumed the position of its Superintendent of Schools. After 28 years of experience in several public school districts, Wright left his home state of Kansas, and moved in 1914 to Madison, Wisconsin, to engage in full-time graduate study at the University of Wisconsin. The next year, he earned an M.A. degree with a thesis titled “A Study of Errors in Geometry.” After one year, and with a graduate degree in hand, he was hired as a professor of education at Colorado State Teachers College (CSTC) in Greeley (now University of Northern Colorado). During his eight years tenure at Greeley, Wright joined Phi Delta Kappa and became

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a charter member of CSTC’s Theta chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. Wright’s research output at CTSC included a report entitled The Training School (Wright 1921). Likely, during summers at CSTC, he began taking additional graduatelevel courses at Harvard University. Earning an Ed.M. degree from Harvard in 1923, he moved to Boston to complete his doctoral studies and research. During the 1923-24 school year, he was a lecturer for the Massachusetts Department of Education, perhaps at teachers’ institutes, and at Boston University. Wright received his EdD degree at Harvard in 1924 with a dissertation entitled “The Certification of Teachers in the Secondary Schools of the United States” (Wright 1924). With his sterling Harvard credential, he travelled to Missouri for the final major move of his life, assuming a professorship at Washington University, St. Louis.

WORK AND LIFE IN THE GATEWAY CITY Moving to St. Louis, Missouri, brought Wright nearly full circle to his home in Kansas. The time spent in St. Louis, almost 30 years, only eclipsed his earlier life in Kansas by two years. Apparently, his years in St. Louis at Washington University (WUSL) proved to be happy and productive. First and foremost, Wright was a teacher. The courses he taught varied little over his career at WUSL. During most years, he taught two basic courses: “Principles of Education” and “Principles of Teaching in the Secondary School.” Junior-level students took the former one as their second course in their professional sequence. Senior students enrolled in the latter course and completed classroom observation and student teaching as part of this course. Wright, also head of the Education Department at Washington University, continued his interests in school leadership by teaching several key graduate level courses. He offered two such courses with regularity. Both might be found then as now under Educational Foundations in larger departments, but Wright had few faculty colleagues. His “Current Educational Thought” was a routine summer offering to graduate students who were encouraged “to bring to St. Louis worthwhile books on education which they possess” (Washington University 1939, 25). The other Foundations course, “Educational Classics” was a straightforward educational philosophy course. Wright taught three other courses that may be characterized as focusing sharply on school administration matters. “Problems in Supervision” provided “principles, procedures and techniques of supervision” (Washington University 1935, 26). Two other courses, “Teachers and Pupil Personnel”

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and “The Reorganized Secondary School,” filled out the school administration offerings for WUSL graduate students. In addition to his teaching at Washington University, Wright routinely published articles in leading professional journals. Most of these articles attest to his interest in school district leadership. His research appeared in such journals as Educational Administration & Supervision, School Executive, The American School Board Journal, and even Kappa Delta Pi’s own The Educational Forum. Often, they reflected his experience in St. Louis area schools. Wright served on both the St. Louis Public Schools District (SLPS) and Webster Groves Public Schools District (WGPS) Boards of Education. His tenure on the WGPS Board lasted for 16 years. Late in his career, he joined the SLPS Board in 1951. Indeed, he finished a Board report on Monday, 9 November 1953, and was scheduled to present it at a Board meeting the next night. However, he fell ill on the 10th, telephoned in his regrets for missing the meeting, and passed away in his sleep that evening.

PARTICIPATION IN KAPPA DELTA PI Frank Lee Wright enjoyed a long engagement with Kappa Delta Pi that lasted more than 30 years. As a new faculty member at Colorado State Teachers College, he joined students and colleagues in chartering the Theta Chapter in 1920. At the time of Theta’s chartering, Kappa Delta Pi had only recently reached out to the nation’s best teachers colleges for new chapters and more initiates. Wright served as Theta’s chapter counselor for one year before heading off to doctoral study at Harvard. After arriving at his major institutional home as a professor, Wright surely was central to the chartering of the Beta Upsilon chapter at Washington University in St. Louis in 1930. He served as Beta Upsilon’s chapter counselor until his untimely death. This long tenure included the years in which he held Kappa Delta Pi’s top officer positions of Executive Vice President, Executive President-Elect, and, finally, as the Society’s Executive President. Wright became a national officer in 1942 when he was elected 2nd Executive Vice President replacing the long-serving Alfred Hall-Quest, a man who developed many of the institutional features that brought great acclaim to the Society. He championed the KDP Lectures and wrote the history of the Society’s first 25 years. No living person likely knows what the real circumstances were, but Hall-Quest surely was politically “eased out” of his office and the editorship of publications was transferred to Kappa Delta Pi Headquarters and to E. I. F. Williams, then Executive Secretary. Indeed, the nominations committee did not nominate Hall-Quest

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for another term—he had been 2nd Executive Vice President/Editor from 1919 to 1942—but nominated Wright instead. Someone nominated HallQuest from the floor for his old position, but Wright won, apparently handily. Wright’s major duties as 2nd Executive Vice President for Kappa Delta Pi during the last years of World War II and its aftermath were to work with individual chapters. He travelled extensively to evaluate possible chapters, help install new ones, and sustain many others. He was an extended counselor to countless chapters throughout the nation. Wright was nominated for KDP Executive Presidency in 1950 without opposition and won outright. Two years later, Wright again received the Nominations Committee choice for Executive President. He was the only nominee on the Ballot. However, Katherine Vickery, another long-time Executive Vice President, received a nomination from the floor, but Wright was elected Executive President and Vickery was re-elected as Executive Vice President. Upon Wright’s death in 1953, Vickery became the Society’s Executive President—a Southerner and the first woman to serve Kappa Delta Pi in that office. As Executive President of Kappa Delta Pi, Wright led the Society into uncharted racial terrain. On his watch as the Society’s chief executive, four new chapters were installed at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, the first KDP presence at these segregated institutions. In 1950, chapters were chartered at Tennessee A&I University (later Tennessee State University) and Miner Teachers College, in Washington, D.C. (later merged with the Wilson Teachers College chapter). Two years later, new chapters were installed at both Southern University and A&M College (in New Orleans) and Langston University (in Oklahoma). Also, in 1951, Wright extended the invitation to deliver the prestigious the KDP Lecture to Charles Johnson, Fisk University President. Johnson became the first African American to deliver the Lecture; his presentation was published by KDP as Education and the Cultural Crisis. During the last year of Wright’s presidency, the KDP Executive council labored to establish a new headquarters. He successfully lobbied for St. Louis to be considered alongside Chicago and Washington, D.C. However, Wright died before the Board’s decision devolved from these major cities to rest with West Lafayette, Indiana. Likely, if Wright had lived, he might well have seen KDP place its headquarters in one of those three major American cities. Wright served Kappa Delta Pi well for nearly thirty years. As chapter counselor or national officer, Wright’s tireless devotion to the Society reached many people. Wright received the following, fitting tribute at the end of a eulogy published in the March 1954 issue of The Educational Forum:

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M. D. DAVIS and J. M. WALEHWA Dr. Wright’s zeal for teaching, his conscientious devotion to student growth in teacher preparation, his friendliness and warmth of personality, and his quiet good humor and helpfulness to those who sought his counsel have meant much to all with whom he worked (384e).

REFERENCES Frank Lee Wright. 1954. The Educational Forum 17(3): 384a-384e. Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. http://www.nps.gov/jeff/index.htm Kappa Delta Pi. 1953. Executive council minutes, February 15-16. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Kappa Delta Pi: 100 Years of Excellence in Education. http://www.kdp.org/ 100years/KDP_timeline.html Thompson, Rachel, n.d. From the pages of Judy Young … Historical highlights of Kappa Delta Pi. West Lafayette, IN: Kappa Delta Pi. Washington University. 1935. Seventh-Ninth Annual Catalogue, 1935-36: The Summer Session: June 12-June 24. Special Collections, Washington University in St. Louis (St. Louis, MO). Washington University. 1939. Eighty-Third Annual Catalogue, 1939-40: The Summer Session: June 17. Special Collections, Washington University in St. Louis (St. Louis, MO). Wright, Frank L., Biographical File, Special Collections, Washington University in St. Louis (St. Louis, MO).

CHAPTER 7

KATHERINE VICKERY (1953-1958) Female Visionary Cheryl J. Craig

Katherine Vickery 1953-1958 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 65–73 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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More than a decade before women’s liberation became a widespread movement, Katherine Vickery served as Kappa Delta Pi’s eighth Executive President against a national backdrop of changing race relations, the Cold War, and McCarthyism. At the Twentieth Biennial KDP Convocation held in Stillwater, Oklahoma, Vickery exhorted the delegates with this message: honor carries with it corresponding responsibility … to try, to the best of our abilities, to enlarge the scope and influence of education as a profession and of teachers as leaders in a world fraught with distrust, ignorance, and superstition. May we rise above all pettiness, minor contentions, and antagonisms, and in a spirit of tolerance and understanding, work for the best interests of Kappa Delta Pi as an honor society pledged to the highest interests of our profession. (Vickery 1956, 1)

These words provide a window into KDP’s mission as the largest educational honor society in the United States. They also say something about the visionary character of Vickery, KDP’s first female president, and her unswerving belief that members committed to the organization’s mission could help illuminate a world darkened by “unlovely” things (Dewey 1938). One of the unlovely things that KDP faced during this era was the tension caused by desegregation. Case in point is a story told about “Miss Vickery” (also known as “Miss Kate”) by O.L. Davis, Jr., who was President of the Alpha Pi Chapter of Peabody College in Nashville, Tennessee, when Vickery visited as the Executive President of KDP’s national organization. Vickery was to address spring initiates at the Maxwell House (“Good to the Last Drop”) Hotel. In an e-mail communication, Davis reminisced about how hard he had worked with the hotel officials “to insure their cooperation in welcoming [the local chapter’s] first Black initiates, the first Blacks to enroll officially in [Peabody] College, all doctoral students on leave from their positions as dean or president of an all-black college in one of the southern states.” He then described what happened: I met Dr. Vickery, a very stately southern lady, [and] I told her that our chapter hoped that our first Black initiates would be able to come to the banquet-initiation. Her heart may have missed a beat, but her face and demeanor never revealed her innermost convictions. (O.L. Davis, pers. comm.)

Davis continued: “The evening, on the surface, was a rousing success. The meal was high quality. Dr. Vickery … gave a good address…. We had a very ‘proper’ initiation.” But there was one hitch—“none of [the] Black initiates showed up.” Summing up the occasion and the times, Davis wrote:

Katherine Vickery (1953-1958) 67 Stepping onto a formerly all-white campus in the daylight was one thing. Entering one of the grand old hotels of a major southern city—at night— and through the front door … was clearly another…. That night even I [O.L. Davis, Jr.] had a nightmare that featured white nightriders clothed in white sheets riding into the Maxwell House and disrupting [the] initiation. (Davis, pers. comm.)

As for Vickery, it seems she, too, harbored reservations about the initiation ceremony. However, being the professional she was, she pressed forward, keeping her private stance as a white citizen living and working in a racially segregated southern state to her personal counsel. After all, the Gamma Iota Chapter (City College of New York [CUNY]) had already urged the Executive Council of KDP to revoke privileges of “any chapter which does not meet the standards of the Society with regard to race, color, and religious qualifications” (Meeting of the Executive Council Nov. 3-4, 1951, 4-5), and the 1956 Convocation site of Stillwater, Oklahoma, was specifically chosen by the Executive Council since “there would be no racial question involved in holding the Convocation” there (Meeting of the Executive Council April 1-3, 1955, 2). Vickery was born in Dahlonega, Georgia, in 1898 on the brink of the twentieth century. The majority of her life unfolded on college campuses because she lived across the street from North Georgia College where her father was a professor of Greek and Latin. She earned her Bachelor’s degree there and then a MA degree (1919) and a PhD in Psychology (1931) with a minor in Philosophy from George Peabody College for Teachers, having written her dissertation on The Effects of Change of Work on the Work Decrement (Vickery 1931). In-between Vickery taught English and Latin for three years at a high school in Milledgeville, Tennessee, before returning to Nashville to complete her terminal degree at Peabody College. Women won the right to vote in the year following Vickery’s receipt of her Master’s degree; the stock market crashed the year she was conferred her doctorate. Vickery’s employment at Alabama College (now University of Montevallo) began in 1922. A collection of letters written by friends and colleagues to endorse her induction into the Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame sheds even more light on Vickery’s achievements. She arrived in the state of Alabama “when there were only a handful of psychologists in the state’s colleges and universities, and almost none with the quality and depth of her academic training” (R. Fowler, letter). Her career continued until 1968 when she reached mandatory retirement age. During her tenure, she taught courses in philosophy, mental health and all phases of psychology and served as department chair from 1948-1968. She is credited with introducing philosophy courses to her campus and for having fought vehemently for the separation of the religion and philosophy departments, while being a devout Episcopalian herself. In 1966,

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Alabama College students dedicated their performance of the play, Populi sunt victame, to her. Despite challenging economic times, Vickery managed to study education comparatively and, through that interest, travel to Mexico, England and France. In life (1947), Alabama College awarded her an honorary doctorate (D. Sc.) and recommended her for the college’s presidency. Her biography was included in Who’s Who of American Women, Who’s Who in America, and Who’s Who in the World. During the Cold War, while in her 50s and 60s, Vickery’s comparative education study trips continued. She ventured further afield to Northern Europe and Russia where she witnessed first-hand the Russian education system. As a consequence of the latter journey, she contributed a chapter to the book, The Changing Soviet School (Bereday, Brickman, and Read 1960). While not much is known of Vickery’s early life, a great deal is known about her teaching. Endorsement letters sent to the Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame after her death attest that Vickery was praised for her dedication to the profession and as an instructor who was “keenly interested in the minds of people, and [who] encouraged her students to develop to the maximum” (M. Harris, letter). One female student declared her approach “energetic and brilliant” and credited Vickery for actively involving her and other students in the intelligence testing of young females at the Girls’ Training School in Birmingham, Alabama, to aid them in understanding the “many facets of anti-social behavior” (S. Head, letter). Not only was Vickery’s teaching exemplary, she was also generous with the use of her laboratory. One male Vanderbilt freshman, whose home was in Montevallo, recalled how Vickery took him on a tour of her lab and enabled him to have full access to it during holidays while he worked on his undergraduate degree at neighboring Vanderbilt. Her confidence in him quelled “any doubts [he] may have had about his career path” (R. Fowler, letter). As a woman in a field with few women scholars, she was especially known for mentoring females and for sending promising students to excellent graduate programs throughout the U.S. (B. Strickland, letter). Martha Williams, Executive Secretary-Treasurer of the Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame, in an interview, particularly recalled the influence Vickery had had on young females’ professional lives: Dr. Vickery was a good role model for women like me. When those hard times would come, when you would think “I might not be able to finish,” she would be very encouraging and help [us] find the strength to go on. (Duda 1999, 27)

Vickery’s ascent in KDP, an honor society, was a long climb. She first became elected to membership in Kappa Delta Pi in the Alpha Pi Chapter at George Peabody College for Teachers when she was a graduate student.

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After that, Vickery served as counselor of the Beta Lambda Chapter at Alabama College for 36 years. She was elected to the Executive Council of KDP in 1942 as Executive First Vice-President, succeeding Florence Stratemeyer. Vickery continued in this post until 1953 when KDP’s seventh Executive President, Frank L. Wright, suffered an untimely death and she became Acting Executive President in addition to fulfilling her designated role as Executive First Vice-President. This she did with charm and grace as minutes of meetings reveal time and again. “Her warm personality and friendship” were the traits that J. Richard McElheny, Executive Secretary Emeritus of KDP, recalled (pers.comm.). By 1954, she had been officially elected as Executive President, and in 1955, the Beta Lambda chapter (University of Montevallo) awarded her the Honor Key, making her one of only fifty living laureates to be recognized at that time. In 1956, Vickery began her second term as Executive President, which made her the last elected President to serve two terms (1954-1956, 19561958). After that, she assumed the role of Executive Counselor, a position she held from 1958 until 1964. When Vickery died in 1978 at the age of 80, a clipping from a University of Montevallo publication described her as “one of the real saints of the institution” (McElheny 1978, 34). Students from the former Alabama College/current University of Montevallo immediately funded a memorial scholarship in her honor. In less than a year, they had collected $10,000, a substantial sum for the 1970s, one that spoke volumes about the importance of Vickery to the lives and careers of her students. She was eulogized for her “keen mind, her wide field of vision, her intolerance for mediocrity, and her love for the challenge of human potential.” She was also remembered for her work with students of whom she “demanded the best” and to whom she “gave her best” (M. Collins, letter). And, on October 17, 1985, seven years after Vickery’s death from failing to survive surgery, she was inducted posthumously into the Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame as “a many faceted woman-teacher, counselor, organizer and writer” (L. Griffith, letter). She was held up as “a great lady of [the twentieth century] in Alabama’s history” and as a woman who was “already enshrined in the memories and lives she touched” (Duda 1999, 28). In KDP Executive Secretary Emeritus J. Richard McElheny’s words, Vickery was “one who so richly merit[ed] honor” (J. R. McElheny, letter). During Vickery’s presidency, KDP had 204 institutional chapters, ten alumni chapters, and a cumulative total membership of 122,226 as of January 31, 1956 (Vickery 1956). The Lecture Series proposed by T. C. McCracken, President Emeritus in 1925, was in a healthy state of affairs, and The Educational Forum was exerting a “marked influence” on the educational landscape with copies beginning to be distributed internationally. Furthermore, fellowships for foreign study had been established as a con-

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sequence of one of the many committees in which Vickery participated (Noll, Stratemeyer, Vickery and Benjamin 1954). One matter under serious consideration was a “suitable form of memorial” to commemorate William Chandler Bagley, KDP’s founder (Vickery 1954b), while another matter of discussion was the establishment of a permanent home for the KDP Headquarters. A further issue concerned the perennial problem of retaining new members as well as the increase of the initiation fee from $6.50 to $7.50 and the annual dues to $2.50—with both increases being soundly defeated (Vickery 1958). In 1957, she led the decision to pay Professor I. L. Kandel of Teachers College, Columbia University, a $5,000 honorarium to write a biography of Dr. William C. Bagley and, in 1958, the decision to approve a request to translate Dewey’s Experience and Education (1938) into Korean and Hindi. The volume had already been translated into Arabic when Vickery served as Executive First Vice President (Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi 1951). In sum, more than 75 entries in the Google Scholar search engine instantiate Vickery’s KDP involvement. Most document her extensive work on committees; others signal columns she wrote in The Educational Forum. As often is the case, those with leadership skills do not rise to the top in only one organization. Such was the case with Vickery. She served as president of the Alabama Psychological Association and was a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She also was recognized as a Pioneer by the National Association for Social Workers Foundation (NASW 2010). In the state of Alabama, she also was a trailblazer where women’s rights were concerned. She chaired the sub-committee of the Alabama Governor’s Commission on the Status of Women and spearheaded a two-day conference held on the Alabama College campus in 1950. Attended by female leaders from across the nation, the conference—which cohered around the theme Women in the Home, Women in Business, and Women in the Professions—is recognized as a “milestone” in the history of the Women’s Rights Movement in the South. However, despite being a relentless supporter of the position and rights of women, “she abhorred the term, ‘women’s libber’ and denounced vigorously some of the antics of groups advocating equality for women.” Paradoxically, she shared the same agenda of those whom she criticized. Like them, Vickery also struggled for “equal pay, positions of responsibility at the top, representation on boards and committees, and where there was or could be, an opportunity for women to have a voice in policy or direction” (L. Griffith, letter). But the reach of Vickery’s leadership skills did not end there. Her most significant contribution to women’s rights came through her work as a charter member of the Montevallo chapter of the American Association of University Women (AAUW). Once again, Vickery served both locally— President of the Alabama Division (1948-1950)—and nationally— as a

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member of The Status of Women and Standards and Recognition committees and Vice President of the Southeast Central Region, one of the twelve regions in the U.S. She is remembered for defending the position that males and females with equal professional qualifications should be given equal consideration in job competitions and was known for frequently taking up this issue with her home institution’s leadership. During the 1950s, she and other members of the Montevallo Branch of the AAUW wrote letters of protest when Senator Joseph McCarthy labeled the AAUW a “subversive” group and attacked Judge Dorothy Kenyon of New York City and Dr. Ester Caukin Branauer of Washington, DC, both of whom had AAUW connections (AAUW 2008). Where equal rights were concerned, Vickery “‘stood up’ for women, often meeting issues ‘head on’” (L. Griffith, letter). The same was true of Vickery’s participation in the mental health area. She was “unlike many academic psychologists who disdain the application of their discipline.” In contrast to other psychologists, Vickery “maintained a lifelong commitment to the mental health of Alabama citizens” (R. Fowler, letter). She actively supported the Alabama Mental Health Association and helped nurture it into becoming an important force for shaping policy. In fact, her efforts in this field have been considered so outstanding that she is often attributed with being the “mother of mental health in Alabama” (J. Jackson, letter). When she retired, she devoted her time to researching the mental health field in Alabama, mostly because she felt that those who tread the path before her had not received the recognition they deserved. The inquiry resulted in the publication of her book, A History of Mental Health in Alabama (Vickery 1972). According to the Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame website, her volume “charted a course in the mental health field which placed the state among the leaders in the nation in the development of programs and facilities for the mentally disabled” (Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame 2000). A group home (consisting of eight single-bedroom units) for disabled, low income adults located in Clanton, Alabama, has been named in her honor. In closing, Katherine Vickery’s life was spent serving the causes to which she felt called. She clearly was a forerunner on numerous fronts. Yet, she “never sought fame” for personal gain (M. Harris, letter). “Avarice” was never her motive, wrote S. B. Stickney in the Foreword to her book (Vickery 1972). Rather, “her life of service and concern for others” distinguished her as “a remarkable person” who was “at ease with young or old, poor or prominent, ignorant or educated” (M. Harris, letter). Kappa Delta Pi was indeed fortunate that she broke the important ground she did as the organization’s first female President and eighth President overall. With “her dedication to high standards of scholarship…, service to humanity and careful attention to thrift,” ‘Miss Kate’ “captured the very essence of Kappa Delta Pi” and

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earned her place as one of the organization’s “truly great giants” (McElheny, 1978, 34). Her vision and legacy live on.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT Special thanks is extended to University of Houston doctoral student, Donna J. Reid, who served as Research Assistant on this project.

REFERENCES Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame. 2000. Katherine Vickery (1898-1978). http:// www.awhf.org/vickery.html American Association of University Women, Montevallo Branch. 2008. A brief branch history. http://www.aauw-alabama.org/mvallohistory.html Bereday, George Z. F., William W. Brickman, and Gerald H. Read. 1960. The changing Soviet school: The comparative education society field study in the USSR. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Dewey, John. 1938. Education and experience. New York: Collier Books. Duda, Cynthia. 1999. Katherine Vickery: Psychology teacher and educational leader. American Educational History Journal 26(1): 27-28. McElheny, John Richard. 1978. A Tribute to Dr. Katherine Vickery. Kappa Delta Pi Record 15(2): 34. Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1951. Hotel Madison, Atlantic City, New Jersey. February 14-16. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1951. Chase Hotel, St. Louis, Missouri. November 3-4. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1955. Hotel Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio. April 1-3. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). National Association of Social Workers Foundation. 2004. NASW social work pioneers. www.naswfoundation.org/pioneers/v/vickery.html Noll, Victor H., Florence Stratemeyer, Katherine Vickery and Harold Benjamin. 1954. Report on the committee on proposed fellowship in international education. The Educational Forum 18(Supplement 004): 504v. Vickery, Katherine. 1931. The effects of change of work on the work decrement. PhD diss., George Peabody College for Teachers. Vickery, Katherine. 1954b. Greetings from the Executive President to the Convocation (March 11th). Purdue University, Bloomington, IN. Vickery, Katherine. 1956. A vision for the future. Unpublished speech on the occasion of the 20th Biennial Convocation of Kappa Delta Pi. Stillwater, OK. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL).

Katherine Vickery (1953-1958) 73 Vickery, Katherine. 1958. From the retiring executive president. The Educational Forum 22(Supplement 004): 504c-504d. Vickery, Katherine. 1972. A history of mental health in Alabama. Montgomery, AL: Alabama Department of Mental Health.

CHAPTER 8

JOHN J. HARTON (1942-1964) Steady Hand at the Helm O. L. Davis, Jr.

John J. Harton 1958-1964 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 75–80 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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From its hesitant first years, Kappa Delta Pi was led by national officers who typically served the Society for several biennia. Rumbles against this pattern must have been evident as early as the 1920s, but chapter delegates to the Biennial Convocations likely recognized little possibility for change in the politics of governance until well after World War II. Presidents and other officers served multiple terms and most elections, held at Convocations until 1992, were based on a slate of single nominees for offices. Most officers came from Midwestern states and almost all were men. Strikingly, only three women served as officers until one of them, Katherine Vickery, assumed the presidency in 1942 upon the death of Frank Lee Wright, the incumbent Executive President. Custom of a quarter century had kept female scholars and educators from the Society’s presidency. Student delegates to Convocation in 1950 turbulently pushed for a student representative to the Executive Council, a position finally achieved two years later. Change was on the wind, but the wind blew slowly. Kappa Delta Pi was fortunate to have had individuals whose leadership enabled it to abandon its patriarchic and near oligarchic past and enter, however tentatively, into a more even-handed and participatorily democratic period. One of the strongest pilots who guided the Society through the heavy seas of this transition was the unlikely John James Harton. Harton was a Southerner, born in the small college town of Conway, AR, on February 24, 1901. A descendent of early American settlers in this area, he and his family were solidly middle class. Harton began working in his father’s mercantile store as a teen-ager and, at the age of 16, he graduated from Conway High School. He continued to work in the family business for the next four years, by which time, he had saved enough money to enroll in Hendrix College, a small Methodist institution in Conway. He graduated with a BA degree and married Ora Taylor in 1924. They lived in Marlton, AR, until 1928 at which time he took a post teaching French and mathematics in Portland, AR. Harton, after just one year at Portland, moved to teach English at Russellville High School, and, then, in 1930, he became Principal and Superintendent of Schools in Tillar, AR, positions that he held until 1934 (Harton, pers. comm.). Following his first year of teaching, Harton enrolled in summer term graduate courses at George Peabody College for Teachers in Nashville, TN. He returned to summer studies during 1930 and 1931 and received an MA degree in educational administration in 1932 with Professor Walter Cocking as his thesis advisor. Resigning his positions in Tillar at the end of the 1933-34 school year, Harton enrolled for doctoral studies in educational psychology at Duke University in June 1934 and received a PhD degree in 1937 (Harton, pers. comm.). While completing his doctoral dissertation, Harton taught at Virginia’s Mary Baldwin College during the 1936-37 academic year. He accepted

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his first post-doctoral position at Arizona State Teachers College, Flagstaff (now University of Northern Arizona), and taught there for four years, 1937-1941. During this period, his daughter became quite ill and, to help her condition, he and his family moved to Fresno, CA, the final move of his career. In 1941, Harton became a member of the education and psychology faculty of Fresno (CA) State College (now Fresno State University) and from which he retired in 1966 as Chair, Department of Special Education. His academic specialty was children’s giftedness (Harton, pers. comm). Harton’s published research scholarship was limited. On the other hand, it reasonably was above average for most education professors during the periods of economic depression, wartime, and post-war recovery that dominated his career. He did prepare three scholarly reports from his dissertation (Harton 1939a, Harton 1939b, Harton 1939c) and at least two additional articles (Harton 1941, Harton 1945) prior to his heavy commitments as a Kappa Delta Pi officer during the final years of his career. Notably, Harton’s published writings as a Society officer often went beyond the important, routine issues of Society organization to confront national educational concerns, e.g., criticism of schools and educator’s dedication (Harton, 1958, Harton 1960, Harton 1962) Clearly, Harton’s most focused participation in institutional service was his long service as counselor of the Kappa Delta Pi chapters at the two colleges at which he taught. Throughout the period of his heavy involvement in Society affairs, and until he retired at Fresno State, he was the counselor of the Gamma Psi chapter. Harton had been initiated into the Society during his doctoral studies at Duke. In 1952, Harton attended his first Convocation in East Lansing, MI. Without previous experience and visibility at the Society level, the nominations committee asked him to become the nominee for Executive Second Vice President to replace the incumbent, Professor Victor Noll of Michigan State College (now Michigan State University). Across several biennia, some chapter delegates observed that most officers came from Midwestern universities and only a few from institutions in the south and west. Harton’s counsellorship at a major California teacher education college surely must have attracted the attention of senior Kadelpians. His subsequent nomination to the exclusion of the seated officer may be seen as a political move, based on now unknown circumstances, but one that backfired on the dominant officer group. Noll was nominated from the floor and, in the election, was chosen for a second term, the first ever nominee from the floor to be elected an officer of the Society (Thompson, n.d.). Two years later, Harton accepted the nominations committee’s request to stand for the position of First Executive Vice President and the commit-

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tee presented its conventional single slate of nominees to the Convocation. All nominees were elected by acclamation. In 1956, all officers were reelected. Important changes in Society leadership were assured at the 1958 Convocation. Katherine Vickery, after sixteen years on the Executive Council of which more than five years were as KDP’s first female Executive President, refused to be a candidate for reelection. As her replacement, Harton, the westerner, was nominated and elected. He would serve three terms until 1964, the last individual to serve multiple terms as president of the Society. Harton’s presidency was dominated by plans for and the construction of the Society’s first permanent headquarters building in West Lafayette, IN. From 1924 to 1962, the Society’s Headquarters were in spaces donated by and later rented from Heidelberg College, Tiffin, Ohio, at which Professor E. I. F. Williams was a member of the faculty and parttime Executive Secretary of Kappa Delta Pi. Surge in membership and in the number of chapters during the post-World War II years necessitated additional space and an expanded staff. As well, Williams was nearing retirement and needed to plan for his eventual departure from Society obligations (Thompson, n.d.). Plans for a new Society Headquarters required a decade of work. At the 1952 Convocation, delegates approved a plan for the establishment of a permanent location for the Society Headquarters and set aside $75,000 for the land and construction of a facility not to exceed total costs of $150,000. Seven years later, in 1959, the Permanent Home Committee recommended to the Society that it accept an offer from Purdue University to sell property at a very reasonable price for a KDP Headquarters building adjacent to the Purdue campus in West Lafayette, IN. Delegates to the 1960 Convocation approved this recommendation and the Executive Council appointed a Building Committee and a Fund Raising Committee. By 1962, appeals for gifts for the construction of the building had raised some $20,000, mostly donations from individual members and chapters. President Harton worked intensely to help raise the needed funds in hope that the completed facility would be debt free (Thompson, n.d.; Harton 1959a; Harton 1961). Coincidental with the launch of plans to build a permanent headquarters, Harton and other officers were faced with the necessity of selecting a new Executive Secretary for the Society. This individual, they reasoned, should be employed during the planning and construction of the building such that the transition of the Headquarters from Tiffin, OH, to West Lafayette, IN, would be as smooth as possible. A widespread search for candidates for this position was undertaken and three individuals were interviewed by the search committee. Selected for this position in June,

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1962, was Dr. J. Richard McElheney, counselor of Zeta Phi chapter and a faculty member in industrial education at the University of Miami (FL) (Thompson, n.d.). Within his second term as Society president, Harton had led two impressive developments. Employment of McElheney brought a Society executive into the construction planning of the new headquarters and enabled the small headquarters staff to make plans to move almost all records and files of half a century to the new building. As well, fund raising for the projected new building and preparation of final construction plans continued unabated. In March, 1962, Harton and other officers awarded the construction contract. Seven months later, Executive Secretary McElheney and his small staff moved into the building. When the new facility was completed, its total cost was $166,070.62, not much in excess of the estimated costs ten years earlier. However, the new building was not debt free. Fund-raising had been inadequate to cover the expenses. It carried a deficit of $54,000 (Thompson n.d.; Harton 1963). Harton and the other officers had one more major task to complete as a result of Executive Secretary Williams’ retirement. A new editor of The Educational Forum was needed because Williams had also served in that role since 1942. From the search, Professor Harry S. Broudy, a prominent member of the faculty in social foundations of education at the University of Illinois and an experienced author and editor, agreed to accept the position of Forum Editor in early 1962. He was the first editor of a Society journal who was neither a Society officer nor an employee (Thompson, n.d.). The 1964 Convocation was held at Purdue University. The feature of the meeting, of course, was the dedication of the new headquarters building for the Society. President Harton had earlier notified the Nominations Committee that he did not wish to serve a fourth term. In the elections that followed, Gerald Read of Kent State University and a Society vice-president for eight years, was chosen as Harton’s successor. As the Convocation drew to a close, Harton entertained a motion, “RESOLVED, That no new chapters of Kappa Delta Pi will be installed in colleges or universities which maintain official operating policies of discrimination on the basis of race, color, or creed.” The motion garnered enthusiastic support and Harton declared that it had been accepted (Proceedings 1964, 209). No longer in a major leadership role in Kappa Delta Pi and in retirement at Fresno State, Harton continued to maintain a presence in the Society. The Executive Council selected him to membership in the Laureate chapter in 1974. Two years later, he accepted the invitation of the Nominations Committee to be the single-slate nominee for Laureate Counselor and he was elected. He served in this position for two terms

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until 1980 at which time Professor William M. Alexander of the University of Florida replaced him. Harton died in his eighty-fifth year on February 17, 1986. Quiet, gentle John Harton’s presidential leadership moved Kappa Delta Pi out of its depression and pre-war era’s mind-set and set the stage for new ventures in the operations of the Society. To be sure, he built upon the sturdy, fiscally conservative position that had enabled KDP to survive and to expand for almost fifty years. The construction of a permanent headquarters building must be recognized as the fruition of dreams and hopes held – and plans and decisions made—by previous Society leaders. At the end of his presidency, Kappa Delta Pi also had the headquarters and publications leadership to launch the second half-century of its contribution to American education.

REFERENCES Harton, John James. 1939a. The influence of the degree of unity of organization on the estimation of time. The Journal of General Psychology 21(1): 25-49. Harton, John James. 1939b. An investigation of the influence of success and failure on the estimation of time. The Journal of General Psychology 21(1): 51-62. Harton, John James. 1939c. The relation of time estimates to the actual time. The Journal of General Psychology 21(1): 219-224. Harton, John James. 1941. Can all parents expect phenomenal growth in the IQs of their children? The Journal of Educational Research 34: 506-508. Harton, John James. 1945. Nursery schools should be included in post-war planning. California Journal of Elementary Education 13(May): 230-237. Harton, John James. 1958. Greetings from the office of the incoming executive president.” The Educational Forum. 22(Supplement 004): 504d. Harton, John James. 1959a. From the executive president. The Educational Forum 24(Supplement 002): 128c-128d. Harton, John James. 1959b. From the executive president; Professionalism: Ideals and reality. The Educational Forum 23(Supplement 002): 384c-384d. Harton, John James. 1960. From the executive president: The job is ours. The Educational Forum 24(Supplement 002): 384c-384d. Harton, John James. 1962. Time for greater dedication. The Educational Forum 26(Supplement 004): 504h-504p. Harton, John James. 1963. From the office of the executive president; A review and some reflections. The Educational Forum 27(Supplement 004): 512e - 512f. Kappa Delta Pi. 1964. Proceedings of the twenty-fourth biennial convocation of Kappa Delta Pi, February 27-29, 1964. West Lafayette, IN: Kappa Delta Pi. Thompson, Rachel, n.d. From the pages of Judy Young…. Historical highlights of Kappa Delta Pi. West Lafayette, IN: Kappa Delta Pi.

CHAPTER 9

GERALD H. READ (1964-1966) International Educator Marcella L. Kysilka

Gerald H. Read 1964-1966 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 81–92 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Gerald H. Read was not only the ninth President of Kappa Delta Pi, but he was also a member of the Society’s Laureate chapter. Gerald (who disliked the nickname Jerry) was born on June 28, 1913, in Akron Ohio, to Charles L. and Clair May Read. He spent his entire life in the Akron-Kent area of Ohio. His parents lived in the North Hill area of Akron and he attended the public schools there, graduating from North High School in 1932. He was the youngest of three boys; his brothers were Ralph D. and Ivan C. Read (Ohles 1986; Korllos, pers. comm.). Upon graduation from North High, Read applied to and was admitted to Kent State University in the Fall, 1932. He double majored in history and Spanish and graduated magna cum laude with a BS in Education in 1936. While at Kent State, he was on a full football scholarship until a football injury ended his playing days. He then served as the team manager. Read also had a beautiful singing voice and was a member of the Glee Club (Korllos, pers. comm.) Read’s football injury plagued him throughout his life. However in 1936, when he was at St. Thomas Hospital for surgery for osteomyelitis, he met his future wife, Victoria Catherine Twarog, who was a nursing student at St. Thomas School of Nursing in Akron, Ohio. They were married on June 5, 1941 (Thornbury, pers. comm.). During Read’s senior year at Kent State, he organized and conducted a study tour for ten university students to Cuba. Although no one knows for sure the origins of his interest in Cuba, Roger Read, his nephew indicated that Read’s father was stationed in Cuba during the Spanish-American war (Read, pers. comm.). He was especially interested in “the rural education program initiated by Fulgencio Batista, president of Cuba” (Ohles 1986, 5). In 1937, Read attended The Ohio State University and earned a master’s degree in 1938; his thesis was The History of Cuban Education (Thornberry, pers. comm.). Upon completing his master’s degree, Read obtained a job as a principal at Talmadge Junior High School in Talmadge, Ohio, and, then, he studied at the University of Havana in 1941 to improve his Spanish. Until this time, Read’s travels were limited to those close to home. Being a son of a member of the Ku Klux Klan, he was not encouraged to explore beyond his immediate environment (Cushner 2000). From 1941-1943, he was a Spanish and history teacher at Perrysburg High School in Perrysburg, Ohio. In 1943, he enrolled in the PhD program in comparative education at The Ohio State University and concurrently taught at Kent State University’s Laboratory School from 19431948. He was appointed to Kent State University’s College of Education faculty in 1948 at which he developed courses in history and philosophy of education. In 1950, Read completed his doctoral studies; his dissertation was Civic-Military Rural Education in Cuba; Eleven Eventful Years 1936-

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1941. He continued his faculty position as professor of comparative and international education at Kent State University until he retired as Professor Emeritus in 1975. During his time at Kent State, he helped establish the Comparative and International Education Society (CIES, formerly the Comparative Education Society (CES). CIES evolved from annual conferences on comparative education which were first organized by William W. Brickman at New York University, in 1954. CES evolved from a branch of the National Society of College Teachers in Education. In 1954, Brickman, Gerald Read (Kent State University) and Bess Goodykoontz (U.S. Office of Education) met in Washington, D.C. to “explore the possibility of designing a program that would provide a significant and first-hand experience in Europe for professional educators who had a responsibility for teaching courses … that dealt with education in other lands” (Brickman, 1966, 7). In April 1956, Brickman and Read proposed that participants at the Third New York University Conference, “Comparative Education in Theory and Practice”, vote to form the Comparative Education Society; it was approved on April 28, 1956 (Swing 2007). According to Read’s minutes, the goals of CES were ambitious: • To promote and improve the teaching of comparative education in colleges and universities; • To encourage scholarly research in the field; • To interest inter-visitation of education and on-the-spot studies of school systems throughout the world; • To cooperate with specialists in other disciplines in interpreting educational developments in a wider cultural context; • To facilitate the publication of studies and up-to-date information on comparative education; • To encourage cooperation among specialist in comparative education in studies, exchange of documents and first hand descriptions of education; • To cooperate wherever possible with such organizations as UNESCO, the International Institute of Education and the Organisation of American Studies (Swing 2007, 2). William Brickman was elected President, Robert Sutton (The Ohio State University), Vice President, and Gerald H. Read, Secretary-Treasurer. The membership consisted of 155 members, the majority of whom were “junior” faculty—a rather bold moved for young scholars. The first overseas trip “sponsored” by CES occurred in the summer of 1956 with a group led by Brickman and Read; the group visited schools

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and universities in Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, France, the Netherlands and England. The CES held its first international meeting in Geneva, Switzerland on September 1, 1956 at which tour participants listened to papers about the education and schooling in Switzerland, the USA and Germany (Swing 2007). Between 1956 and 1958, the society sponsored a series of trips to Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Ghana, Japan, Kenya, Korea, Liberia, Nigeria, Republic of South Africa, Tanganyika, The Congo Republic and Venezuela. Brickman and Read led groups to five continents and 24 countries during the first six years of the Society’s existence (Swing 2007). On April 25, 1957, the leadership approved the establishment of the Comparative Education Review, the official journal of CEA, and the first issue was published in June, 1957, with George Bereday as Editor and Gerald Read as Business Editor (Swing 2007, 4). Gerald Read served as Secretary-Treasurer of CES from 1957-1965. CES became CIES in 1968. In 1957, during the height of the Cold War, and the launching of Sputnik, the The American Ambassador to the Soviet Union, Llwelyn Thompson, encouraged the U.S. State Department to establish educational and cultural relations between the two nations. Thompson invited Read and Brickman to Moscow for an exploratory visit. Read’s wife, Vicky, accompanied them in as much as she was fluent in Russian. (Cushner 2000). In 1958, the first academic exchange agreement between the U.S. and the Soviet Union was signed. Upon their return home, Brickman and Read were deluged with opposition to this agreement led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Federation of Labor, and the National Education Association. Members of the U.S. State Department of Education accused Brickman and Read of undercutting their negotiations with the Soviet Union. Brickman and Read were summoned to Washington to meet with the department and others who were concerned about their efforts. The meeting was in February, 1958. Present at that meeting were Oliver Crowell of the U.S. Department of Education, John Mills, Director of the International Department of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and William G. Carr, of the National Education Association. After much heated discussion, Brickman and Read made it clear that their project was supported by Llwelyn Thompson, The United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union and was supported by the Comparative Education Society and the Ford Foundation (Ohles 1986). Read and Brickman conducted the first Russian trip in August and September, 1958, with seminars in Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev, and Tashkent. This trip led to the publication of The Changing Soviet School (1960), co-authored by Read, Brickman, and Bereday (Cushner 2000). After his success in gaining entry to the Soviet Union by U.S. educators, Read went on to negotiate other exchange agreements with Romania

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(1958), Hungary and Czechoslovakia (1960), Poland and East Germany (1961), and the People’s Republic of China in 1973 (Cushner 2000). The first trip to the People’s Republic of China was in 1974 and was sponsored by Phi Delta Kappa. In a conversation with John Ohles (1986), Read shared the story of the opening up of the People’s Republic of China to American educators, In 1972, Read was lecturing at Haile Selassi University in Ethiopia. He was asked by Ethiopian Airlines to serve as an advisor to them as the airlines were granted the rights to fly into China. President Haile Selassi invited Read to fly with him and the royal family on the inaugural flight of Ethiopian Airlines to Shanghai, along with associates from Time Magazine, Newsweek, The Washington Post, the New York Times and the Africa American Institute. Once in China, Read had several meetings with Chou En Lai, Premier of the People’s Republic of China as well as other Chinese officials and educators. Arrangements were made for a delegation of American educators to visit China and arrangements were made for Chinese professors to pursue graduate work in the U.S. “The first Chinese doctoral students came to Kent State University. Read then served as Director of the China-USA Exchange of University Professors” (Cushner 2000, 7). As a result of this trip, the Reads met Kongit Haile Meriam, the niece of the Director of Sales for Ethiopian Airlines. Kongit’s father had died. The Reads, whose hearts were touched by her story, adopted her; she graduated from Kent State University with a master’s degree, married, moved to Californian and provided the Reads with two grandchildren; Mariana and Yoel Dawit (CIES, Newsletter, 2005). Gerald Read retired from Kent State University as Professor Emeritus in 1978 after 30 years of service, but he maintained his interest in international studies. He continued his work as Director of Comparative Education Field Studies until 1986 for the following professional organizations: Phi Delta Kappa; Kappa Delta Pi; the Comparative and International Education Society; Pi Lambda Theta; Delta Kappa Gamma; the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development; and the National Council for the Social Studies. Seminars were offered in Europe, Africa, Australia, South America, Asia, and the Soviet Union. During his lifetime as an academic, Read received numerous honors and scholarly awards. He was the first recipient of Kent State University’s President Medal in 1969 for his outstanding service to education; he was a Fulbright Lecturer in Quito, Ecuador, in 1973, then served and chaired the selection committee for Fulbright Scholars in Education from 197578. He received Service Awards from Phi Delta Kappa, Kappa Delta Pi, Pi Lambda Theta and Delta Kappa Gamma, education honor societies; he was honored by educators in Great Britain for promoting comparative education. In 1985, he was elected a Fellow of the College of Preceptors,

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University of London. He also was named Honorary Professor of the USSR Academy of Pedagogical Sciences and Honorary Academician by the Russian Academy of Education (Thornbury, pers. comm.). At the time of his death on September 13, 2005, Gerald Read was survived by his wife of 64 years, Victoria Read, his daughter, Victoria Anne and her husband Carlton F. Thornbury, and his grandson Alexander T. Thornbury, his brother Reverend Canon Ralph D. Read, and his adopted daughter Kongit Dawit and her children Mariana and Yoel Dawit, and several nieces and nephews in Ohio, Connecticut and Florida (Akron Beacon Journal, November 6, 2005). Although the Reads were often characterized as being astute investors and frugal spenders, they managed to establish or to increase a number of endowed programs that will serve students and teachers for years to come. These programs include student and athletic scholarships at Kent State University; The Read Center for International and Intercultural Education at Kent State University; the Phi Delta Kappa Teacher Travel Scholarships; the Gerald H. Read Laureate Doctoral Scholarship in International Education (Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation); the Center for Distance Learning at the Northeastern Ohio Universities Colleges of Medicine; the Read Pavilion at the Porthouse Theater at Blossom Center in Ohio, the summer home of Kent State’s theater department; and the Victoria C.T. Read Public Library in Flushing, Ohio (CIES Newsletter, September 2005).

A DEVOTED WIFE AND PARTNER One cannot talk about Gerald Read without recognizing the love and support he received throughout his career by his wife of 64 years, Victoria Catherine Twarog Read. Vicky, as she preferred to be called, was born October 31, 1915 in Flushing, Ohio, and was one of four children born to Andrew and Antoniana Arendarczyk Twarog (Charlotte Observer 2005). Vicky was a strong, independent, highly opinionated, demanding, and loving person. She held high expectations for herself, her husband, her children, her friends, and any organizations of which she or her husband were members. Vicky kept an impeccable house, not unlike many women of Slavic descent. Besides her work with her husband, Vicky Read had several interests and projects of her own: She was a devoted student of Ikebana and was a delegate from the U.S. to seven World Ikebana International Conferences in Japan; she established the Victoria C.T. Read Scholarship at Kent State University’s College of Nursing; she endowed the Adopt-A-Scholar Scholarship of Phi Delta Kappa, for which she received in 1991 the Outstanding

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Philanthropist Award by the National Society of Fund Raising Executives; and in 2006, Vicky made a gift to the Special Collections Department of Kent State University’s Library and also established the Gerald H. and Victoria C.T. Read Archival Assistantship and created classroom space dedicated to teaching archival research skills for graduate and undergraduate students(www.ohio.com/obituaries, 11/12/06) Vicky and Gerald were a special couple—highly devoted to each other and their respective professions. Marion Korllos, long time friend and colleague, described the Reads as the most forgiving persons she ever met; they truly cared about students and were wonderful with all of them. They held high expectations for them and helped them reach those expectations! The Reads were remarkable educators, worldly, down to earth and practical (Korllos, pers. comm.).

GERALD READ AND KAPPA DELTA PI Gerald Read had a long term relationship with Kappa Delta Pi. Inducted into the Delta Beta Chapter (installed in May 1935) of Kappa Delta Pi when he was an undergraduate student at Kent State University, he became the chapter Counselor in 1948. He was the first and only person in Kappa Delta Pi who served as National Vice President for ten consecutive years (1954-1964), working with both Katherine Vickery and John J. Harton, presidents during that time. He was elected National President for the 1964-1966 biennium and served as Advisory Counselor from 1966-1968. He served as Chairman of the Commission for the Study of Kappa Delta Pi from 1966-1968. In 1971, he initiated Kappa Delta Pisponsored seminars to the Soviet Union; that effort began a continuous overseas educational travel program for Kappa Delta Pi. In 1986, on the basis of his world-wide scholarship in comparative and international education, he was elected to the Laureate Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi (Kappa Delta Pi Archives, August 2010). Kappa Delta Pi went through a number of changes during the years that Read served on the Executive Council and as President of the Society. Importantly, a permanent headquarters was established in West Lafayette, IN; fiscally, Kappa Delta Pi was strong and had a large endowment fund; Richard J. McElheny became a full-time Executive Secretary of Kappa Delta Pi and Professor Henry Broudy became the part-time editor of The Educational Forum. As a result of these changes, the society could concentrate on rethinking the role and function of Kappa Delta Pi. One of Read’s first tasks as President of Kappa Delta Pi was the appointment of two committees directed by actions taken at the Twenty-fourth Biennial Convocation. These committees were the Regional Planning

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Committee and the Long Range Planning Committee. Read also chose to use these two committees as the President’s Advisory Committee, an “interior group, brought together by the President to which matters of the Executive Council can be referred for which a wider hearing and in turn, from which can come suggestions for consideration by the Executive Council” (Read 1964, 44-45). Former presidents Katherine Vickery and John Harton served as advisors and Richard McElheny and Read served as ex-officio members of this committee. The two committees, Regional Planning and Long Range Planning, acting as the President’s Advisory Committee, were charged to submit concrete and specific proposals and recommendations to the Executive Council and the Twenty-fifth Biennial Convocation. In his President’s Message to members published in the December 1964 issue of Kappa Delta Pi Record, Read urged members and chapters to share ideas and concerns with these committees or with individuals serving on these committees. Read’s President’s messages published in each issue of Kappa Delta Pi Record that Read revealed how strongly Read was about making Kappa Delta Pi an inclusive society, reaching out to professionals, teachers, and students alike for input and ideas. He was also concerned about the fiscal stability of the organizational and outreach programs that would inform members of “world issues” not just U.S. issues. In his Presidential Address at the Twenty-fifth Biennial Convocation in Houston in February, 1966, Read eloquently shared the strong viewpoints held by Kappa Delta Pi members regarding the future of the Society: 1. A strong feeling among a minority of the Kadelpians that sheer survival of the Society is not enough. 2. The criticism that leadership of the organization was old and tired, highly authoritarian, and protectors of the status quo. 3. Others were accepting of leadership but wished Kappa Delta Pi to become more engaged in new functions and activities that would better reflect the larger purpose of Kappa Delta Pi in a changing society (Read 1966, 118). Read viewed the Twenty-fifth Convocation as an opportunity to encourage conversations to clarify the purpose, goals and directions of the Society. He stated: I think we can all agree that the purpose, plan of organization and functions which may have served us satisfactorily in the past may not necessarily be adequate for today or tomorrow. Likewise, I think we can all agree that unless we keep abreast of merging needs, Kappa Delta Pi will be seriously

Gerald H. Read (1964-1966) 89 handicapped in attaining its purposes and will tend to become increasingly ineffective in this world of rapid change. (119)

He summarized several factors that might in the future weaken or destroy Kappa Delta Pi if not adequately addressed by the membership and leaders of the Society. These concerns included the tendency to overemphasize expansion of chapters as well as quantity rather than quality of members, projects, activities and services. He also noted the stubborn holding on to established traditions, procedures, and emphases that no longer were consistent with modern developments in education. He emphasized that KDP should not take on services and activities that could be better provided by other agencies. He was concerned that both alumni and campus chapters might become social or speaker-oriented clubs rather then groups that would devote themselves to the scholarly pursuit and enhancement of education. He believed that many chapters were too reliant on Society officers and headquarters staff to provide programs and activities for local chapters and suggested the possibility that individuals would seek to use Kappa Delta Pi to enhance their own prestige rather than making a significant professional contribution to the Society. He worried that a possible power struggle and the constant bickering between campus and alumni chapters would sap the strength and resource of Kappa Delta Pi and suggested that campus pressures and demands on professors and students were increasing which would make it more difficult to locate a faculty sponsor of real worth. He believed that the same factors could reduce the numbers of serious scholars in education to assume officer responsibilities at the Society level (Read 1966, 126). Read indicated that it was only by some forceful prodding by this wife, Vicky, that he accepted the responsibility of serving as Kappa Delta Pi President and he was really concerned about finding professors and educators who could devote the time and energy to working with professional organizations while they engaged their professorial and scholarly responsibilities. Many changes to Kappa Delta Pi occurred at the Twenty-fifth Convocation. For example, the office of President-Elect was established, national dues were raised to $5.00 and would be directly billed by the National Office, and local chapters would initiate a minimum local chapter fee of $1.00 to a recommended $3.00 maximum. Many local chapters did not have a dues structure at all, making it difficult to carry out local projects. In addition, the Convocation approved the formation of the Commission for the Study of Kappa Delta Pi. Read, serving as Advisory Counselor of Kappa Delta Pi, became the chair of that Commission and the following individuals, most of whom were Laureates, constituted the membership of the Commission: John Brubacher, Professor, University of Michigan;

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George S. Counts, Professor Emeritus, Teachers College, Columbia University; Henry Hill, President Emeritus, George Peabody College for Teachers; Ernest Melby, Professor and Dean Emeritus of the School of Education, New York University and Distinguished Professor of Education, Michigan State and Florida Atlantic Universities;. John Norton, Professor Emeritus, Teachers College, Columbian University: and Katherine Vickery, Professor of Psychology, Alabama College and former president of Kappa Delta Pi. This Commission met a total of three times during the 1966-1968 biennium (Read 1967). The Commission, after much deliberation, identified central problem areas which they deemed the greatest concerns of Kappa Delta Pi which needed prolonged study and analysis: 1. Selection of membership: Should Kappa Delta Pi be more selective? Should professional qualities be considered as well as scholarship? 2. Purpose: How best to serve all members? How to encourage more personal contact between professors, educators, and students? 3. Image: How can we improve local and national images so that Kappa Delta Pi truly represents scholarship and leadership in education? How to locate chapters on large and powerful universities which do not have chapters? 4. Alumni: How best to organize and serve alumni members? What precautions should be taken to keep Kappa Delta Pi from becoming a professional group at a time when the scholarly dimension of education needs understanding in the larger cultural milieu? 5. Laureates: How best to use the members of the Laureate Chapter for leadership and service roles? How can they be more active and visible at Convocations? 6. Data Collection: How can Kappa Delta Pi collect and analyze data to establish the professional composition and geographical location of active membership? 7. Attrition: What must Kappa Delta Pi do to keep members active in Kappa Delta Pi? Should KDP Record and The Forum be our only outreach to members? If so, they must reflect the interests of the members. 8. Self-Analysis: How large do we want to be? Are out selection standards high enough? Which colleges and universities are deserving of chapters? 9. New Directions: What should be the purpose of honor societies in view of the transition to a system of mass higher education? Are

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10.

11.

12.

13.

our programs relevant or significant given the changing educational environment? Bridges: How do we build relationships between the major disciplines that will help us to understand and solve the current pressing problems in education? Should Kappa Delta Pi organize seminars and interdisciplinary panels to engage in analyses of presentations on a variety of issues and publish their results in our publications to share with students, teachers and professors to use locally? Themes: Should the national program committee suggest a theme for the year and possible programs for local groups to use--a sort of resource kit for chapter to use to engage in broader educational issues? History: Should Kappa Delta Pi, which was mores than fifty years old, initiate a scholarly analysis, interpretation and assessment of its fifty years of growth with a projection for its possible future role in American education? Continuous Study: Because of the rate and speed of change in American education, should Kappa Delta Pi continue to study and research the role and function of Kappa Delta Pi as an Honor Society in Education? (Read 1967).

As a result of their extensive analysis, the Commission recommended that the Committee for the Continuing Study of the Future of Kappa Delta Pi be established; it should consist of the active leaders of the Society; and they should evaluate its present programs and long-range plans. Many of the questions put forth by this Commission were and are being examined by the leadership of Kappa Delta Pi. Perhaps that is the legacy this distinguished group of educators left us—the need for constant selfanalysis to ensure the future of Kappa Delta Pi as an International Honor Society in Education.

FINAL OBSERVATIONS Without doubt, Gerald Read played a significant role as a dedicated leader of Kappa Delta Pi. As with all the tasks that he chose to undertake, he led with careful thought and concern for the organization. He devoted many years to Kappa Delta Pi and challenged the organization continuously to analyze itself and its role in American education. What is amazing about Read is that he was a true leader in education in so many ways through a variety of professional groups and honor societies and, when

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engaged in each role, he made those groups feel like they were the only one that had his attention. He was a man of many talents and interests and he wanted to improve American education at the same time that he wanted to open the world to America’s students, teachers, and professors. He was an international educator with very few peers and a friend to many Kadelpians, as well as students, teachers, professors, and world leaders.

REFERENCES Brickman, William W. 1966. Ten years of the comparative education society: An historical analysis. Comparative Education Review 10(1): 4-15. Charlotte Observer (Charlotte, NC). 2005. Gerald Read Obituary. September 14. http://www.legacy.com/obituaries-print.aspx?n=gerald-read&pid=15591171 CIES Newsletter.2005. Dr. Gerald Read, architect of international education, dies at 92. September. http://www.cies.us/newsletter/sept%2005/GeraldRead.htm Cushner, Kenneth. 2000. Gerald H. Read: Ambassador to the world. Phi Beta Delta Lifetime Achievement Award Ceremony. http://dept.kent.edu/pbd/pdf/ awards_read.pdf Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Ohles, John F, 1986. A conversation with Gerald Read. Kappa Delta Pi Record 23(2): 53-56. Read, Gerald H. 1964. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 1(2): 44-46. Read, Gerald H. 1966. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 3(4): 118-127. Read, Gerald H. 1967. Report of the commission for the study of Kappa Delta Pi. Kappa Delta Pi Record 4(2):51-53. Swing, Elizabeth S. 2007. The Comparative and International Education Society (CIES), in Common interests, uncommon goals: Histories of the World Council of Comparative Education Societies, eds. Vandra Masmann, Mark Bray, and Maria Manzon: 94-115. Hong Kong: Springer. Victoria Catherine Twarog Read Obituary. Accessed November 12, 2006, http:// www.ohio.com/obituaries

CHAPTER 10

ESTHER J. MCKUNE (1966-1968) A Determined Woman Marcella L. Kysilka

Esther J. McKune 1966-1968

A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 93–99 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Dr. Esther J. McKune was born on July 16, 1920 in Binghamton, New York, a small community in Upstate New York near the Pennsylvania boarder in a bowl-shaped valley at the confluence of the Susquehanna and Chenango Rivers. Binghamton has always been a transportation crossroads and manufacturing center known for its production of cigars and shoes and the home of IBM. McKune attended the Binghamton schools, graduating from Binghamton High School in 1938 and attending the New York State Normal School in Oneonta, New York (now SUNY Oneonta). At Oneonta, she majored in elementary education and upon receiving her bachelor’s degree in 1942 moved to Chenango Forks, New York, at which she taught elementary school for four years, first at Chenango Forks Elementary School and then Thomas Jefferson Elementary School. (West, pers.comm) In 1947, she moved to Ames, Iowa to attend Iowa State College (now Iowa State University) at which she completed her master’s degree in elementary education in 1950. While attending Iowa State, she also earned her pilot’s license in 1949. McKune loved the wide-open spaces and particularly loved flying (West, pers. comm.). After graduating from Iowa State, McKune returned to her beloved New York, accepting a second grade teaching position at Palentine Bridge Elementary in the Mohawk Valley area of New York. In 1951, while still teaching at Palentine, she served as an adjunct professor at Cortland State College (now SUNY at Cortland). McKune once again moved from New York, this time in 1953 to Greeley, Colorado, to pursue a PhD degree at Colorado State College of Education (now the University of Northern Colorado). While at CSCE, McKune was initiated into Theta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi in 1954. Upon her graduation from Colorado State College of Education, McKune once again returned to New York and accepted a position as assistant professor in elementary education at Oneonta State University Teachers College (SUTC) in Oneonta, her alma mater. By 1957, McKune became the Director of Extension Programs for the State University unit which in 1959 had 18 centers around the state. McKune became the chapter counselor of Epsilon Sigma Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi in 1961 and served in that position until 1973. She spent the remainder of her academic career at Oneonta, retiring in 1978 (West, pers.comm). Upon her retirement, McKune spent many years traveling around the world, expanding her knowledge and enjoying new adventures which reflected her interest in the social studies. One of her more memorable trips was her initial venture into Micronesia in 1975. Her experiences there, exploring the area, meeting people and observing children only enhanced her desire to “see the world.” McKune spent her summers on the coast of Maine and spent time with her family (West, pers.comm). She

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continued going to some professional meetings, including Kappa Delta Pi. She was also a member of AAUP and NSSE. Much too little is known about Esther McKune. A very private person, she accumulated no archival records that would shed light on her professional and private lives and contributions. Esther McKune passed away on June 19, 2011.

ESTHER J. MCKUNE’S SERVICE TO KAPPA DELTA PI AS 1ST VICE PRESIDENT McKune began her leadership role at the Society level in 1964 when she was elected as 1st Vice President. She served in that role from 1964 to 1966. During that biennium, Gerald Read was the President of Kappa Delta Pi and, as President, called for a comprehensive study of Kappa Delta Pi and its role in education. McKune’s report focused on the duties of the 1st Vice President and how they related to the overall goals of Kappa Delta Pi. According to McKune, the major role of the 1st Vice President was to provide guidelines and assistance to the development of new chapters (McKune, April 1966). During that biennium, requests for information about establishment of chapters increased dramatically. In reviewing the avalanche of requests for chapters, McKune reported to the Executive Council that the desire to increase the membership of Kappa Delta Pi was appropriate; however, growth must be done cautiously. She wrote in the April 1966 issue of Kappa Delta Pi Record: Our primary concern must be that the high ideals of our Society will be maintained, the standard of an institution and the quality of its educational programs must be investigated as thoroughly as possible within our limitation before any encouragement can be given toward pursuing applications for the establishment of a chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. (128)

Also, she reported that according to a resolution passed in 1964, “an institution devoted entirely to the education of members of one sex, one religion, or one color, were discouraged from perceiving interest in a Kappa Delta Pi Chapter” (McKune 1966a, 128). As part of her job as 1st Vice President, she shared the process to be followed by a petitioning group. Perspective chapters had to submit a Chapter Application Form providing required institutional information. Once submitted, the members of the Executive Council evaluated the application for the merit of the college or university. When officers completed this task, they returned their ballots to the KDP headquarters for tabulation. If the majority of the Executive Council approved the application,

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the applying institution was notified to proceed with a detailed application. The detailed application was then submitted to the 1st Vice President who summarized the initial evaluations and submitted them along with the detailed application to the Executive Council. If the Executive Council approved the application, it was sent to all active chapters for a vote. If a majority of the active chapters supported the application, an installation date was established and the petitioning chapter was notified of its approval (McKune 1966a, 130). McKune visited four applying institutions to clarify discrepancies in information provided on the applications and to provide guidance in completing the applications. During her tenure as 1st Vice President, 47 institutions applied for chapter membership in Kappa Delta Pi, 10 were approved and installed (McKune, 1966a, 131).

THE PRESIDENCY OF ESTHER J. MCKUNE In her presidential address to the Society, Esther McKune indicated that during the 1966-1967 academic year and her first year as President of Kappa Delta Pi, the emphasis of the Society would be on Regional Conferences. She perceived the value of these meetings as an opportunity of the members to meet with the Society leadership to share “discuss common concerns, share ideas, and re-examine our goals as an Honor Society” (McKune 1966b, 3) She established the President’s Advisory Committee chaired by Dr. Ruth Sugarman. The first meeting of this committee was cancelled due to an airline strike; consequently questions this committee would explore were printed in the October 1966 issue of Kappa Delta Pi Record: 1. How effectively do the Regional Conferences serve the purpose of Kappa Delta Pi? 2. What scholarly activities should be under taken by the Society? 3. Is the committee structure efficient and satisfactory? 4. How can Alumni Chapters make more concrete contributions? 5. Are our present publications serving the purposes desired? 6. What should be the future role of Kappa Delta Pi? (14). These questions were continuously explored by subsequent Executive Councils. The Executive Council also decided it should honor the hard work of Dr. E. I. F. Williams, former Executive-Treasurer of Kappa Delta Pi. His efforts led to the establishment of a National Office in West Lafayette,

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Indiana and recognition of Kappa Delta Pi as a professional organization in many educational circles. The honor was “the establishment of the E.I.F. Williams Award given to chapter(s) making the most outstanding contribution to the Society and education” (McKune 1966b, 14). Although established, no archival evidence exists that this award was ever granted. McKune was always concerned with the image of Kappa Delta Pi as an honor society and a professional association. In her president’s message in the December 1966 issue of Kappa Delta Pi Record, she shared the frustrations of many students and chapter counselors who were concerned (and at times embarrassed) with the poor attendance and participation in chapter activities. She challenged all chapters, including Alumni chapters and the Laureate chapter to live up to the purposes and ideals of the Society. She suggested that too many members were passive rather than active in Kappa Delta Pi; members pledged upon their induction into Kappa Delta Pi to uphold the ideals of the Society and, thus, they were obligated to “continuously strive to fulfill them” (McKune 1966c, 68). She reminded members that Kappa Delta Pi was a unique honor society in which Kappa Delta Pi members were “both men and women of high scholarship to work shoulder to shoulder on the improvement of the status of teaching, to make an impact on education, and to assume the role for development of leadership abilities” (68). She also reminded members of the importance and significance of one of the highest forms of recognition in Kappa Delta Pi—that of the Honor Key. To receive the Honor Key, a person must be a member of Kappa Delta Pi for a minimum of 15 years and must have provided leadership within the local chapter, within the Society and, most important, but have provided eminent service in the field of education (McKune 1967a, 141143). During McKune’s Presidency, the William Bagley room at Headquarters was established. A second history of Kappa Delta Pi was proposed (but never completed) to follow the first, Kappa Delta Pi 1911-1935 (HullQuest, 1938). She also proposed that Kappa Delta Pi enter the new age of multi-media learning. She encouraged chapters to collect audio-visual materials to preserve the history of Kappa Delta Pi. A major AV Production was presented at the 1968 Convocation in Denver (McKune 1968, 132-134). In 1967, Kappa Delta Pi received a new form of recognition. The Bdetin de Institutiona de Pedagogie de Mexico, a catalog of articles appearing in periodical publications, recognized two entries from Kappa Delta Pi: the January 1967 issue of The Educational Forum edited by Chet Bowers and Kappa Delta Pi Record for all 1966 issues. A total of 142 entries from 10 countries and only 3 entries from the United States had been submit-

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ted, two of which were Kappa Delta Pi publications (Executive Council Minutes 1967). Student involvement in national activities of Kappa Delta Pi became a reality during McKune’s presidency. Students for the first time in the history of Kappa Delta Pi were appointed to standing committees of the Society. Development and installation of new chapters continued with 23 installations held during the 1966-1968 biennium. Also, efforts were made to have the laureate Lectures presented at the Convocation with individual lecturers working 2-4 years out to assure their participation at the Convocaton.

CLOSING THOUGHTS An overview of the messages of President McKune to members of the Society published in Kappa Delta Pi Record reveal the considerable depth of her beliefs in the purposes of Kappa Delta Pi and how this organization can and should make a difference in the education field. Kappa Delta Pi was not just an honor society to McKune. Rather, it was a building stone to the improvement of education for all students across the country, regardless of age, ability or ethnicity. She viewed the toils of Kappa Delta Pi members as essential to the provision of quality education for all. McKune was extremely dedicated in her service to Kappa Delta Pi. She was a powerful woman who kept the standards of the Society high and expected everyone else to meet those standards.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT Special thanks to Wendy West, Esther’s niece, who was most helpful in providing specific information on Esther’s early life and career. It was my privilege to know Esther—she gave me good advice, which helped me in both my personal life and my professional life. She was a unique woman for her time.

REFERENCES Kappa Delta Pi. 1967. Executive Council Minutes. October 12-15. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). McKune, Esther J. 1966a. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 2(4): 128131.

Esther J. McKune (1966-1968) 99 McKune, Esther J. 1966b. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 3(1): 13-14. McKune, Esther, J. 1966c. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 3(2): 67-68. McKune, Esther, J. 1967a. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 3(4): 141143. McKune, Esther, J. 1967b. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 4(1): 27-28. McKune, Esther, J. 1968. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 4(4): 132-134.

CHAPTER 11

WIPPERT ARNOT STUMPF (1968-1970) Turbulent Times Ron Knorr

W. A. Stumpf 1968-1970 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 101–112 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Wippert Arnot (W. A.) Stumpf, the 10th president of Kappa Delta Pi, was born in Elgin, Illinois on January 20, 1899, the son of John H. and Emma Kasdorff Stumpf. At the turn of the 20th century, the local community was ending a period of labor unrest at the Elgin Watch Company, its namesake major industry, and entering an era of economic prosperity. This success particularly was recognized in the growth of the local schools. During Stumpf ’s days as a student in the public schools of Elgin, this success resulted in a doubling of the size of the local high school by the time he graduated in 1918. While Wippert Stumpf registered for the military draft in the fall of 1918, he was not called into service in the waning days of World War I. Instead, Stumpf served in the U.S. Navy Reserve in 1918 and 1919 and again in the Illinois National Guard from 1929 to 1936. He enrolled at the University of Illinois-Urbana in the fall, 1918. Stumpf ’s undergraduate degree was in Accountancy, a field of study that served him well during his career in education. Despite the rigors of preparation for a career in accounting, he found time to play clarinet for legendary Director of University of Illinois Bands Albert Austin Harding, just as the Jazz Age dawned across a post-war America (Buford 1952). The distractions of extra-curricular activities did not negatively affect the young scholar, as he was inducted in the Alpha Chapter of Beta Alpha Psi, national honorary society in accounting. Stumpf graduated with a Bachelors of Arts degree in 1922. Beginning in 1923, W. A. Stumpf was listed in the Illinois School Directory as a teacher of “Commercial Subjects” at the Pontiac (IL) Township High School at which he also served as department head. He remained at this school until 1935. During this time, Stumpf also served as Editor of the Elgin Courier-News (1930-31) and President of the Elgin Teachers’ Council (1934-35). He had begun an education career that would last nearly 50 years, leading Stumpf to positions in important government agencies, professional educators’ organizations, and to professorial appointments at two prestigious universities. By the early 1930s, Stumpf had begun his graduate education in pursuit of a Master’s of Arts degree at the University of Chicago. There were other changes for him in those early Great Depression years as well. In 1933, Wippert Stumpf married Helen Lardinois in a union that lasted almost 60 years and produced sons Karl John and David. His thesis, “Federal Participation in Public Education in Illinois under Emergency Relief Measures,” was a detailed study of the “extent and effect in the State of Illinois of the Federal Government’s attention and benefice” (Stumpf 1935). Stumpf ’s business background assisted in his evaluation of the programs of the New Deal as these proposals attempted to improve edu-

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cation in his home state during this trying economic time. He was awarded the Master of Arts degree in 1935. Stumpf then commenced work on his doctorate, also at the University of Chicago. It was during this training that Stumpf began to participate in various educational organizations. Specially, he began a long relationship with Phi Delta Kappa, a professional association for educators. Stumpf served as a writer for the Phi Delta Kappan, producing a column on membership activities and writing an abstract and summary of the 1936 annual convention, held in St. Louis. His recap of the major events of that convention, including his analysis of speeches by Democratic Senator (later U.S. Vice President) Alben Barkley, Republican Governor Harry J. Allen of Kansas, and renowned Socialist Norman Thomas, framed the debate over Roosevelt-era policies (Stumpf 1936). The language of these speeches mirror similar debates over government policies in the early 21st century, and Stumpf ’s careful reporting provided a fascinating insight into the discussions of that time. In 1938, Stumpf was named Associate Editor of the Phi Delta Kappan. He also served as Associate Editor of Educational Abstracts, Educational Director of the Chicago Joint Board of the International Ladies Garment Union, and Supervisor of WPA education projects for the Chicago area. In the 1930s, the University of Chicago was solidifying its reputation as a leading progressive academic institution. From 1915 onward, the university had considered the idea of a new curriculum for its undergraduates. Robert Maynard Hutchins, university president from 1929 to 1951, championed this “New Plan,” as the scheme became known (The University of Chicago). Only three days older than Stumpf, Hutchins’ youthful exuberance, combined with his experience in higher education (Hutchins had served as Dean of the Yale School of Law at age 28) must have attracted Stumpf towards a career in academia. In any case, the New Plan became a topic of interest for Stumpf. The New Plan was an attempt to instill a liberal arts basis from the Western intellectual tradition into the undergraduate curriculum, reserving specialized training for graduate school. Such a plan must have been foreign to Stumpf whose undergraduate degree focused on specific profession, a common curriculum in the first three decades of the 20th century. Hutchins’ New Plan called for the elimination of grades and course requirements at the undergraduate level, replacing them with comprehensive exams, broadly based class themes, and use of the Socratic Method. The New Plan was a daring idea, running counter to the curricular thinking of the day, and that boldness attracted Stumpf ’s analytical nature. His dissertation, “A Comparative Study of Certain Aspects of the Old and New Plans at the University of Chicago,” examined the differences in the curriculum in place at Chicago before and after the limited

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installation of Hutchins’ ideas (Stumpf 1941). Stumpf was awarded the PhD degree in 1941. Soon after graduation, Dr. Stumpf moved from his native Illinois and the progressive environment of the University of Chicago to Georgia, the heart of the segregated South. In 1942, Stumpf began employment in Atlanta as the Research Assistant for the Re-survey of the University System of Georgia. His other tasks in Georgia were varied including an appointment as Associate Professor and Consultant in school administration for the Agricultural and Industrial Development Board at the University of Georgia and work on the Annual Reports of the Georgia State Department of Education. He remained prolific in his scholarly pursuits as well, writing articles for a variety of education journals and, in a nod to his undergraduate training, for the Journal of Accountancy. During his time at Georgia, Stumpf continued to solidify his reputation as an authority on matters of educational organization and administration. Stumpf left the University of Georgia in 1948 to accept an appointment as Associate Professor of Education at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. One of the principal tasks in his new position was to assist in the establishment of a Doctor of Education program at this private university, so similar in structure and prestigious reputation to his own graduate alma mater. Stumpf continued his other academic interests as well, publishing on a variety of topics across his career at Duke, including an analysis of school board selection in Georgia and Alabama, teacher supply issues, problems of school construction and, in a vision of the forthcoming distance education age, a study of educational television’s affect on secondary education administration. One of Stumpf ’s projects involved the issues of civil rights and equal educational opportunities for African-American students in school districts in Durham. In one such project, Stumpf followed the work of fellow Duke Professor John W. Carr in efforts to overturn the “separate but equal” fiat of Plessy v. Ferguson. This work was used as the basis of Carr’s unpublished report entitled “A Report on a Comparison and the Program and Facilities of Instruction in the Negro and White Schools of Durham”, illustrating inequities in the racially segregated schools of the City of Durham (W. A. Stumpf Papers, University Archives, Duke University). As part of the march towards Civil Rights, the work of researchers like Carr and Stumpf were vital as testimony for the plaintiffs suing for equal educational opportunity. In 1951, a Federal District Court found that Black schools in Durham were unconstitutionally underfunded (Blue vs. Durham Public School District 95 F.Supp, 441, M.D.N.C. 1951). This finding gave hope to other litigants in similar cases, and in 1952 the plaintiffs in a similar case (Winborne et al. v. Taylor et al, 195 F.2d 649) cited the work of these Duke Professors. In Winborne, the plaintiffs claimed unconstitutional

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discrimination by the school board regarding inequality of facilities under the terms of the 14th amendment. Despite the compelling evidence provided from the examination of the Durham Public School facilities, the court found no discrimination. It would take other litigants in different venues to change that unjust decision (see Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483, 1954). Stumpf remained interested in the socio-economic factors that affected the public schools of Durham and nearby areas. In 1955, he surveyed some 500 high school seniors in Durham, Guilford, and Wake County high schools using a three-page questionnaire to assess the subjects’ economic status, educational background, living conditions, current activities, and post-graduation plans. The resulting unpublished report, entitled “Plans of High School Seniors,” linked the relationship of poverty and low socio-economic status to lowered future expectations of high school graduates in these North Carolina counties (W. A. Stumpf Papers, University Archives, Duke University). Until his retirement as Professor from the Duke faculty in 1968, Stumpf ’s expertise in school administration and educational facilities planning was in demand throughout the Southern United States. He spent his teaching pursuits as Director of Undergraduate Studies and in guiding numerous students through Duke’s EdD program that he helped to establish. Recognized as a senior scholar and expert in organization, new opportunities for leadership opened for Stumpf, including service in the National Conference of Professors of Educational Administration, American Association of School Administrators, National Education Association, National Council for School Construction, and Kappa Delta Pi. Stumpf ’s leadership in Kappa Delta Pi began by his service as Counselor for the Alpha Tau chapter at Duke. His national leadership in Kappa Delta Pi began at the 1964 Convocation at which he was nominated for the office of Second Vice President, a position in existence at that time. Stumpf ’s nomination faced initial opposition from the floor of the Convocation when the name of Dr. Virginia Rowley was placed into nomination. After a speech from both candidates, Dr. Rowley removed her name from consideration and Stumpf was elected by acclamation. One of the duties of this position was to give program guidance to the chapters. Stumpf performed this role in an analytical fashion. His report in the February 1965 Record was an auditor-like account of chapter program practices, along with suggestions for improvement to increase the quality of program topics and encouragement for increased frequency of chapter meetings (Stumpf 1965). Later that same year Stumpf was appointed by the Executive Council to a subcommittee charged with the examination of procedures employed in the national office, a task for which Stumpf was well suited. The results of this subcommittee’s work

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resulted in changes in the employment terms for the Society’s Executive Secretary and other professional employees. At the 1964 Convocation, the Society determined that the position of President should be filled by a person who had spent time in preparation by a term as President-Elect. Accordingly, that position was established and the election for its first occupant was set for the 1966 Convocation. The formal duties included counseling with delinquent chapters, chairing the planning committee for the next Convocation, and observing the national operations of the Society as well as the work of the current president, Executive Council, and professional staff before taking on the presidency. The nominating committee selected Stumpf for this new position. Unlike his election as Second Vice President, there were no nominations from the floor and Stumpf was elected by acclimation as the first President-Elect in Kappa Delta Pi history and, by that action, he became its 10th President. Although the Society’s constitution had been amended to define the duties of this new position, the official record reveals that its first occupant felt limited by the organization’s initial assignments for its first PresidentElect. Within a day of Stumpf ’s election as President-Elect, the task of planning the 1968 Convocation was given to the professional staff, specifically the Executive Secretary. In the April, 1968 Record, Stumpf taciturnly reported that his duties consisted mostly of suspending delinquent chapters, and then only after the Executive Secretary had taken all the steps needed for that task (Stumpf 1968a). He also observed that the President and Executive Secretary had done all the planning for the next Convocation without his input, while expressing that “what had been done is entirely satisfactory to me” (Stumpf 1968a, 22). In a brief statement, Stumpf listed his preparation for the presidency as having “attended all Executive Council meetings this biennium, all but one in the previous biennium,” and “observed the president and immediate past-president. This constitutes my preparation, plus my previous experience as an administrator. I trust it will be sufficient” (Stumpf 1968a, 22). A review of the Executive Council minutes shows slightly more involvement for President-Elect Stumpf than his report indicated. Stumpf was assigned to attend a number of these conferences and installation ceremonies across the country at various points of his term. He was also named to several ad hoc committees, usually dealing with finance or personnel issues within the National Office. During this time of expansion of the number of chapters, one task assigned to the President-Elect was a significant problem for the Executive Council. While this growth seemed an important matter for the Society, it was made more so by the loss of delinquent chapters. In October of 1966, Stumpf was directed to write 58

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chapters to inform them of their delinquent status, in an attempt to resolve this problem and to encourage retain the chapters good standing. Other initiatives begun during this biennium met with mixed success. The Executive Council inherited the task of building an audio-visual library, a task Stumpf had worked on in his time as Second Vice President. During this term, some progress was made on the catalogue of audiovisual materials available in the National Office and used by chapters to promote the Society and inform the membership of its benefits, rituals, and programs. Other plans were not as successful. Numerous attempts were made to arrange for the writing of a fifty-year history of Kappa Delta Pi for the period 1911 to 1961. Despite efforts by the Council to secure this task and the agreement of a member of the Society to undertake this work, no such history was written during the 1966-68 biennium. In fitting with his administrative background and at the Council’s direction, Stumpf located a qualified expert at Duke University to review the Society’s Constitution and Bylaws, an ongoing task for this committee. He located an unnamed graduate student at Duke to review these documents and the resulting appraisal was forwarded to the National Office in preparation for a new by-law format. Stumpf also contributed to the revised policy manual for use by the National Office and Executive Council, although the minutes of the meeting where this manual was discussed and approved indicate that he was absent during its discussion due to a sudden illness (Stumpf recovered and attended the remainder of the meeting). The opportunities and problems facing Kappa Delta Pi in the 1966-68 biennium were significant. Some reflected the nature of any honor or professional society dependent on ongoing membership growth and competent professional and volunteer leadership. Others reflected a changing time in American society and in the purpose of the preparation of teachers. These issues, as well as new ones, faced the newly retired Duke Professor and newly installed President W. A. Stumpf as he began his two-year presidential term at the 1968 Convocation. According to the official minute book of the Executive Council, President Stumpf began his duties at 9:45 P.M. on March 9, the last day of the 1968 Convocation. Stumpf chose to take the sparse minutes of this brief meeting himself in syntax that appeared more like notes he was writing to himself. While this act in itself is not particularly remarkable, it portends future events that mark aspects of the Stumpf Presidency as problematic. During the first full meeting of the newly installed Executive Council, held in October 1968, 24 points of business were considered. The vast majority of these items were routine and related to the ongoing business of the Society, such as the admission and suspension of chapters, planning for regional and national events, and the receipt of routine officer

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reports. One item of business in this meeting provides evidence of significant issues related to the operation of the Society, specifically in the National Office. Although the Executive Council tabled any revision of the Bylaws, a project that President-Elect Stumpf had promoted, the Council went into executive session without the professional staff (namely, the Executive Secretary and his assistant) to meet with Nolvin A. Ward, a management consultant. Ward’s services were considered as part of an ongoing study of the operations of Kappa Delta Pi begun during the previous presidency of Esther McKune. The minutes of this closed session indicated unnamed “problems at the national [office] level.” Ward was engaged at a fee of $10,000 to $15,000 for a three month study of the national office and the job function of the Executive Secretary. Ward’s further work was to be formally defined after his preliminary report. Stumpf again took the unusual step of taking a separate complete set of minutes in addition to the ones recorded by the Executive Secretary. A comparison of the two minutes of this extraordinary meeting reveals no substantial differences in the two and both were approved at the next Executive Council meeting in January 1969. It was the last time Stumpf took such an action. Stumpf ’s first “President’s Message,” published in the October 1968 edition of the Record, focused on issues outside those noted at the Executive Council meeting (Stumpf 1968b). He commented at great length on the purpose of Kappa Delta Pi in a turbulent society during that tumultuous and tragic year in American history. Stumpf firmly encouraged the Society’s members “towards realizing its goals believed by many as worthy of attaining, not as personal aggrandizement” (Stumpf 1968b, 20). He also addressed the political turmoil among college students making up the core membership of Kappa Delta Pi, reminding them that at the last Convocation the delegates chose not to involve the Society in contentious issues “however important they might be in other connotations. Matters of student power on campuses, the draft, teacher militancy, and the like, important as they are, are matters for the personal decisions of individual members” (Stumpf 1968b, 21). Stumpf encouraged the membership to act in a highly responsible manner when carrying out their responsibilities as educators. Inertia defined the work of the Executive Committee during the Stumpf Presidency. During the 1968-1970 biennium, much of the Executive Committee’s dealings consisted of the usual routine of receiving reports, discussing new chapter applications and delinquent chapters, and other such business. A few new program initiatives were proposed, such as new schemes regarding the extended work of the Society with the Commission on International Education, the Commission on Professional Education, and the Commission on National Educational Problems. No

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action was taken on any of the recommendations of these organizations. A motion to produce a Regional Conference Yearbook at an estimated cost of $1,000 failed, as did a motion to pay the Convocation travel expenses of Executive Council member’s spouses. Stumpf ’s suggestion that the President or other members of the Council may require unpaid time away from their usual work and that the Society should consider reimbursing them for that time was also rejected. Indeed, financial matters weighed heavily on the Executive Council. A reduction in the formula of funds paid to chapters to send delegates to the Convocation was approved and met with disappointment from the chapters. The Council agreed to revisit this issue, but did not during the biennium. Annual dues were increased from $5.00 to $7.00, a 40% increase. The Council approved a motion that authorized the Executive Secretary to borrow “from the bank such funds as are necessary to meet the current expenses month by month.” Inexplicably, no limit set on the amount of such a loan. A proposal from the Budget Committee to invest the Society’s monies in Mutual Funds, “as a way of increasing the Society’s financial standing,” was discarded. The Budget Committee (among others) was asked to produce budgets well in advance of the February 1970 Convocation in Boston. No such budgets were ever noted as received or acted on in the Council’s minutes. Another item of inaction involved the “management audit and review” report of Nolvin Ward. This report listed and defined five essential functions of the Executive Secretary, as well as it listed the four elements that the long-proposed management handbook that Stumpf and others had advocated in prior administrations should contain. Most of Ward’s recommendations were simple, suggesting that the Society describe the aims of such a handbook, while defining management structure and the roles of the National Office in general and the Executive Secretary specifically. He also suggested far more substantive actions for the board, including an indepth examination of the Council’s objectives and policies, a master program plan for the Society, and a detailed examination and definition of the duties of committees and structure of the Society. Ward also proposed an increase in the number of professional staff and amount of financial reporting provided to the Executive Council, as well as expanding the size of the Council. There was no discussion noted in the official minutes of the meeting, only a motion to accept the report, which carried. No other action was taken on Ward’s report. Ultimately, faced with dire financial circumstances, the Council “directed that Mr. Nolvin Ward be informed that as of July 4, 1969, the Council will no longer be requiring his services for the present time.” While Ward’s report was discussed again in various Council meetings, no action was taken on his recommendations.

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The last meeting of the Council during the Stumpf administration ended also with little action. Held in conjunction with a busy Convocation, the February 1970 meeting of the Council was disjointed in both attendance and focus. Neither the incoming President nor the Counselors were in attendance for any of the rambling seven meetings of the Council meeting, many apparently held between sessions of the Convocation. The naming of T. E. Musselman as one of the founders of the Society was discussed several times before a final vote establishing that designation was passed. Minor issues were briefly discussed, but no substantive business was conducted, only a notation that the next council meeting would be held in April at the West Lafayette Headquarters for the transfer of the Society’s business from the old Council to the new one. If such a meeting was held, no minutes were recorded. Because of a change in the Society’s Year, the 1970 Biennium consisted of 27 months. This addition meant that the Stumpf Presidency was extended by three months. No record of any Council action taken after the February meeting is available, but President Stumpf gave a report covering the last year of his term. Published in the April 1970 Record, it described the challenges and opportunities the Society faced and encouraged student involvement in the affairs of the Society at local, regional, and national levels (Stumpf 1970). Stumpf noted the growth experienced in the Society during his term, while giving credit to the Executive Secretary for increased membership retention. He mourned the death of E. I. F. Williams, the long-time Executive Secretary and Treasurer of the Society and lauded the completion of the “Kappa Delta Pi Slide-Tape,” while lamenting its lack of use among chapters. Stumpf also mentioned concerns that still faced the Society. The Ward Report was mentioned in passing, only to say that the “matter is in abeyance.” Not mentioned was the continued failure to produce a fifty-year history of the Kappa Delta Pi. While stating that the Society is “fiscally sound,” he noted the problem of lack of “ready cash” and its effect on potential programs. In his concluding comments, Stumpf commented on items beyond the Society’s business. Returning to the theme he mentioned in his first President’s Report regarding the role of Kappa Delta Pi during turbulent times, in an America torn by the bigger issues of war, desegregation, and battles over student power, Stumpf sought to focus the Society on its purpose, without ignoring the world around it. He commented, “As Kappa Delta Pi is now, it provides a recognition of capability and potentiality that does not limit the service of its members. Any member may choose to originate, sponsor, promote, and bleed, if he chooses, for any cause he wishes. Or he may choose to ignore causes and improve his teaching or his research. Or he may choose to do all these things”

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(Stumpf 1970, 103). With these words, the official record of the Presidency of W. A. Stumpf was complete. As stated in the Bylaws of that time, Stumpf assumed the position of Advisory Counselor and member of the Executive Council for the new Biennium beginning June 1, 1970. He did not attend the first meeting of the new Executive Council in September. In fact, Stumpf never attended any meetings after his presidency. Stumpf ’s Advisory Counselor report in the April 1972 KDP Record was in character with his previous sparse statements to the Society’s membership and hinted that he had been cast aside by the new Executive Council (Stumpf 1972). He wrote that while it was customary to ask for the views of the Advisory Counselor during Council meetings, “Circumstances militated against [my] attendance” (emphasis mine). He also noted that he not been provided any Council minutes during the biennium. (Stumpf 1972, 22). Still, Stumpf provided two suggestions. One was for the Society to reconsider its roles and objectives in light of the social complexities of the early 1970s. The other was to eliminate the position of Advisory Counselor as soon as possible (Stumpf 1972). After his term as Advisory Counselor, there was no further mention of President Stumpf in the KDP Record. By 1972, he had been retired for four years from his professorship at Duke. In that year, Stumpf served as project director of Project SPIRIT, a Durham NC-based organization designed to collect and dissimilate information helpful to the elderly. Otherwise, no information about the next twenty years is openly available about Dr. Stumpf. After a stay in a Durham nursing home, Wippert A. Stumpf died November 26, 1991. His wife Helen passed away some four years later.

REFERENCES Buford, Cary C. 1952. We’re loyal to you, Illinois. Demorest, Ill.: The Interstate. Stumpf, Wippert A. 1935. Federal participation in public education in Illinois under emergency relief measures. Master’s Thesis, University of Chicago. Stumpf, Wippert A. 1936. Problems in education as emphasized in addresses at St. Louis: Part II. The Phi Delta Kappan, 18(8): 236-246. Stumpf, Wippert A. 1942. A comparative study of certain aspects of the old and new plans at the University of Chicago. PhD diss., University of Chicago. Stumpf, Wippert A. 1965. Speaking of programs. Kappa Delta Pi Record 1(2): 7376. Stumpf, Wippert A. 1968. Report of the President Elect. Kappa Delta Pi Record 4(3): 135. Stumpf, Wippert A. 1968. President’s Message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 5(1): 20-21. Stumpf, Wippert A. 1970. Report of the President. Kappa Delta Pi Record 6(3): 102103.

112 R. KNORR Stumpf, Wippert A. 1972. Report of the Advisory Counselor. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8(3): 22. The University of Chicago. Robert Maynard Hutchins. http://president.uchicago.edu/history/hutchins.shtml W. A. Stumpf Papers, University Archives, Duke University.

CHAPTER 12

LORRENE LOVE ORT (1970-1972) Valuing Artistic Creativity and Academic Excellence in Educators Sherri R. Colby

Lorrene Love Ort 1970-1972 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 113–127 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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In preparation for the 1972 Kappa Delta Pi Convocation in Phoenix, Arizona, Dr. Lorrene Love Ort (1971) invoked the symbolism of the pyre and the phoenix in her composed lines: Long ago, or so the tale is spun, an exotic bird of spectacular plumage and a sweetly voice would, after a phenomenally long life, build a final nest of twigs from the spice tree. The nest symbolized both pyre and perpetuation, for here the phoenix—its life cycle ended—consumed itself in a sweet-scented fire, and here, too, arose a glorious young phoenix from the ashes. (9)

As Ort figuratively explicated, the “glorious young phoenix,” after arising from the ashes of the “sweet-scented fire”, embarked on a worshipful journey “to the altar of the sun god, Ra” (Ort 1971, 9). Like the rising phoenix, the Kadelpians prepared to gather in Phoenix, Arizona to “weave the warm and dynamic magic that will unite us [Kadelpians] to our common purpose” (Ort 1971, 10). In this spirit, the “privileged ones to see the phoenix in 1972” (Ort 1971, 10) would partake in a celebration of golden days past and in a renewal of hope for the magnificent future of Kappa Delta Pi. This inspirational, lyrical message typified Ort’s imaginative crafting of colorful, idealistic prose to articulate her ideals. As remembered by associates for her ladylike class, creative finesse, exacting determination, and boundless enthusiasm, Ort catalytically and artistically served Kappa Delta Pi (Amos, pers. comm.; Dermer, pers. comm.; Marsh, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.; Turkett, pers. comm.).1 On April 17, 1918 in Sedalia, Missouri, Alma Hirschfelt and James Owen Love welcomed their first and only child, Lorrene Love, into their home. Shortly after her birth, James Love entered the military in May 1918 to fight with the Allied troops in World War I; however, an unfortunate bout of phenomena resulted in his untimely death on October 15th of the same year (James O. Love 1917). On May 21, 1921, Lorrene Love’s widowed mother married William Frederick Rose, a World War I veteran from Missouri. Sometime between 1921 and 1930 (exact date unknown), the newly constructed family moved to Mobridge, South Dakota, the place where Lorrene Love attended secondary school (Marriage License 1921, Bureau of the Census 1930; Ort 1955). After her high school graduation, Ort chose to pursue a bachelor’s degree in music (awarded 1939) at the conservatory in Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio (Ort 1955; Stang, pers. comm.). Known traditionally as an elite, liberal arts music school (Oberlin College 2010; Ort 1955), Oberlin offered her opportunities to gain foundational experiences in classical, arts-based curricula, fortuitously shaping her perspectives on teacher education (Marsh, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.; Turkett, pers. comm.). After graduation, she taught music (1939-1942) at Napoleon Elementary School in Napoleon, Ohio, where she met her life-long love,

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Vergil Ort, who served as principal. Her enduring friend Mary Amos described their healthy playful courtship in a humorous incident: Vergil Ort hung Lorrene Love’s coat high on the school gymnasium ceiling, and she, in retaliation, knitted the opening of his coat together to prevent him from wearing it. On November 1, 1941, the couple married, and she, in the spirit of originality and independency, modified custom by wearing all black attire instead of the traditional white (Ort 1972; Stang, pers. comm.). With the 1942 outbreak of World War II, Vergil Ort joined the navy and enrolled in radio training at the University of Houston. With his wife at his side, he assumed active duty as Officer-in-Charge of Training Aids at the U.S.N. Training Center in San Diego, California and eventually rose to the rank of Lieutenant Commander (USNR), serving until his release in 1945. After the war, the couple returned to Napoleon Public Schools, she performing as a teacher, and he leading as the principal of a new elementary-junior-high school. During the summers of 1948-1950, together they enrolled in master’s classes at Ohio State University, and she earned her Master of Arts degree (1950) while her husband completed doctoral courses (Stang, pers. comm.; Ort Professional Resume). In 1951, the couple accepted a two-year contract with American Samoa. Vergil Ort assumed leadership as General Superintendent of Samoan schools, specifically overseeing the elementary, junior-high, dependents, summer, and teacher training schools, and Lorrene Ort taught at the Feleti Memorial Teacher Training School, an experience permanently shaping her future educational perspectives (Ort L. 1955; Ort V. 1972). In her dissertation (1955), she shared a revealing narrative of how she sought to raise “the gauntlet—the challenge—the invigorating push” (Ort 1955, 8) to understand the cultural ways of Samoan children, thereby expanding her own creative aptitudes and those of a Samoan boy named Simi: Several years ago, a teacher stood on the doorstep of a new and wonderful experience—one that had its setting on a pin-point island in the South Pacific. Each morning as she greeted the Samoan students and teachers she did so with a “Good morning, Iutita” or a “Good morning, Matea”… she accompanied each child’s name with the soft Samoan greeting, “Talofa, lava!”... From one child [Simi], however, this brought no similar response or greeting and no answering smile … his countenance mirrored unhappiness, and his lips were troubled with incoherent mumblings. (7-8)

Recognizing Simi’s disgruntled reactions to the greeting ritual, Ort questioned the other students regarding the problem. Simi, like his peers, failed to comprehend English; therefore, he chose either to ignore the morning greeting or to respond with the syllable “U’u” (Ort 1955, 8). In

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time, she expressed delight at Simi’s willingness to embrace the gauntlet when he disrupted her concentration by tapping her on the cheek. She turned, and “there stood Simi—barefoot and briefly clothed … with him the regal air of one who has donned the purple vestments of the elect” (Ort 1955, 8). To her satisfaction, “he gravely bowed, then said in clear, soft tones, “Good morning, teacher!” (Ort 1955, 8). As demonstrated in this narrative, Ort possessed an abiding, lofty respect for innovative challenge, a quality she sought to cultivate in herself and in others. After completing their two-year contract in 1953, the couple vacationed in Australia, New Zealand, North Africa, Asia, and Europe (Ort V. 1972). Returning to Ohio, they enrolled in doctoral programs at The Ohio State University, becoming in August 1955, as Vergil Ort (1972) records, “the first husband and wife team in the history of the University to be granted PhD degrees at the same commencement.” She majored in elementary education, with an emphasis in creativity, and he majored in school administration. In the preface of her dissertation, she (1955) offered a fitting tribute to her husband, “…the author has naught to extend but her hand and wish that together they might continue this wonderful hand-in-hand journey of creative living and learning that the graduate years have but commenced” (Ort 1955, ii). Ort served from 1954-1955 as the Related Arts Coordinator for The Ohio State University School, an experience offering a unique, cultivating environment for her dissertation study, “The Expanding Role of Creativity in the Elementary School.” Dr. Laura Zirbes, who served as Ort’s advisor, had pioneered an arts based curriculum into the early grades of the University School. In 1948, President Truman granted Zirbes the Woman of the Year Award as a “teacher of teachers (Klohr 1996),” and she continued this legacy with the publication of her landmark text Spurs to Creative Teaching (1959) in which she advocated infusing creativity into all disciplines. Former student Klohr (1996) described Zirbes as “an extraordinary, powerful teacher” (142) who “challenged students and her professional colleagues to rethink, revision, and reimagine their professional goals and to design methods for achieving them” (Klohr 1996, 142). By the early 1950s, The Ohio State University enjoyed national recognition for its School of Education as well as its experimental University School that served grades K-12. The education professors of Ohio State appeared to be divided between two poles: the academic scholars who sought to scientifically measure behavior (as established by their former Dean George Arps who had studied in Germany with Wundt) and the democratic philosophers such as Boyd Bode, Harold Alberty, Laura Zirbes, Margaret Willis, and H. Gordon Hullfish who embodied Dewey’s progressive ideas in practice and scholarship (Klohr 1996). Established in 1930 and opening in 1932, the University School resulted from the lobbying of Dean

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Arps and the vision of Professor Bode who sought to found a laboratory school upon Dewey’s principles of democracy. The school arrived in time to participate activity in the Progressive Education Association’s Eight-Year Study with Ralph Tyler serving as the evaluator. The democratic values interwoven in the school’s conception prevented one individual from claiming himself as “founder”; therefore, the school emerged through collegiate collaboration (Kridel 2002; Kridel & Bullough 2007). Former University School student Butche (2005) described “growing up in University School” (1) as a place at which “student progress … was assessed against the student’s own potential, not by the potential of others, nor the arbitrary satisfaction of grade level” (Butche 2005, 1). In her dissertation, Ort’s perspectives reflected the vision of Zirbes and the values of the University School: when purposefully planned for, creativity catalytically fostered academic excellence through focused exploration and arts-integration, occurring within evolving, democratic classrooms. Ort (1955) expressed gratitude to Zirbes for inspiring “an untold bequeath of a greater vision” (ii) and for “the professional stimulation of being creatively constructive while raising the sights” (Ort 1955, ii). Tantamount to Zirbes’ later Spurs to Creative Teaching, Ort shared how the inherent “yeast of creative expression” (Ort 1955, ii) cultivated children’s aptitudes for challenge, spontaneity, inspiration, availability, and flexibility, by selecting purposeful experiences giving “impetus to imagination and observation” (Ort 1955, 95). Her writing style resonated her love of beauty as she lyrically infused classical, Renaissance, Victorian, and modern poetry, literature, and philosophy in her descriptions of the children’s experiences. Of this, she shared: Just as the child needs a growing repertoire of friends and acquaintances— the better to acquire the sympathetic flow of self with society, so, too, does he need an enlarging repertoire of vital experiences….The child needs the aesthetic, emotional, and spiritual sensitizing with which expanding and deepening creative experiences with beauty will endow him. (Ort 1955, 191)

Through this process, the child burgeons into a more imaginative self endowed with qualities essential to learning in childhood and beyond, and as “requisite for living and becoming” (Ort 1955, 94). In 1956, the Orts assumed positions as assistant professors at Bowling Green State University (or BGSU in Bowling Green, Ohio). Vergil Ort (1972) eventually became an associate professor and the Assistant to the Dean. In contrast, Lorrene Ort spent her first year as assistant professor at the Mansfield Branch of the university, and then transferred to the main campus to assume the role of the Director of Student Teaching and Curriculum for the Bowling Green City Schools. In 1960, her official title as overseer of the student teaching program changed to the Director of

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Student Teaching and Professional Laboratory Experiences, and she continued to serve in this role until 1970, simultaneously rising to the rank of associate in 1961 and full professor in 1966 (Ort Professional Resume). As a teacher educator, Ort taught undergraduate courses in language arts and reading and graduate courses in curriculum and supervision. Under her leadership, the student teaching program expanded by the late 1960s into a network of approximately 20 area school systems, with more than 2,000 students placed each year (BGSU Retirees Association 2005). From 1958-1970, she edited the university’s student teaching handbook, the materials for the professional laboratory experiences, the student teaching evaluation forms, and compiled the yearly student teaching and laboratory report. Her extensive, continued involvement in student teaching bears evidence from her expansive list of consultantships with Cincinnati Public Schools (1959-1963), Lakewood Ohio Public Schools (1963-1964), and teachers colleges (1964-1972) in New Jersey, Indiana, Idaho, and Maryland as an NCATE (the well-known accrediting organization for teacher preparation) representative (1964-1972) (Ort Professional Resume). Notably, Ort sought to infuse the arts and the classics into the teacher preparation program in order to foster the attributes of persistence, dedication, exploration, and imagination (Marsh, pers. comm.). Regarding her scholarship, Ort published approximately 15 short articles from 1950-1964 on reading, creativity, and the arts in journals including Childhood Education, Reading, Triad, Music Journal, Elementary English, National Education Association Journal, The Clearing House, The Reading Teacher, and Ohio Schools. Her articles generally were practitioner in nature and on topics such as creativity, children’s literature, poetry, and art. During the late 1950s and early 1960s, she participated in the publications committee for the journal Educational Leadership, sponsored by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Her most prominent national publication became the Word Book, a spelling primer for elementary grades (editions from 1962-1976), with accompanying workbooks for students and manuals for teachers. Fellow Kadelpian and former president A. Keith Turkett (pers. comm.) referred to her Word Book as “a wonderful thing” during a time when spelling primers took center stage in elementary classrooms. Colleagues and former students especially remember Ort for her gift of oratory, as indicated by her numerous, wide-spread speaking engagements (Amos, pers. comm.; Marsh, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.; Turkett, pers. comm.). Her professional vitae lists more than 300 speeches delivered and papers presented, with an approximate average of three appearances a month from 1960-1972. Her activity in organizations such as the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, Kappa

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Delta Pi, and National Council of Teachers of English constituted much of her national orations, and at the regional level (mostly in Ohio), she spoke frequently to faculty and administrators from school districts and state universities, even delivering addresses at education administrator conferences, PTA (parent teacher association) meetings, and community venues. Throughout her career, she maintained membership in additional professional organizations, including the American Association of University Women (AAUW), the National Education Association (NEA), the Ohio Education Association (OEA), and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) (Ort, Professional Resume). In 1963, Ort published for the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development a small booklet entitled A Matter of Fences: An Essay, highlighting her artistic writing skills and her philosophy of education. Fred T. Wilhelms (1963), Chairman of the Publications Committee, credited Ort with writing the ideal desk book for the aspiring educational stylist, seeking to “resonate with her fresh delight at childhood’s wonder, her reverence for the impulse of the here and now, and her calm acceptance of the harsh, thorough challenge that leads to discipline” (v). As Wilhelms aptly described, A Matter of Fences, with its imaginative, rhythmic prose, invites readers to undertake the pursuit of creativity through fresh dedication to artistic values. In her essay, she called upon educators to genuinely consider the fences of the mind: Every man finds his fences—fences that would guide, protect, challenge or barb his further actions. Some find fences that are external, some discover internal palings, others encounter physical walls, and the most daring will perceive even a Maginot line for what it basically is—a figmentary fortress of the mind. (Ort 1963, 25)

For Ort, the fences of the mind may find expression through an individual’s ideas and actions, by building fence rows, as he or she “tears down some and rails at others” (Ort 1963, 25). Thus, the creative challenge for the individual becomes “to discover for himself the stile, the gate, the rent, or the creep hole that each fence offers as outlet or inlet” (Ort 1963, 25). As a teacher educator, Ort deemed herself responsible for helping her pupils, young and old, to rediscover creativity, “by looking back through the slatted palings of time to former years to discover again the fence” (Ort 1963, 25) and then by embarking on new journeys. Of this, Amos (pers. comm.) commented: She was an outstanding teacher … both in the classroom and out because she was as open out of the classroom as she was in. She had such creative ideas. She had been in the classroom, and she didn’t bring theory to us; she brought practical things ... I realize Lorrene was far ahead of herself in

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many ways with the ideas that she had for us. She expected creativity, and as a result, she got it, and we worked our tails off for her.

Notably, Ort expected from others determination, fastidiousness, and excellence in their performance of their academic duties—but always with the intent of lifting her students and colleagues toward loftier ideals (Amos, pers. comm.; Marsh, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.; Turkett, pers. comm.). In his curriculum vitae, Vergil Ort records his membership in Kappa Delta Pi as early as 1957, at the onset of his new professorship at Bowling Green State University; more than likely at this time, his wife joined with him. Although probably recruited to provide needed leadership to the Delta Phi Chapter at Bowling Green State University, together they served throughout the remainder of their careers, as friend Marsh (pers. comm.) noted, as “proud Kadelpians.” Accordingly, Vergil Ort served on and chaired regional and national committees for the Society as early as 1960, and prior to her presidency, Lorrene Ort spoke at regional meetings from 1959-1967. In the late 1960s, she joined the Executive Committee as an officer, and later was elected president of Kappa Delta Pi for the 1970-1972 biennium, with her husband offering partnering service (Ort, L. Professional Resume). Fellow Kadelpians and colleagues described the deep interconnectedness of the pair in nearly all of their professional endeavors; her contributions simply cannot be understood without an acknowledgement of her husband’s continual, loving support (Amos, pers. comm.; Marsh, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.; Turkett, pers. comm.). As Marsh explained, “Together they represented an epitome of both scholarship and devotion to the ideals that KDP promotes” (pers. comm.). Near the end of Ort’s presidency, Kadelpians of Bowling Green State University granted the couple the Honor Keys at a special banquet. According to Marsh (2010), they actually tricked Vergil Ort into believing that the banquet was to be held in honor of his wife, subsequently deceiving Lorrene Ort by professing an alternate tale of her husband’s supposed honor. Due to a delayed flight in Toledo, Ohio, Marsh and his wife Martha arrived to the banquet late, but as Marsh (pers. comm.) shared, the evening concluded delightfully, “Just as planned, each was surprised. They delighted in our recognition of their beloved mate. They were overwhelmed to learn that they would share the honor together.” In his curriculum vitae, Virgil Ort (1972) proudly explicated how he received the Honor Key “for eminent service in education and fifteen years of service to Kappa Delta Pi.” The time prior to, during, and after Ort’s presidency marked a period of expansion for the Society. In 1962, J. Richard McElheny assumed

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leadership as Executive Secretary and his conservative efforts toward steady growth augmented the membership through the late 1970s (Marsh, “Kappa Delta Pi Reflections”). The spirit of growth already present at the time of her election, in part, inspired Ort’s interests in chapter expansion during her presidency. Turkett (pers. comm.) and Marsh (pers. comm.) recalled how she worked to adopt new chapters into the organization through inspirational visits to the universities. In part, she hoped new chapters would ameliorate the society’s financial constraints due to economic inflation, thereby still achieving steady growth, preserving the traditions of excellence, and preventing the organization from suffering from unwise, aggressive spending (Hall-Quest 1938; Marsh, pers. comm.; Turkett pers. comm.). Ort also applied this conservative view of expansion by insisting on firm academic standards for entrance. In a time of “soaring college enrollments” (Ort 1968, 136) and “the creation of new schools of higher education” (Ort 1968, 136), she advocated the acceptance of those chapters whose membership demonstrated high levels of accomplishment. During her vice-presidency, she outlined her expectations for chapter entrance into Kappa Delta Pi, and then she firmly maintained those expectations during her presidency: Hence, before seeking accreditation or re-accreditation, many schools which lack the ermine of an imprimis position of hope to enhance their professional garment with purple (and green) of an honor society…. In today’s culture, there are those who equate demanding with getting, and these would also categorize honor with other give-aways on the marketplace. (Ort 1968, 136)

As she mentioned, membership in an honor society must be earned and could not be bought in the giveaway marketplace of higher education. Her deep respect for the founders, the exemplary scholastic tradition, and the honor rituals of the organization guided her perspectives of how Kappa Delta Pi should enlarge in view of the “incessant and clamorous knocking at the door” (Ort 1968, 136) stemming from the proliferation of higher education. In the final year (1972) of her presidency, the report on membership in Kappa Delta Pi Record revealed the majority of the membership as “extremely successful in their educational experience” (Sederburg 1972, 68), by earning high grades and by intending to further their graduate education. Those who remember Ort describe her more as an inspirational leader rather than a logistical administrator. Known for her imaginatively crafted speeches, she commanded attention through dramatic displays. To illustrate, at the 1972 Convention in Phoenix, she donned a bonnet and shawl, calling the breakfast meeting to order by ringing a school bell

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(Turkett, pers. comm.). Similar to her efforts in student teaching at BGSU, she sought to strengthen the connection between the local chapters and the Executive Council through personal visits, teaching local chapter members the honorary rituals of Kappa Delta Pi (Marsh, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.; Turkett, pers. comm.). For Ort, growth depended on cultivating within members the values of interest, involvement, sociality, service, and commitment (Norris, 1970). Turkett shared how Ort mentored him during his vice-presidency regarding her vision for expansion, and his own commentary offers insight in this regard: Kappa Delta Pi seeks to encourage, to praise, and to inspire great service…. As Dr. Ort has effectively said, there is ‘honey in the hive’ for the one who seeks the best in life and work. Chapter growth and development continue to keep alive in a dynamic way our quest for knowledge, duty, and power. (Turkett 1971, 58)

Her 1970 President’s message reiterated the same themes as she compared the society to a “lovely, handmade quilt” (8) where the members represented the “initial stitchery,” (Ort 1970, 8) “skillful needlework which united the Society so effectively and which later expanded into diverse chapter and alumni groups … of the finest quality” (Ort 1970, 8). Then, returning to her beloved metaphor, she declares, “No hive worth its honey can long endure unless every member exerts, exudes, and expends” (Ort 1970, 8). Notably, she radiated Hall-Quest’s description of the original character of Kappa Delta Pi, as “‘An Honor Society in Education” supporting “professional standards and research projects”, designed to attract to education exceptional people (1938, 4-5). Ort’s efforts culminated with her support for the symbolic creation of the Bagley Room for the National Headquarters. In 1971, former president Katherine Vickery invited members to contribute artifacts, such as a school bell, old textbooks, teacher’s aides, and an abacus, to furnish a “suitable memorial to his memory” (1971, 50). The room, adorned with Bagley’s original desk and office furniture, embodied his goals to form a society “to promote the standards of scholarship and research … for the preparation of teachers and to confer the honor of membership on those students who gave evidence of ability, character, scholarship, and professional promise” (Kandel 1961, 11). Notably, Ort’s vision for Kappa Delta Pi promoted and expanded Bagley’s foundational perspectives, the promotion of academic excellence and superior teaching, through assumed deference to both classical curricula and child-centered pedagogy (Marsh, pers. comm.; Null 2003), for Bagley’s “greatest concern in life was for the education, not the training of teachers” (Vickery 1971, 49). Accordingly, Ort also expected educators to embody lofty ideals purposed by Bagley and to demonstrate the imaginative artistry advanced by Zirbes.

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Concerns regarding American isolationism following the Vietnam War prompted the society to “move into a more active program of leadership, scholarship, and traditional service in American education” (Commission on International Education 1971, 53) through globalization. Serving as chair of the Commission of International Education prior to her presidency, Ort sought to expand travel opportunities for members, in hopes “shore[ing] up our American schools abroad, and at the same time, provide members of Kappa Delta Pi and others with an opportunity to teach in or to administer in” (Commission on International Education 1971, 54) in foreign schools. During Ort’s presidency, these globalization efforts continued to include seminars in Great Britain, Ireland, and Scandinavia and secured scholarships future visits to Africa, Latin America, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union (Commission on International Education 1971, 54; Coleman 1972). After her presidency, Ort continued to serve on the Executive Council as Advisory Counselor, and as expected, she promoted the same values of academic excellence, service, and commitment. In her 1974 report, she expressed concerns about the rising inflations of grades, “for a ‘B’ average today is too often yesterday’s ‘C” and about the “period of economic escalation and stress” (Ort 1974, 127). Returning to the purposes of Kappa Delta Pi, she recommended financial parsimony, instead advising the society to consolidate efforts toward “human potential, and instead of dividends are realized in unknown yearly yields” (Ort 1974, 127-128). For the alumni chapters, she encouraged the society to conduct an intensive study to determine the contributions of individual members, who may “have become the outstanding gatekeepers, designers, implementers, and thinkers in the profession” and in so doing, the society steer future expansion efforts from the helm of meritorious service (Ort 1974, 127-128). In 1977, Ort retired from Bowling Green State University and joined her husband who previously retired as professor and associate dean for the College of Education in 1973 (BGSU Monitor 2005; BGSU News 1985; Sentinel 1994). Together, they spent their retirement years beautifying their home and garden, sailing on Lake Erie, and enjoying their fruit farm in Mercedes, Texas. She continued to explore her talents by sewing and knitting, creating splendid suede suites, pillows, and other artistic pieces. Friends and neighbors described the Orts’ residence as a magnificently decorated wooden house with contemporary furnishings, Oriental rugs, and memorabilia from their world travels and service in Samoa. As avid gardeners, they embraced nature. Grand trees lined adorned the property, containing a sizeable lily lined pond with a rowboat, vegetation of orchids and a rhubarb patch, and habitats for small animals, including wild birds and chickens. Inside the home, the small viewing nooks with magnificent windows offered peaceful places for wildlife viewing. At the

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dining room table, architecturally designed by Vergil Ort, they entertained numerous guests with ornate dishes and savory meals (Amos, pers. comm.; Dermer, pers. comm.; Marsh, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.; Turkett, pers. comm.). In a 1995 letter to Marsh, Ort described her enthusiasm for cooking from the garden, “I read Baker’s formula for successful gardening, next my curiosity gets the better of me, and yes, I tried those impossible recipes out of pure disbelief, and bingo! I was hooked, really and truly hooked” (Marsh, pers. comm.). In the community, the Orts offered service as Vergil remained active in the Kiwanis Club and American Heart Association (of which he was a former president) and as Lorrene participated in the Wood County Retired Teachers Association. In this capacity, she contributed as Memorial Chair and Newsletter Editor and wrote a brief history (published in 1996) of the association (BGSU News 1985; Ort 1996). In 1985, the university awarded the Orts the Honorary Alumnus Award for significant contributions. Of the award, alumni representative Weiss commented, “In our visits to alumni chapters all over the country, there are always just a handful of faculty people that our graduates ask about. Time and time again, alums ask me if the Orts are still teaching, or if we have heard from them” (BGSU News 1985). On August 13, 1994, Vergil Ort died at the age of 86, and memorials were to be given to the Lorrene and Vergil Ort Scholarship fund at BGSU, the American Heart Association, or St. Mark’s Lutheran Church (Sentinel 1994). In a letter to Marsh (pers. comm.) shortly after Vergil’s death, Lorrene Ort communicated poignant feelings: About two weeks before death came, I was cleaning out our coat closets … and there I discovered our academic robes and regalia hanging in dust proof plastic coverings. At this juncture, I turned to Vergil who had just come in from the garden and he said, “You know honey when I die, I want to be buried in my academic robe.” Vergil looked at me with a rather startled smile, and I smiled too, and lo and behold! He’s buried in his robe. When I die, I decided I shall be buried right beside him in mine.

After her husband’s death, she faced the difficult challenge of learning to live alone. After six months of fearful drivers’ education with an instructor from Bowling Green State University, she finally earned her first driver’s license, opting to venture out her husband’s red Cadillac by only turning right instead of left in order to avoid oncoming traffic. She preserved, however, both in driving and in community service as she gave generously of her time and financial resources in the final years of her life (Amos, pers. comm.; Dermer, pers. comm.; Stang, pers. comm.). In collaboration with the Wood County Teachers Association, she supervised an annual donation to the Wood County Library for books honoring deceasing edu-

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cators from the community (Books and Bytes Summer 2005; Winter 20052006). On July 25, 2005, she peacefully departed, leaving substantial financial contributions to Bowling Green State University, Oberlin College, the Wood County Library, and St. Mark’s Church; her memoriam gifts were to be granted either to the Vergil and Lorrene Ort Kappa Delta Pi Scholarship Fund or to Bowling Green State University (BGSU Monitor 2005; Dermer, pers. comm.). In remembrance of Ort, Marsh shared, “She was a unique president of the society because she was a classy lady,” who believed “we [teacher educators] should be people who understood and had feelings about the nicer things in life and the beautiful things in life” (pers. comm.). For Ort, the values of academic excellence and artistic creativity characterized her educational philosophy, her professional contributions, and her lifelong pursuits.

NOTE 1.

Dr. Frank E. Marsh (Kappa Delta Pi president 1972-1974) served with Ort on the Kappa Delta Pi executive council for 6 years. Dr. Turkett (Kappa Delta Pi president 1974-1976) also served with Ort on the Executive Council. Dr. Stang joined the education faculty at Bowling Green University in the late 1960s, and she worked with Ort and her husband during their tenure at the university. Helen Dermer met Ort in 1958 as a student at Bowling Green State University, and she became a close neighbor and friend who oversaw Ort’s estate after her death. Mary Amos enrolled in Ort’s teacher certification courses at Bowling Green University in the mid 1950s, and over time, Ort became a personal mentor and eventually a close friend to Mary.

REFERNCES BGSU Monitor (Bowling Green, OH). 2005. August 1. BGSU News (Bowling Green, OH). 1985. News and notes. October 11. BGSU Retirees Association Newsletter. September 2005. Bowling Green State University Archives, Bowling Green, Ohio. Books and Bytes, Wood County District Newsletter. Winter 2005-2006. Bowling Green, Ohio. Bowling Green State University Archives, Bowling Green, Ohio. Books and Bytes, Wood County District Newsletter. Summer 2005. Bowling Green, Ohio. Bowling Green State University Archives, Bowling Green, Ohio. Bureau of the Census. 1930. Fifteenth Census of the United States,1930, Mobridge, Walworth, South Dakota. National Archives and Records Administration, Washington D.C.

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Butche, R. 2005. Growing up in University School: An autobiographical look into America’s most experimental laboratory school. 2nd ed. Columbus, OH: Greenbrier House Publishing. Coleman, J. 1972. Report on the Commission of International Education. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8: 127. Commission on International Education. 1971. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8: 53. Hall-Quest, Alfred Lawrence. 1938. Kappa Delta Pi, 1911-1936. New York: The Macmillan Company. Kandel, Isaac L. 1961. William Chandler Bagley: Stalwart educator. New York: Columbia University. Klohr, Paul R. 1996. “Laura Zirbes: A teacher of teachers.” In Teachers and mentors: Profiles of distinguished twentieth-century professors of education, edited by Craig Kridel, Robert V. Bullough, Jr., and Paul Shaker, 139-146. New York: Garland Publishing. Kridel, C. 2002. And gladly she would learn: Margaret Willis and the Ohio State University School. In Founding mothers and others: Women educational leaders during the Progressive Era, edited by Alan R. Sadovnik and Susan F. Semel, 217-236. New York: Palgrave. Kridel, Craig and Robert V. Bullough, Jr. 2007. Stories of the Eight-Year Study: Reexamining secondary education in America. Albany: State University of New York Press. James O. Love, No. 724-1, A.G.O. 1917. Soldier’s records: World War I. Missouri State Archives, Missouri State Library, Jefferson, Missouri. Marsh, Frank E., n.d. Kappa Delta Pi reflections: With pride in our past and faith in our future.” Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Marriage License, William F. Rose to Alma Love. 1921. Missouri Marriage Records. Missouri State Archives, Missouri State Library, Jefferson, Missouri. Norris, J. A. 1970. Kappa Delta Pi Guidelines for Chapter Activities, Minutes of Meetings of the Executive Council. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Null, J. Wesley. 2003. Disciplined progressive educator: The life and career of William Chandler Bagley. New York: Peter Lang. Oberlin College. 2010. About Oberlin. http://new.oberlin.edu/about. Ort, Lorrene Love. 1963. A Matter of Fences: An Essay. Washington D.C: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Ort, Lorrene Love. 1971. Message from the president. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8: 910. Ort, Lorrene Love. 1970. President’s Message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 7: 7-8. Ort, Lorrene Love. n.d. Professional Resume of Lorrene L. Ort. Bowling Green State University Archives, Bowling Green, Ohio. Ort, Lorrene Love. 1974. Report of the advisory counselor. Kappa Delta Pi Record 10: 127-128. Ort, Lorrene Love. 1968. Report of the first vice president. Kappa Delta Pi Record 4: 136.

Lorrene Love Ort (1970-1972) 127 Ort, Lorrene Love. 1955. The expanding role of creativity in an elementary school.” Ph.D. Dissertation, Ohio State University. Ort, Lorrene Love. 1996. Published history of the organization: Wood County, Retirees Association, Bowling Green State University Archives, Bowling Green, Ohio. Ort, Lorrene Love. and E. E. Wallace. 1972. 1976. Word Book. Levels 1-8. Chicago: Lyons and Carnahan. Ort, Virgil. 1972. Professional Resume of Vergil K. Ort. Bowling Green State University Archives, Bowling Green, Ohio. Sederburg, William A. 1972. The membership of Kappa Delta Pi. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8: 65-68. Sentinel (Bowling Green, OH). August 15, 1994. Bowling Green State University Archives, Bowling Green, Ohio. Turkett, A. Keith. 1971. And still we grow. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8: 58. Vickery, K. 1971. William Chandler Bagley: A personal remembrance. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8: 49-50. Wilhelms, F. T. 1963. Forward. In A Matter of Fences: An Essay, author Lorrene Love Ort, p. v. Washington D.C: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Zirbes, Laura. 1959. Spurs to creative teaching. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons.

CHAPTER 13

FRANK E. MARSH, JR. (1970-1972) Sowing Seeds for Future Growth Mark David Dietz

Frank E. Marsh Jr. 1970-1972 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 129–143 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Dr. Frank E. Marsh, Jr. was the first individual to be elected President of the Society in an openly contested election. As such his election represented something of a sea-change for Kappa Delta Pi. As Marsh himself pointed out, that change was reflected “in a small ritual” in the Founder’s room at Society Headquarters. Twelve chairs surrounded the conference table in that room and each had the plaque of a former president of the Society. Marsh, as the thirteenth president, added his name to the chair of the first president, W. W. Denton. “In a way,” he said, “it was the second time around” (Marsh, pers. comm.). KDP in the 1970s was a conservative organization facing a world undergoing tremendous change and a profession, teaching, that would remain at the heart of these changes for the remaining decades of the twentieth century. Marsh understood the conservative nature of the organization and could appreciate how difficult it was for many of the older members to embrace the changing demands of the profession. But he had an eye on the future and he recognized that he had a responsibility to help shape the organization to be more responsive to the changing American scene. Marsh is certainly (as of this writing) one of the oldest members of KDP. As he said, “Well, I’m not quite ninety-one yet [this was November 24, 2010, only a few days prior to his ninety-first birthday]. But you know I’m in pretty good health and my mind hasn’t deserted me. I’m pretty lucky, you know” (pers. comm.). Marsh was more than just a “lucky” guy. He was Dean of the College of Education at Northeastern University at a time when the school was going through major growth changes. During Frank’s watch the program received national accreditation and began to produce its first doctoral students. At almost the same time (the early 1970s), Frank was President of Kappa Delta Pi. He also served from 1988 to 2002 as the chairman of the KDP Education Foundation where he helped to guide the program and enable it to realize its current success. Marsh has a passion for education and a collaborative spirit that allowed him to work successfully with a variety of people from professional peers to students, to KDP administrators and directors, and his two highly professional and successful wives. “Frank became a mentor for me, certainly in terms of past history,” remembered Dr. Michael Wolfe, former Executive Director. “More than anyone else in the organization, he knew why things happened and who the key players were. He has ties to the past like no one else” (Wolfe, pers. comm.). Frank’s sense of history did not come from passive observation alone. Frank had three qualities which helped him succeed. First, he listened to and respected the actions and lives of those who came before him. Given the opportunity to meet with and hear the stories of early KDP members and leaders, he sought them out and listened with unfeigned interest.

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Second, Frank did not keep these stories to himself. He is a bit of raconteur. Again, Wolfe noted, “Frank had a great sense of humor and was a tremendous story-teller. Marsh’s waxing of a good story entertained us many a time” (pers. comm.). But good storytelling has a value beyond mere entertainment. Marsh told stories to help the organization stay connected with its past and effectively find its way into the future. The third quality is one not usually associated with a listener and storyteller. Marsh was a doer. He was known for his ability to get things done, to organize and plan, to see a vision through to realization. These three qualities inform a life story that may well describe the history of a “lucky man,” but they also describe the actions of a man who was engaged with life and passionate about education.

EARLY HISTORY Marsh was the third of six children born to Frank Eugene and Selma Solin Marsh. He was born November 27, 1919, in Worchester, Massachusetts. He still has a love for New England and the old Yankee spirit expressed in the words of poets like Robert Frost. His father’s family had colonial roots (John Marsh, his earliest ancestor on American soil, had emigrated from England in 1640). Marsh’s mother was first generation American; her parents came from Sweden. Marsh grew up in a small community ten miles outside of Worcester where he attended Rutland Mass High School with a graduating class of twelve, only four teachers, basketball and baseball (Marsh played varsity on both), but no football. When Marsh graduated from high school, his older brother and sister were already in college. Marsh had to work for a year in order that he too could afford to go to college. He worked a lunch counter and got his hands dirty as a garage attendant. He also worked on a large farm that was part of a state hospital, hauling hay in from the fields, tending gardens, and milking cows. In the fall of 1938, he enrolled at Clark University. He played varsity baseball and was class captain, responsible for coordinating intramural team activities. In 1942, he graduated with a degree in English; that same year he attempted to enlist in the Army, but was turned down for medical reasons—something of an irony given his long lifespan. So, instead, Marsh joined the workforce hoping to find the occupational path that would suit him. The summer of his graduation he went to work at the Norton Company where he learned how to fashion diamond-studded grinding wheels. The company wanted to move him to Canada to help direct a similar operation. He chose instead to go into teaching.

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Before continuing the progression of Marsh’s career, attention should be paid to Martha Sandberg, the woman he married in 1942. Often in biographies, the spouse is portrayed as a relatively unimportant echo of the more substantial subject of the biography. Such was not the case for Martha or for Dr. Virginia Horns, the woman whom Frank Marsh married later in life after Martha suddenly and unexpectedly passed on in 1984. They were women of substance and intelligence who cared deeply for the teaching profession and made contributions to the profession in their own right. Martha was a graduate of Simmons College in Boston. She taught English and home economics, first in Rutland, then later in Manchester, Vermont, and Hanover, New Hampshire. She even hosted a radio cooking program. Marsh was influenced by the examples that Martha and his own mother had set for him in the teaching profession. Where Marsh had thought his primary goal was to become a sports coach, with Martha’s help, he began to realize that he could develop as great a passion for teaching. She also helped him to survive in a liberal arts environment and to appreciate the importance of becoming a well-rounded educator. With her help, he learned that teaching was more than just transmitting knowledge; it was engaging personally with young individuals as they matured and learned. Marsh’s first teaching position in 1942 was as a teacher-coach at Burr and Burton Seminary. Burr and Burton was a semi-private secondary school in Manchester, Vermont. With about twenty tuition students, Burr and Burton also provided secondary education for Manchester and several small surrounding towns. Altogether the school served 300 students, grades 9-12. Marsh taught English and both girls and boys physical education. He also coached touch football, basketball for girls and boys, and boys’ baseball. In his first season of coaching basketball, he took the school team to the state tournament—for the first time in the school’s history. This success resulted in a call from a friend who said to Marsh, “Whatever you are making, I’ll add a thousand to it if you will coach basketball at my school.” Martha’s response was, “If that is why they want you, they can get rid of you just as easily.” Marsh stayed where he was (Marsh, pers. comm.). Throughout his career, Marsh remained a strong believer in the power of sports to enhance education. Nonetheless, he noted that when the focus was shifted to winning, when schools, as he put it, “get football crazy,” then they tend to stop helping students use sports to learn who they are (Marsh, pers. comm.). And, as a result, sports cease to have the educational value they should have. When he began as a teacher, Marsh conceived of the role of the teacher as one who “knows something” and passes that knowledge on to the stu-

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dents (Marsh, pers. comm.). But the more he got involved in teaching, the more he began to realize how important it was also to find ways by which effectively to communicate with students. His wife, Martha, helped him to devise new approaches to teaching and to embrace teaching as a profession. As a beginning teacher, he was assigned to the students who were tracked as non-college bound. Wanting to reach out to these students, he tried some experiments. For a class in American History, for example, he created a series of pictures which he projected on a screen at the front of the room. He then asked the students to help him tell the story behind the pictures. The idea was to bring the students to history through the pictures rather than through an overemphasis on the textbook. Students who had been classed as “non-readers” came to him at the end of class and told him, “You know, Mr. Marsh, history ain’t really so bad” (Marsh, pers. comm.). In 1944, Marsh was offered a position at Hanover (New Hampshire) Junior-Senior High School. He spent twelve years there, years which he described as “happy and productive.” He served a term as president of the New Hampshire Social Studies Association; he also participated in the state Guidance Association and helped to develop a guidance program for his school. In 1949, Marsh received his M.Ed. from the University of New Hampshire. He majored in Secondary Education with a minor in Educational Administration. In the same year he was initiated into Kappa Delta Pi. One of the highlights of Marsh’s early career was the year (1953-54) that he spent as a Ford Foundation Fellow. The opportunity that the fellowship presented to him not only offered a chance for him to learn, but it deepened and broadened his perspective on education and legislation. His proposal involved a detailed study of the legislative process, but he also took the opportunity that the Fellowship offered to enroll in graduate courses at George Washington University in order to provide more structure for the experience. With other Ford Fellows, he had personal interviews with several senators and cabinet members, met President Eisenhower, attended numerous Senate and House sessions and committee hearings, and visited federal agencies like the Mint and the War College. Washington that year was not without its drama including the national drama of Senator Joseph McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities hearings. Perhaps most dramatic for Marsh was that on March 1, 1954, he was present in the House gallery when four individuals unfurled a Puerto Rican flag and began shooting at the representatives engaged in debate on the floor below. Several congressmen were wounded, but, surprisingly, no fatalities resulted from the incident (Omang 1979). When Marsh returned from the year of his Fellowship, he developed a slideshow presentation using a diary he had kept during the year and the

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numerous photographs he had taken. He used this presentation to share his experience with other teachers and educators. As Marsh put it, “The slideshow forced me to rethink what this experience had done for me. No matter how exciting our ideas, we have to relate to other people—other people who have other ideas. It was a really transforming experience”(Marsh, pers. comm.). The experience as a Ford Foundation Fellow led Marsh to think in larger terms about his career. He sought help from his wife, Martha, and together they planned out a new career path in higher education, one that might Marsh felt better suit him than school administration. “I owe more to Martha than any single person in my life,” Marsh admitted. “She gave up a secure job to help me move forward in my own teaching career, a career in which I, frankly, regarded myself as something of an unknown quantity. But she believed in me” (Marsh, pers. comm.). Marsh had met Dr. Lester S. Vander Werf, the Dean of a new College of Education at Northeastern University. Vander Werf invited Marsh to join the faculty of the new college. Marsh saw this as an opportunity to “be able to help more students, and to prepare the teachers who would, in turn, prepare other teachers.” But he also knew a doctoral degree would be a necessary step if his new career was to have any chance of success. In 1956, the Marshes moved to Boston, in order that Marsh could pursue his doctoral degree at Boston University. Martha taught in Newton, Massachusetts, at one of the finest secondary schools in the state. The couple struggled through the next few years on Martha’s income. Fortunately, the new career for Marsh proved a successful one and soon after resulted in a second joint career choice that would parallel the first. The couple jointly decided to focus on KDP and mutually work toward supporting the organization with its important educational goals. Martha continued her teaching career until Marsh became Dean of Education at Northeastern. At that point, she decided to step away from her personal teaching career and focus instead on supporting Marsh in his career.

NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY Marsh’s new home, Northeastern University, was, at the time he joined it, in the midst of significant growth. The institution had its origins in 1898, when the Boston YMCA, through its “Evening Institute for Young Men,” began an Evening Law School. Students at the school came out of the world of nine-to-five workers, young men and women who wanted to get ahead, to move beyond their current jobs, to take part in the hopeful promises of turn-of-the-century America. Focusing on this population amounted to an experiment in education. The experiment proved

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extremely important in the history of American higher education. Northeastern University had sheered course from the tree-lined campuses with national fraternities and sophisticated programs copied from the European exemplars of higher education and focused, instead, on programs for the working population. Northeastern was not alone in this effort to break the mould and reach out to a different audience by addressing the community’s growing needs for job-holders educated in law, commerce, finance, engineering, and even automotive maintenance. This new approach to higher education meant reaching out to adults in the workplace and to students who could not afford higher education if they were not able to work and learn at the same time. It was one of many grand experiments in American education, but this would prove to be very successful, one that would change the face of education in America—a change whose effects are still being felt today (Frederick 1982). A major part of Northeastern’s experiment consisted of dividing its program into two parts. Evening courses were offered to those who were already fully engaged in the work world, individuals who could not adjust their work schedule to the offerings of an educational institution; the institution had to adjust to them and provide classes in the evenings when they were free from work responsibilities. Day courses were offered on a different plan. For day courses, a cooperative work program was adopted. The cooperative work program was first pioneered in 1906 at the Engineering School of the University of Cincinnati; Northeastern introduced its own cooperative work program in 1909. The cooperative work program allowed the student to earn wages as an intern for a short period, 13 weeks in the case of Northeastern, and then spend the next thirteen weeks in a purely educational mode, building on and deepening what the student had learned as an intern “on the job.” Marsh joined Northeastern in 1956 as an Assistant Professor in the College of Education while continuing to pursue his doctoral degree at Boston University. In 1958 he took on the role of Education Placement Director. The following year he completed his EdD degree and was named an Associate Professor at Northeastern. In 1964 he advanced to full professor status. Along with his administrative duties, Marsh taught courses such as Human Development and Growth (for which he prepared by taking additional course work at Harvard), Methods and Materials, and History of Educational thought. In the early years of the doctoral program he taught a course in Educational Leadership. Later, as Dean, he continued to teach simply “because I love to teach” (Marsh, pers. comm.). When Marsh joined Northeastern he found himself intimately involved in the university’s cooperative program. As Marsh put it, “I became something of an expert on how you administer a coop program; I even went

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out and talked to other schools who were considering the move. For example, most schools did not understand that in a cooperative program, you have to do everything twice—once for the group that is currently on campus and then again for the other half of the class when they return from their internships” (Marsh, pers. comm.). Cooperative programs, as Marsh soon realized, require a certain kind of faculty, with their own particular strengths and a willingness to work under the unusual conditions that a coop program creates. Fortunately for Marsh the coop approach suited the style of confident, individualized education that he had been working toward in his earlier educational experience. He enjoyed the interaction with individual students who through internship work and classroom experience were coming to know themselves. “I remember one student coming to me at the end of a 13 week internship,” recalls Marsh, “and telling me, I don’t want to be a speech therapist because you only get to work with one student at a time, and I like working with more students than that. That’s a realization about yourself that you cannot get in the classroom”(Marsh, pers. comm.). In 1966, Dr Vander Werf decided to step down as the Dean and Marsh was appointed Acting Dean; one year later he was named full Dean of the College of Education. Dr. Lester S. Vander Werf came to Northeastern University in 1954, when Northeastern was in the midst of rapid post-war growth. He developed a long term plan for the college in the early 60s that was scheduled to be completed in the middle of that decade. The long range plan included establishment of an Educational Research Center, development of graduate programs in new fields (guidance, special education, and instructional leadership), extension of the internship program, and professional accreditation for the college. In the next five years, the College grew and progressed toward meeting these visionary goals, but Vander Werf ’s replacement would still have a lot of work to do to fully meet these goals. Fortunately, Dr. Vander Werf had an able successor in Dr. Frank Marsh. Like Vander Werf, Marsh saw the value of a solid grounding in social sciences and the humanities. He also placed a high value on the cooperative program and felt that it should be central to both undergraduate and graduate education. Perhaps, most importantly for a smooth transition, Marsh understood and supported the vision of Vander Werf ’s long range plan and was committed to achieving his predecessor’s goals. Undeniably, the highpoint of Marsh’s tenure as Dean of the College of Education was accreditation from the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education in 1967. The College of Education had come a long way from its founding roughly a dozen years earlier in 1954. The College continued to grow under Marsh’s direction. 1970 saw 55 full-time faculty, 1,300 undergraduate students, and 1,001 graduate stu-

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dents. And Marsh achieved another high water mark for the college in 1974 with the addition of a Doctor of Education degree. This degree was designed as a program for educational leaders who were in mid-career; five years in a leadership role were needed for admission to the program. The program emphasized the interdisciplinary nature of educational leadership and the dissertation required applied research into specific problems. While the college continued to grow in the 1970s, enrollment from the post-war baby boom generation dwindled, and the college would have to seek other sources of growth and a new audience for its offerings. Marsh wrote cogently on this phenomenon in 1975: [Teacher Education] no longer deals solely with training the young in communication skills. A more fitting definition is that teacher education includes all studies and experiences that are necessary to prepare a person to teach, to organize learning experiences, to administer educational institutions, or to provide supportive services for the learning process at all levels. (Marsh 1977)

But the College of Education was not Marsh’s only concern in the early 1970s. When Federal Judge W. Arthur Garrity asked for assistance from local educational institutions in his efforts to desegregate Boston schools, Northeastern University President Asa Knowles asked Marsh to represent Northeastern. Marsh recalls the task was an onerous one due to the tensions and outright hostility that ensued. “We did a lot of bussing, but we never came anywhere near solving the real problems—very unfortunate” (Marsh, pers. comm.). Nonetheless, Marsh saw this as a learning experience and came away with a deeper understanding of the difficulties involved in social change. The one high point for Marsh was participation in a committee that planned a new music magnet school; Marsh happily recalled that Arthur Fiedler, conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra, was also a member of the committee. In 1984, Marsh stepped down from the Dean’s chair, but continued to teach until 1986 when he moved to Hoover, Alabama (a suburb of Birmingham) to be with his new wife, Dr. Virginia Horns Marsh.

KAPPA DELTA PI Marsh was initiated into Kappa Delta Pi in 1949 by the Beta Beta Chapter at the University of New Hampshire. At Northeastern University, Marsh was asked by Dean Vander Werf to recommend a suitable honor society for the growing college. “I chose KDP for several reasons,” Marsh explained. “It admitted both men and women. It admitted both graduate and undergraduates. And I was already a member” (Marsh, pers.comm.).

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In 1964, Marsh became the founding Counselor for the Kappa Zeta Chapter KDP at Northeastern University. From 1968 to 1972, he served on the Society’s President’s Advisory Committee. He and his wife, Martha, co-hosted the 1970 Convocation in Boston. In 1970, with the accreditation of the College of Education behind him, but the introduction of a Doctorate of Education yet to be added to its offerings, Marsh was elected President of Kappa Delta Pi. This election was the first to be held under a new set of guidelines that had been developed under the leadership of Dr. Gerald Read (president from 1964-66) and which were adopted at the 1968 Convocation. Marsh described the situation in the following words: Our Society was fifty-three years old. Therefore the average term of service was more than five years. … A look at the record suggests that the presidency had been passed along by a sort of seniority process among members of the Executive Council. This led some to the conclusion that it was a closed process. (Marsh, pers. comm.)

The new constitution and bylaws authorized a nominating committee and contested elections. Elections would take place at the Convocation. The new president would serve for two years, but would precede this with a two year period as president-elect and follow it with a two year period as past-president. The changes to the nominating process enabled stump speeches to be delivered during the 1970 Convocation. Marsh clearly had a talented for expressing his views with clarity and force as the following excerpt from his speech on February 28, 1970, demonstrates: I have come to understand that Kappa Delta Pi is many, many things. It is undergraduate students, it is graduate students, counselors, and many, many other people who because of their duties are not able to participate actively, but do read our wonderful publications. … The values of this Society are magnificent. But any value that is looked upon as something splendid becomes untouchable. It is the question of leadership in this Society which causes new meaning and new relevance to move into dedication and those values have been passed down here. (Convocation Council Minutes, February 28, 1970)

Two particularly notable elements of this speech characterized Marsh’s coming presidency: the emphasis on the constituency of KDP (in particular, its student members) and the need for a change that held on to older values while gradually changing a somewhat conservative organization with values so “splendid” they had, perhaps, become almost “untouchable.” During his term of office, Marsh pushed the Commission on Reform and Renewal to publish a manifesto for professional renewal and

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used six regional meetings as a means for getting more Kadelpians, and more students, involved in the Society. In the December, 1973, Kappa Delta Pi Record, Marsh attributed his own desire for reform to two great thinkers, Ralph Waldo Emerson and William Chandler Bagley. Emerson had long been one of his favorite thinkers. He paraphrased Emerson’s thoughts in a way that spoke directly to the needs of KDP (note the subtle quibble in the first sentence on “Society” which, in the context of Marsh’s argument, could mean society in general, or KDP in particular). Help to make your Society such that it will regard its schools as but a small part of its total and general educational responsibilities. Teach school in such a way that the pupil, after becoming an adult, will feel that his most noble deeds are but an expression of the spirit he inhaled in childhood. (Marsh 1973).

Dr. Bagley’s thoughts and writings, as one of the founders of KDP, could be used by those who wanted to avoid reform and renewal to suggest that no change was needed. Marsh, however, insisted that what Bagley had proposed was “no static doctrine.” In a subtle anecdote on the “overemphasis upon Progressivism,” he attempted to bridge the gap between Bagley’s followers and the Deweyan progressives. So who was right and who was wrong in this controversy? Does it really make a difference now? Can we not agree that there was much truth and reason in both sides of the controversy? … Let us readily admit that education is badly in need of a renewing spirit. I believe that both Ralph Waldo Emerson and William Chandler Bagley can be a source of inspiration for this regeneration. (Marsh, 1973)

In July 1970, as President-elect, Marsh visited the University of Illinois at Urbana to participate in a ceremony hosted by the Alpha chapter of KDP. During the ceremony Dr. Thomas Musselman was recognized as a founder of KDP along with Dr. William Chandler Bagley and Dr. Truman Lee Kelley. Musselman and Kelley had been graduate students of Dr. Bagley and had helped in the creation of the Illinois Education Club which would later become the Alpha Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. The recognition of Musselman had involved some controversy particularly from those who felt that Musselman’s involvement in the early founding of the Society resulted from the happenstance of his being one of Dr. Chandler’s graduate students at the time. Marsh set the controversy to the side and saw this moment in the history of KDP as an opportunity to learn more about the rich heritage of the Society.

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During Marsh’s tenure, editorial practice for The Educational Forum was changed significantly. Most importantly, the Executive Council adopted the recommendation of a working Editorial Board (Minutes for a Telephone Conference of the Executive Council, January 30, 1973). Membership in prior Editorial Boards had been largely honorary, but the new board would engage in reading submitted manuscripts and making editorial suggestions. The addition of a graduate student to the Editorial Board was clearly in keeping with Marsh’s desire for increased engagement with the student members of the Society. Marsh showed his unique leadership talents on this issue, in particular by championing the ideas and efforts of The Forum’s new editor, Dr. Jack R. Frymier of The Ohio State University. As future KDP President, Dr. O. L. Davis put it, “Marsh’s efforts made possible Frymier’s development of The Forum into a widelyrespected, strongly peer-reviewed scholarly journal. This achievement could not have happened had not Marsh used his considerable influence and had not Editor Frymier applied the pure, clear intellectual leadership he demonstrated throughout his tenure” (Davis, pers. comm.). Marsh’s involvement with KDP did not end with his presidency. Indeed, the KDP Educational Foundation would engage much of his efforts from 1988 on. However, Marsh had some initial concerns about the desirability of a foundation of the type that President Judd and President-Elect Davis had conceived. I can recall [Marsh pointed out] the spirited discussions that took place. Some expressed concern that this undertaking would cause a financial crisis. Others doubted that adequate funds could be raised. I would like to pay tribute to the national president at that time, Dr. Richard Judd of Epsilon Mu Chapter at Central Connecticut University, who championed the cause and successfully launched the venture. After a rather tortured start, the Foundation has prospered. Instead of being a drag upon our finances, it has enhanced them. (Marsh, pers. comm.)

Dr. Michael Wolfe, who later became the Society’s Executive Director and would serve as a director of the Foundation, believed that two factors affected the early operations of the Foundation. One was finance, the other was purpose. Many of the elected leaders of KDP were uncomfortable with fund raising, and they also were uncertain what the Education Foundation was supposed to do or how it was supposed to work. Separating the Foundation from the Society (they are actually chartered in two different states, Indiana and Illinois, respectively) and employing an Executive Director to focus attention on the Foundation helped some individuals to recognize the difference between the two. Marsh felt that “credit should be given to Dr. Jay Hofstetler and his successor Dr. Michael

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Wolfe,” both former Executive Directors of the Society, for developing the Educational Foundation during their tenures (Marsh, pers. comm.). Marsh was asked to participate in the Education Foundation Board when it was first starting up, but decided not to accept membership. By 1988, he agreed to join the Board “for just a short time, but I went to my first meeting and got elected chairman” (Marsh, pers. comm.), he said with a laugh. He would serve as chairman from 1990 to 2002. In 1995, Marsh and his wife Virginia Horns Marsh co-chaired the Convocation in Birmingham, Alabama. According to Dr. Wolfe, “Marsh and Virginia were two people who were always ready to say yes to an assignment. Not only was he chairperson of the Foundation, but he and Virginia were asked to become co-academic editors of KDP Record” (Wolfe, pers. comm.). What was to be a temporary assignment on KDP Record lasted for four years (1998-2002). Virginia and I worked on that together. We would set up articles and screen them, but the basic publication activities were done at Headquarters. Through the year we would set up themes; usually two to three issues had themes. We did one issue on multiculturalism and another on science – that sort of thing. We also wanted to provide a way for students to contribute. We saw that as part of nurturing leadership. (Marsh, pers. comm.)

Marsh met his second wife, Virginia, through KDP. She held a baccalaureate degree from Huntington College in Montgomery, Alabama. Her MEd and PhD were both granted by University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. Her focus was on Elementary Education and she worked as both a specialist in reading and psychometrics. Her academic career began as an instructor at The University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa before being asked to join the faculty of University of Alabama at Birmingham. She rose through the ranks to become professor, was appointed chairperson of Curriculum and Instruction, and served for many years as the University Marshall. Her initiation into KDP occurred during her studies at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. After moving to University of Alabama at Birmingham, she became the founding counselor of the Mu Mu chapter there in 1971. Marsh and Horns were married in 1986. They were married for nineteen years. In 2005, Dr. Virginia Horns-Marsh died of complications from asthma. She also developed an exciting summer program that served to enrich the lives of young children. Every summer she had 3-400 kids in each of two four week sessions. She ran that even after she retired. She was very active in her retirement years. She became the president of a hospital association that worked with families of individuals who were having surgery. I think I’m probably the luckiest guy in the world—I had two good wives. Her family is

142 M. D. DIETZ visiting me this week [December 2010]. Where I did not have any children I now have three grown children and grandchildren. This was just a beautiful relationship. (Marsh, pers. comm.)

CONCLUSION Marsh’s story is not complete without some mention of his life beyond the world of education. He enjoys gardening, reading and writing; he has even had a few poems published. Indeed, poetry, particularly that of the New England poets, is one of Marsh’s passions. He met the poet Robert Frost when Frost was teaching at Dartmouth. A group of us were invited to spend an evening with him around a roaring fireplace. He began, as was his custom with, “I shall say a few of my poems.” I recall vividly one of his comments. It affected my life. At the time I was considering my move from Hanover to Northeastern. I was secure and happy, but I felt the urge to move on to new challenges. Robert Frost commented, “Perhaps the greatest challenge we encounter is to move from what is secure to what is exciting and challenging.” (Marsh, pers. comm.)

He also has enjoyed his involvement with the church over the years. He was reared in the Congregational Church, but is currently a member of the Riverchase United Methodist Church in Hoover, Alabama. Marsh has even spent some time in the pulpit. Along with several other church members, I was sort of dragged in to assist a rural church that was having difficulties. The pastor was ill, so we took turns filling his pulpit. After overcoming my fright, I developed a deep respect for the task of preparing a weekly sermon. After that I was less critical of ministers. Gradually, this activity broadened, and we were asked to fill in for other pastors. I was even asked to substitute for the pastor of my boyhood church each summer during his vacation. All the same, I was pleased that I had not chosen the ministry as a profession. (Marsh, pers. comm.)

Marsh also had a passion for New England history and, of course, for the works of some of the great American educators. Along with Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Dewey is the great American educational thinker Marsh regards as of most importance to him and his career in education. I am deeply moved by the insights about life and learning offered by our first KDP laureate, John Dewey. I saw him speak once, a few years before he died. He was not a very effective speaker; he used big long rambling sentences, much the same way he wrote—but he made an impression on me. Because of my background, he represented for me one of the basic matters

Frank E. Marsh, Jr. (1970-1972) 143 that troubled me as a young teacher. Students came in to class so bored, but if you could use the power of their experiences, you could really engage them in the learning process. It was not the old pouring in process, but had more to do with assimilating your own experiences and getting to know yourself. Dewey did not write or speak clearly in terms that people could understand, and what has become of his philosophies is something that Dewey would not agree with. School is not always fun and easy. Taking significant learning out of the classroom and trying to make it fun and easy is not what Dewey was all about. (Marsh, pers. comm.)

Marsh chose to end his reflections on Kappa Delta Pi with a quotation he had used at the end of one of his articles for Kappa Delta Pi Record. Rather appropriately, the quotation comes from one of Marsh’s own teachers, Dr. W. Elmer Ekblaw, a Professor of Geography, whom Marsh called “a master teacher and much loved philosopher of the great outdoors.” The season for planting is at hand. New grounds are to be planted. Old vistas are to be framed in new forms. New avenues of green are set to grace new ways. New arbors are to be fashioned for shade and shelter and gracious living. Let us plant wittingly, wisely, and well—for posterity. (Marsh, 1973 and Marsh, Undated)

REFERENCES Frederick, Antionette. 1982. Northeastern University: An emerging giant: 1959-1975. Northeastern University Custom Book Program, Boston. Kappa Delta Pi. 1973. Minutes for a Telephone Conference of the Executive Council, January 30. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Marsh, Frank E. Jr. 1973. Renewal: A positive process. Kappa Delta Pi Record 9(2):33. Marsh, Frank E. Jr. 1977. Education Science and Teacher Training, in International Encyclopedia of Higher Education, Vol. 4, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass: 1363. Marsh, Frank E. Jr., N.d. Kappa Delta Pi reflections. Whitepaper prepared for Kappa Delta Pi. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Omang, Joanne. 1979. Puerto Rican terrorists retain nationalist zeal after 25 years in prison. The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.: Sep 11. A1 (2 pages).

CHAPTER 14

A. KEITH TURKETT (1974-1976) “Ideals Are Power” Stephanie van Hover, David Hicks, and John Baran

A. Keith Turkett 1974-1976 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 145–156 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Arlie Keith Turkett, a lifelong educator deeply committed to the ideals of the Kappa Delta Pi Society, served on the Executive Council for ten years (1968-1978) and on the KDP Foundation Board for fourteen years (19902004). His term as Society President (1974-1976) coincided with the bicentennial of the United States of America. Turkett viewed education as an honest and ethical profession, both craft and science. He saw KDP as way to communicate his beliefs to other educators and to the public at large. This chapter traces Turkett’s journey from Vernon, Texas, to Johnson City, Tennessee, and explores his experiences with and his contributions to KDP.

FROM TEXAS TO TENNESEE: A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY Arlie Keith Turkett was born October 12, 1930 in Vernon, Texas to Tom H. and Lillie R Turkett. Vernon, the county seat of Wilbarger County, is located in north central Texas, near the Oklahoma border. In the 1930s, the population of this rural farming community was estimated at 9,137. Tom and Lillie Turkett both came from large families and neither of them had graduated from high school. Yet, as Turkett recalls, both parents valued education and encouraged him and his younger brother, Tommy, to succeed. Turkett attended the West Vernon School, which consisted of a “little” building, a “big” building, and the gym. The smaller building held the first four grades; the larger building held grades 5-10. In 1944, Turkett was one of two students, total, in the 10th grade at West Vernon. The school closed and Turkett was transferred to Vernon High School. Turkett did well academically at Vernon High School, graduating in 1947. He was seated on stage at graduation, one of six students honored with a scholarship for his high Grade Point Average. Turkett became the first person in his family to attend college. He remembers that his father told him he had some decisions to make; he could work on the farm and make a living, or go to college. Turkett recalls thinking that, “I don’t know what college is, but I know what farm work is” (Turkett, pers. comm.). He opted to go to college, starting at Hardin Junior College (now Midwestern State University). After a year at Hardin, Turkett transferred to North Texas State College (now University of North Texas), located in Denton, TX. North Texas State College followed William Johnson’s description of “institutional mobility”: “the history of twentieth-century teacher training can be seen as a series of institutional displacements, with normal schools becoming state teachers colleges, then multipurpose liberal arts colleges, and now, in many instances regional state universities” (Johnson 1989, 243). In 1951, Turkett graduated with a Bachelor of Science (BS) degree in Secondary Education

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(emphases in Social Sciences, Business Administration and English). He decided to remain at North Texas in order to pursue a Master of Education (MEd) degree in public school administration with a minor in elementary education and a related program in Sociology. During his Master’s program Turkett became a teaching fellow and taught freshman education courses. He thoroughly enjoyed college-level teaching. After graduating with his MEd. degree in 1952, Turkett returned to Vernon and started teaching 5th and 6th grade at Central Elementary School. Soon after starting at Central, however, the superintendent of schools moved him to Parker Elementary School. Shortly after this transition, Turkett was drafted to serve in the U.S. military forces. He recalls that, “all my students came down to see me off on the bus” (Turkett, pers. comm.). Turkett served two years in the U.S. army (1952-1954) during the Korean War. He was stationed at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, where he was responsible for information, education, and military training of medical personnel. After his army service, Turkett returned to Vernon Public Schools for the 1954-1955 school year. Turkett’s superintendent suggested that he should consider returning to school to for a doctorate. He subsequently decided to return to North Texas, with a full scholarship, to pursue a Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) in Public School Administrative Leadership with minors in Elementary Education and Sociology. While pursuing his EdD at North Texas, Turkett accepted a position as assistant professor of education of Sam Houston State College (now Sam Houston State University) in Huntsville, TX. While at Sam Houston, Turkett conducted his dissertation research. His dissertation, entitled “Effectiveness of the Undergraduate Curriculum in Teacher Education in Developing Desired Teacher Competencies” used surveys, interviews, and analysis of course content to identify and evaluate the skills, knowledge, generalizations, and understandings required by elementary teachers in order to teach effectively. He asked instructors and students in the Sam Houston teacher education program to identify teaching competencies and investigated which courses at the university were successfully addressing the desired competencies. Turkett defended his dissertation in 1959 and graduated from North Texas with an EdD degree. He remained at Sam Houston State from 1957-1962, at which he was promoted from Assistant to Associate professor. During this time period, on November 25, 1959, Turkett married Shirley Sue Miller. They had attended the same church in Vernon, TX. They adopted two children, Angela and Clayton. In 1962 Turkett accepted a position of Associate Dean of Education/Professor of Elementary Education at Texas Christian University (TCU), located in Fort Worth, TX. In 1966, he also began working with the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL). SEDL was established that year as one of 20

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regional educational laboratories created by Title IV of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. The laboratories were part of a comprehensive strategy to improve education and educational opportunity for all students through development and dissemination of researchbased solutions to the most urgent educational problems. SEDL included 29 Texas counties in and around Dallas and Fort Worth. He enjoyed the opportunity to travel in Texas forming collaborative relationships—he found the work incredibly rewarding. Turkett stayed at TCU for six years (1962-1968) before accepting a position at West Texas State University (now West Texas A&M University). In the 1960s West Texas State University (WTSU) was experiencing a transformation from a regional teachers college to a state university. At WTSU, Turkett served as Associate Dean of Education and Head of the Elementary Education Department, as well as continuing his consultation with SEDL. Turkett remained at WTSU from 1968-1971. He applied for (and subsequently accepted) a position at East Tennessee State University (ETSU). In 1971, Turkett moved with his family to Johnson City, TN. At ETSU, Turkett served as Chairman of the Education Department and as a Professor of Elementary Education. In 1978, the new President reorganized the College of Education and Turkett became Chairman of the newly named Department of Curriculum & Instruction. He also served on the Faculty Senate, becoming Chairman of the Senate from 1975-1976. Throughout his time at ETSU, Turkett taught a heavy course load, at least15 hours a semester, and supervised student teachers (both elementary and secondary). He enjoyed the teaching and supervision--he worked with many preservice and in-service elementary and secondary teachers. In his work as a teacher educator, Turkett’s philosophy reflected the long-standing tension “between the what (subject-matter to be taught) and the how (methodology/methods/activities for learning effectively).” He believed that both of these components are “equally important to the teaching-learning process and the expected product of changed behavior” (Turkett, pers. comm.). Turkett reflected that, “effective teaching/learning cannot be ‘know and show’ (teacher) with the learner expected to ‘sit and get’ ” (Turkett, pers. comm.). He described teaching his teacher education students through learning centers and hands-on activities that taught them how to write performance-based objectives, assess student learning, and write effective lesson plans. He wanted his students to “actively involve the learner in the ‘process’ of learning as well as care about the ‘product’ of learning” (Turkett, pers. comm.). Turkett’s teaching and supervision schedule left limited time for research. While Turkett published articles throughout his career, they reflected his interest in practical aspects of teaching and were published

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in local journals or newsletters.1 Turkett enjoyed his work as a teacher, supervisor and appreciated the “wonderful, hard-working faculty” at ETSU where he remained until his retirement in the summer of 1996 (Turkett, pers. comm.). He and his wife Shirley continue to live in Johnson City, TN and are active in their local community.

TURKETT AND KAPPA DELTA PI Turkett was initiated into Kappa Delta Pi by North Texas’s Alpha Iota chapter. After joining the faculty at Sam Houston State College, he became involved with its Delta Theta Chapter. Turkett attended his first KDP Convocation in Chicago, in 1960. Turkett “liked what Kappa Delta Pi stood for,” that it “reflected our country, our society” (Turkett, pers. comm.). He appreciated the mission, purpose, and message of Kappa Delta Pi and became increasingly involved in the organization. While at TCU, Turkett collaborated with a colleague, Dr. Jeff Horn, to develop a local chapter (Kappa Upsilon). Horn nominated Turkett for the position of Vice-President for Chapter Development. Turkett was elected in 1968. Turkett joined the national leadership of Kappa Delta Pi during a turbulent time in the United States, a time of momentous social and political events. The late sixties and the seventies saw the escalation of the Vietnam conflict, widespread student demonstrations at universities, “Nixon in China,” the Watergate break-in, the fall of Richard Nixon, the “women’s movement,” rising inflation, increased drug use, rising divorce rates, and more (Phillips 2000). The eighth annual Gallup poll of the public’s attitudes toward public schools identified the major problems confronting public schools in 1976 as: lack of discipline; integration/segregation/busing; lack of proper financial support; poor curriculum; use of drugs; difficulty of getting ‘good’ teachers; parents’ lack of interest; size of school/classes; school board policies; pupils’ lack of interests (Gallup 1976). Within this context, Turkett served as KDP’s Vice-President for Chapter Development. He was responsible (duringduring two terms in this office) for overseeing the development of 43 new KDP chapters. Turkett loved this position, noting that “he had an opportunity to offer the 43 chapters I worked with a chance to recognize quality in students. Teachers work so hard [and] fail to get recognition for their efforts” (Turkett, pers. comm.). Turkett also enjoyed the organizational aspect of the position. He compiled detailed notebooks, filled with material from each college or university, as well as site reports. He distributed these dossiers to members of the Executive Council. As a group, members discussed whether or not to recommend that a chapter be installed at a particular institution. Turkett

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was re-elected to this position in 1970. He served as Vice-President for Chapter Development from 1968-1972 (Turkett 1972). In 1971, while Turkett served as Vice-President for Chapter Development, the Kappa Delta Pi Record published his address at the 25th anniversary celebration of Zeta Gamma Chapter, Troy State University (Troy, Alabama). The address explored a topic that remains pertinent today, in 2011, and clearly reflected the context of the times and also encapsulated Turkett’s belief in the power and potential of the ideals of KDP. He observed, “American education today is involved in the most sustained challenge it has ever confronted,” that “the ‘hottest issue’ of the day is defined in one word—accountability” and “efforts are being designed to test the effectiveness of the educational system” (Turkett, pers. comm.). Turkett warned that this focus could shift the educational system’s way of thinking about the nature of teaching in fundamental ways. He also noted that teacher preparation programs were “under attack” and that there remained a wide gulf between the ‘subject-matter-what-professors and the method-matter-how-professors’ ” (Turkett, pers. comm.). He asked the audience to consider how the ideals of KDP (Fidelity to Humanity, Science, Service, and Toil) could offer a “standard of accountability equal to the current attack on teaching” through their emphasis on improving human nature, engaging in free inquiry, contributing to society, and hard work (Turkett, pers. comm.). In 1972, Turkett was elected President-Elect of the Society. He remembers his campaign promise—that “he’d provide a Tennessee ham biscuit to anyone who voted for him” (Turkett, pers. comm.). He served as President-Elect from 1972-1974. In this position, Turkett co-chaired the Convocation Planning Committee for the 1974 Convocation held at the new Marriott Hotel in New Orleans. At this Convocation, in addition to general sessions, student forums, and discipline breakfasts, Dr. Theodore Brameld “well known in the educational world for his philosophy of reconstructionalism” (McElheny 1972) presented the biennial lecture. And, in addition to his work on the Convocation planning committee, Turkett worked with the KDP headquarter staff to identify and make contact with eight chapters that had become delinquent. He also attended two of the six Regional Conferences, as well as the Editorial Board meeting of the Educational Forum (Turkett 1974). Turkett became KDP President in 1974. That fall, in the Kappa Delta Pi Record, Turkett identified the major tasks “which the Council hopes to achieve during the biennium”: “to guide a great Society toward even greater recognition as cooperatively we expand our quest to achieve knowledge, duty, power; to stimulate within each member, each local chapter, each regional conference, and the national Convocation renewed purpose for excellence in education; to encourage expansion of the Soci-

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ety within campus and alumni groups in order to provide recognition of outstanding teacher educators; to conserve and preserve the fiscal resources of the Society; to continue to expand the time honored ideals of the Society—Fidelity to Humanity, Science, Service, and Toil.”2 That same issue also reported a major honor awarded to Turkett—on April 18th, Tennessee Governor Winfield Dunn presented him with an “Outstanding Tennessean Award” to celebrate his election to the Kappa Delta Pi national Presidency. During Turkett’s presidency, membership in the organization maintained a steady pace. Twelve new chapters were added to the Society, and KDP remained in good financial standing. Available meeting minutes3 indicate that some issues dealt with by the Executive Council included disagreement over KDP’s approach to chapter development and preparing for the planned retirement of J. Richard McElheny, then Executive Secretary of KDP. The Council held a “Special Meeting to Clarify Chapter Development Procedures” on March 21, 1975 in Dallas, Texas. The purpose of the meeting was to address confusion that had emerged within the Council regarding procedures and policies in regard to Chapter Development. Turkett suggested the Council put policies in writing to prevent future misunderstandings, that certain responsibilities and procedures could be streamlined, and that the National Office could potentially assume some of the clerical duties of Chapter Development. It was also stated that certain Council members felt they were not receiving sufficient information about institutions being considered for chapters. The minutes from the Dallas meeting note that O.L. Davis, Jr., then Vice-President for Chapter Development, stated that things were proceeding smoothly and that some institutions applying for charters were clearly not qualified. He raised the question of the nature of institutions the Society wishes to encourage to develop chapters by asking, “do we seek or be sought after? Or do we develop a combination to be available to good, qualified schools?” McElheny responded that it had been the policy of the Society to never seek anyone. After extensive discussion, the minutes state that “it was agreed that it is the consensus of the Executive Council that the basic philosophy of chapter development in the Society is the Society should be sought after by interested groups; however, provision is made for the development of formal and informal seeking plans. Formal seeking should have prior Executive Council approval, and informal, should be reviewed periodically by the Council.” Turkett recalled that the Council “didn’t want to get away from the fact that KDP was an elite society that recognized [certain criteria]. In the field of education, with professional degrees, we had criteria we wanted to maintain” (Turkett, pers. comm.). And, in a report published in the October 1976 Kappa Delta Pi Record, the President’s Advisory Committee recommended revision of the criteria for

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membership “in order to strengthen the standards for membership and to enable the chapters to meet honestly all membership requirements.” The phased retirement of McElheny was another issue with which the Executive Council dealt in the 1970s. The February 1975 Kappa Delta Pi Record included an announcement, “Retirement Date Set,” stating that “after sixteen years of effective service, Dr. J. Richard McElheny will retire as Executive Secretary of KDP on May 31, 1978. The Executive council is actively seeking a replacement. It is hoped that a decision can be made by the close of the 1974-1976 biennium….” Turkett recalls that, “McElheny was ready to retire; he had accomplished everything he could and had had a wonderful tenure but due to his age and [his wife’s] illness, he decided to step down” (Turkett, pers. comm.). In an Executive Council meeting on Friday, May 20, 1975, the minutes state that: “it was also recommended that Dr. [Jay J.] Hostetler be informed that, in light of the deliberation of the Selection Committee and interview with the one candidate who applied for the position, he be given the nod for the position of Executive Secretary with the following projected procedure: Advance this year to Associate Executive Secretary (1975-1978), in 1978, advance to Executive Secretary. Dr. McElheny will ‘move into increased activity to generate alumni chapters” and Hostetler will move into the role of Executive Secretary.” Thus, as President, Turkett oversaw the beginning of the transition to new Headquarters leadership at KDP. At the 1976 Convocation, Turkett announced Jay Hostetler’s elevation to the post of Executive Secretary effective June 1, 1978. The 1976 Biennial Convocation was held March 16-21 in Orlando, Florida. The theme, “American Education—1776-1976” celebrated the bicentennial of the United States. Turkett recalled that, “the main thing in the Convocation we emphasized, the underlying theme was the 200 years of our nation and that education, going back [to the time of the founding fathers] was very important.” He added that as part of celebrating the bicentennial, “we were trying to emphasize multicultural education and including participants and presenters from all backgrounds, particularly in the student forums” (Turkett, pers. comm.). Turkett described the celebration of the bicentennial of the United States at the biennial Convocation as a highlight of his presidency In the Convocation Program, Turkett’s “Greetings from your Executive Council” welcomed Kadelpians to the conference and reiterated the bicentennial theme—that “[the Executive Council] are very mindful of the national importance of this bicentennial anniversary of our nation’s birth” and “sincerely hopes you will quickly catch the ‘red, white, and blue’ bicentennial spirit and combine with it the characteristic climate which pervades all meetings of Society members.” The program included general sessions, student forums, discipline breakfasts. Speakers included

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members of the Society, officers from the Executive Council, and national authorities in early childhood, biochemistry, curriculum, leadership, and guidance/administration. Turkett recalls that the planning committee sought, through the student forums and guest speakers, to emphasize multicultural education and issues of diversity. The program also included a social side, including an opening luau and reception and guided excursions to Disney World, Cape Kennedy, and Marine World. The guest speaker for the closing banquet was Dean Rusk, former United States Secretary of State (1961-1969), then Dean of the School of Law at the University of Georgia. At the President’s Breakfast, Turkett gave his address, entitled “Ideals are Power.” Turkett recalls that his words were influenced by the context of the time: we were in the afterthrows of integration. [Kappa Delta Pi] had become a group that was recognized for getting doors open for minorities, for putting forth the idea that we should not be blinded by prejudice. I tried the best I could during my presidency to open the eyes of the people [about these issues]. In my Convocation speech, the power of ideals, I took the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution, the mission of KDP, and the words of William Chandler Bagley to point out that ideals are power. The basic theme [of my speech] was that the country is 200 years old, the future is unlimited, and ideals are important. (Turkett, pers. comm.)

Also published as an article in the October 1976 Kappa Delta Pi Record, Turkett’s speech used key ideas from the founding documents of the United States and from the statement of purpose of the KDP Society to make the case that: as an educator we will, we must, believe in the worth and dignity of all persons. We must recognize the supreme importance of the pursuit of truth, devotion to excellence, and the nurture of democratic citizenship. We regard as essential to these goals the protection of freedom to learn and to teach, and the guarantee of equal educational opportunity for all. (Turkett 1976)

This address reflected Turkett’s commitment to diversity and equity, his belief in the importance (and potential) of education and the “craft and science of teaching”, and his patriotic spirit. Turkett’s “Report of the President,”4 sought to recognize people all over the country who had done something special through their service to Kappa Delta Pi. He recalled, “I wanted members to realize that we complemented each other while being individuals—the staff was important, the regional [meetings] were important, the membership was important. I broke into [distinct] paragraphs to emphasize [that message]” (Turkett,

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pers. comm.). In this report, he noted that membership had maintained a steady pace with the addition of twelve new chapters. He thanked the hard work of the Executive Council members, the National Office, the editors of KDP publications, and Society members. He again highlighted the core mission of KDP by recognizing members for their diligence in performing the “countless chores necessary to maintain [KDP’s] image of knowledge, duty, and power” and reiterated the focus on celebrating the bicentennial of the United States. After stepping down from the role of President, Turkett served as Advisory Counselor from 1976-1978. In April 1978, in his “Report of the Advisory Counselor” he offered suggestions and recommendations for the development and improvement of the Society. These included: designing a national office position of “Budget, Finance, and Investments Director”; conducting an in-depth, comprehensive study of the role and function of the Executive Council be made in order to achieve a more representative and responsible body; evaluate the purpose and mission of Kappa Delta Pi Record; eliminate ineffective use of resources (both fiscal and human) and maintain continuity of programs and projects; increase attention to the individual members of the Society. Although he left Society office in 1978, Turkett’s international service to KDP continued. He was elected to the Board of the KDP Educational Foundation in 1990. The Educational Foundation, founded in 1980, was created to “support the shared mission of the society through fundraising, scholarship and programs.” Turkett was on the Board from 1990-2004; he served as Vice-Chair from 1994-2002 and as Chair from 2002-2004. As Chair, he decided to set a new precedent—serving one, two-year term. He reflected that, “when you have new board members, they come in and have new ideas” (Turkett, pers. comm.). When asked about the significance of the Foundation, Turkett returned to the core ideals of the Society—that “the Foundation is a prime example of seeing the ideals of the society in action: belief in humanity, science, service, and toil. Seeing the Foundation funds continue to grow and be shared with young and aspiring persons in the various fields of educational endeavors is truly wonderful” (Kappa Delta Pi Foundation Anniversary Booklet). During his time of service to KDP at the national level, Turkett was also actively involved in his local ETSU Kappa Delta Pi Chapter (Zeta Iota). The Zeta Iota Chapter has won a number of Achieving Chapter Excellence (ACE) awards as well as an “ACE of ACE” awards. When asked to reflect on his time serving Kappa Delta Pi, Turkett stated: What I remember about Kappa Delta Pi? The wonderful people I had the opportunity to rub shoulders with. I’ve had a marvelous experience with the

A. Keith Turkett (1974-1976) 155 “greats” in education. Teaching and teachers are so extremely important…I enjoyed being [KDP] president. I felt I had the opportunity to do some things. My father had a 6th grade education, my mother left school in 10th grade. I was the first one to go to college on either side of my family. Yet my parents both felt the value of education and imposed it on me, [and KDP speaks] to these values. (Turkett, pers. comm.)

As this quotation indicates, Turkett clearly embraced the central mission of KDP. In speeches, reports and interviews, he constantly and consistently returns to the “basic tenets on which [KDP] was founded”: “believe and trust in your fellowperson; have faith in their improvability; search for truth through relentless and free inquiry. If you would be great you must serve. This is the spirit and essence of education. Finally, toil … work hard and success in a job well done will be your reward” (Turkett 1978).

NOTES 1.

2.

3.

4.

Turkett’s articles include reports and addresses published in Kappa Delta Pi Record. Other publications included, for example: A.K. Turkett, “You, the Cooperating Teacher,” The Texas Outlook 49 (July 1965): 18-19; Keith Turkett and Jimmy V. Purser, “Is Grouping for Mathematics Instruction Practicable in Departmentalized Mathematics Classes?” The Arithmetic Teacher 19 (January, 1972): 61-64 October 1974 Kappa Delta Pi Record. In this piece, Turkett also introduced the Executive Council: Clementine Skinner (President-Elect); O.L. Davis, Jr. (Vice President for Chapter Development); Richard Judd (Vice President for Chapter Activities); James Chambers (Alumni Counselor); Rosemary Park (Laureate Counselor); Jeannie Johnson (Student Counselor); Frank Marsh (Advisory Counselor). Available meeting minutes included: March 21, 1975 (Dallas, TX.); March 16, 1976 (Orlando, FL.); May 30, 1975 (Orlando, FL.); May 31, 1975 (Orlando, FL.) Published in the 1976 April Kappa Delta Pi Record and in the Convocation program

REFERENCES Gallup, George. 1976. Eighth annual gallup poll of the public’s attitudes toward the public schools. Phi Delta Kappan 58(1): 187-200. Johnson, William. 1989. Teachers and teacher training in the Twentieth century. In American Teachers: Histories of a Profession at Work, ed. D. Warren, 243. New York: MacMillan. Quoted by Larabee, David. 2004 The trouble with ed schools, CT: Yale University Press, 29.

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Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation 25th anniversary booklet. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). McElheny, J. Robert. 1972. Dear Kadelpians. Kappa Delta Pi Record 9 (2): 60-61. Phillips, D.C. 2000. Interpreting the seventies, or Rashomon meets educational theory. Educational Theory 50 (3): 321-338. Turkett, A. Keith. 1972. Report of the vice-president for chapter Development. Kappa Delta Pi Record 8(3):121 Turkett, A. Keith. 1974. Report of the president-elect. Kappa Delta Pi Record 10(4): 123-124. Turkett, A. Keith. 1976. Report of the president. Kappa Delta Pi Record 12(4): 109. Turkett, A. Keith. 1976. Ideals are power. Kappa Delta Pi Record 13(1): 20-21. Turkett, A. Keith. 1978. Report of the advisory counselor. Kappa Delta Pi Record 14(1).

CHAPTER 15

CLEMENTINE SKINNER (1976-1978) Educator, Historian, and Activist Cynthia Hansberry Williams

Clementine A. Skinner 1976-1978 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 157–171 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Clementine Anna Deborah McConico Skinner was born amidst a very turbulent era in our nation’s history. Still nursing the wounds from an exhaustive World War I, the United States of America, built on ideals of freedom, equality, and liberty, grappled with the evolution of this identity as a result of the internal turmoil that continued to plague its citizens. Parallel identities—the “immense prosperity of the Roaring and indulgent Twenties” (Soria 1999) amidst the widespread chaos of racial riots, lynchings, and the denial of Civil Rights—set the climate for the arrival of an educator, historian, and community activist who, through acts of literacy, would evolve into one of our nation’s most productive and respected leaders. Given the nation’s turmoil, it was no surprise that Skinner was introduced to issues of social injustice and inequality at an early age. She was born in Birmingham, Alabama, on February 9, 1916, to John Frederick Anthony McConico and Alice Burnett McConico, but raised in Chicago as a result of her family’s relocation during the Great Northern Migration. The McConico’s move to the large, industrial, northern city was an attempt to escape the controversy surrounding her father’s Civil Rights agenda while residing in Birmingham. Owner of McConico’s Book and Magazine Store, Mr. McConico was also active in various Civil Rights organizations, queried the NAACP for information to start a local branch, was arrested and later exonerated for selling The Defender. “In many places in the south, it was illegal to sell The Defender, and people sold or distributed the Defender at their own peril” (Franklin 2006). Life in Chicago during the early 1920s would present tremendous financial challenges for families that struggled to navigate the perils of the Great Depression. Despite the hardships, however, the McConico family managed to survive and, after residing in various parts of the city, reestablished the McConico’s Book and Magazine store at a South State Street location at which they housed, “rare books, back number periodicals, and books by and about Negroes” (Skinner 1995). Producing it’s own magazine, the McConico’s Monthly Magazine (Franklin 2006), the family bookstore operated in an area of the community that became “lucrative and vibrant” for prominent Blacks even during the depression (Franklin 2006). In addition to serving the literary needs of the community for more than forty years, the bookstore also catered to prominent clients such as Arthur Schomberg. Skinner noted that her father sold “many books” to Schomberg whose collection is now housed in the famed Harlem Branch of the public library in New York City (Skinner 1995). Skinner’s father was instrumental in shaping her philosophy toward literacy. He showed her through his life and attention to issues of Civil Rights that literacy was one way to deal with issues of inequality, a way to transform others, and to impart change. As a result, Skinner’s early life growing up in

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a culture consumed with literacy and literature by and about African Americans would have a tremendous impact on her, providing a foundation that would establish a theme for her life’s work as an educator and historian who promoted African American cultural awareness. Growing up in a household that held literacy and literature in high esteem, one could only imagine the critical role of education established in the McConico home. Skinner’s college-educated father, John McConico, attended Selma College (Franklin 2006, 13), held high expectations, and required high academic success from all of his children. Soria (1999) notes that all of the McConico children consequently were “good students … did what was expected of them and received good grades” (189). A graduate of the June 1933 class of the Wendell Phillips High School, not surprisingly, Skinner would be the first student in the history of the school to complete two majors, completing four years of study in both stenography and bookkeeping (Skinner 1995).

WORK EXPERIENCE AS AN ACTIVIST Skinner’s early work experience dealing with issues of racial inequality and employment discrimination launched her role as a community activist. After graduating from high school, Skinner went to work for the Walgreen Drug Company as a temporary fountain helper. A year later as a result of the Negro Labor League’s work for better employment, she acquired a salesclerk position in the houseware section of Woolworth and, after a ten-year term, became a floor manager and buyer. Although Skinner would be the first African American at store 1397 to be promoted to this position (Skinner 1995), more significantly, she began using her administrative authority to impart change within Woolworth and the manufacturing community on behalf of the people of her community. She notes the following in an autobiographical correspondence: [Skinner] was instrumental in getting Overton and other Negro products stocked for sale by Woolworth and getting the manufacturers of face powder (i.e., Pond, Woodberry, etc.) to produce tan and brown shades of powder for Negro women. In addition, she was instrumental in getting the Woolworth hosiery suppliers to manufacture hosiery in colors compatible and flattering to the skin color of Negroes. (Skinner 1995)

Even as an administrator, Skinner was thinking about others and determining to empower them. She was instrumental in getting Woolworth and other manufacturers to produce and sell products unique to the needs of African American people. Consequently, she requested that skin care and hosiery products that are “flattering to the skin color” (Skinner 1995) of

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African Americans be manufactured and stocked at the store. During her early years, Skinner grew up in a neighborhood environment in which in lieu of expressions of the larger, negative perceptions of African American culture and identity, a positive and affirming perception was acknowledged and greatly valued within her family. Thus, perhaps in realizing the value of African American cultural identity, she knew that acknowledging racial elements such as hair, skin care, and hosiery—items that cater to the unique needs of individuals, would be one way of dealing with racial inequality. In addition, dealing with this issue could also provide a way to empower African Americans by helping them realize the value of their own identity. In addition to challenging acts of racial discrimination within the manufacturing community, Skinner’s early work experience at Walgreen and Woolworth also often presented frequent instances of employment discrimination. On several occasions, Skinner watched as several Black workers were not considered for promotions at the store as a result of their race. Management frequently advanced White workers with less seniority for promotions. Interestingly, none of the other Black workers at the Woolworth store challenged the unfair decisions of the managerial staff regarding the promotions. Nevertheless, this is was not the case with Skinner who vehemently challenged a promotion opportunity that was given to a White coworker with “less experience and time on the job” (Soria 1999, 189). Skinner not only confronted her local management about the decision, but she also wrote a letter to Woolworth’s company officers complaining about the unfair employment practices at the local store. As a result, Skinner’s response initiated changes to the employment practices at the store that would impact her success and ultimately the success of future Black employees. Perhaps this situation helped Skinner realize the value of using literacy as a tool of change given the power that it has to transform an issue. This would be the first of many challenges that Skinner would address through the act of writing. Of equal significance, such challenges enabled Skinner to develop her leadership skills in dealing with larger societal issues of racial discrimination.

MILITARY EXPERIENCE WITH WAC: AS AN ACTIVIST After working for Woolworth and achieving success in management, Skinner decided to enlist in the United States Army during World War II. In July, 1943, Skinner was inducted into the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) and immediately placed on inactive duty since the WAAC was being abolished and the women in WAAC were being made a part of the regular army (Skinner 1994). Nonetheless, after a short stay in Chicago,

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Skinner reported to the First Women’s Army Corps (WAC) Training Center in Des Moines, Iowa. After a four-week term in basic training, Skinner accepted assignment with a recently formed Negro WAC Band. Interestingly, in addition to the Negro band, the 400th ASF Band, a WAC band for Whites, was also established even though Major Charity Adams, the highest-ranking African American WAC in the army, sought diligently to integrate the bands. Although Adams was unsuccessful at this initiative, she was, however, allowed to establish a second band, the WAC Band 2, with Lt. Thelma Brown as its commanding officer. In her correspondence, WW II Military Experiences, Skinner details her military experience with the WAC band. She describes the challenges of adjusting to military life, and in lieu of learning the cultural expectations, she also noted the extreme racial challenges, namely the racial politics surrounding the women’s band and even with regard to the living facilities in which she noted some were integrated while others were still very much segregated. What was amazing, however, was that in lieu of these challenges, the White and Black members of the WAC bands still forged “excellent rapport”: I had some knowledge of music, as did all of the members of the Band. However, the majority of us did not play an instrument, and particularly did not play the instrument assigned to us. I was assigned to the trumpet and later the French horn. M/Sgt [Master Sergeant] Joan Lamb (white), Director of the 400th ASF Band on the Post, was assigned as our Director. She provided instruction and lessons designed to teach us to play the instruments. Sgt. Lamb enlisted other members of her Band to participate in teaching us. An excellent rapport existed between the white Band and our Band. (Skinner 1994, 2)

While assigned to the trumpet and French horn, a part of her military experience involved learning marching maneuvers for the band. Skinner explains the requirement of detailed intensive drill routines and how marching maneuvers and drills were practiced until mastery. In addition, the Black band added an additional choral component to its practice that the White band did not include. Consequently, the WAC Band 2 was in greater demand, received many more invitations to participate in parades, bond drives, and recruiting drives than did the White band, and participated as guests of predominantly White organizations which included USOs, Kiwanis Clubs, Chambers of Commerce, American Legion posts, churches, and many other groups. They were even invited to participate in the 34th annual NAACP Conference at which Charles Drew was presented the 29th Spingarn Medal for his work on blood plasma. Skinner noted that all of the organizations, “received us graciously, dined us, lodged us, and included us in their activities. Many of

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the young people sought our autographs as if we were famous celebrities” (WWII Experiences, 3). Unfortunately, as a result of their greater demand, racial tensions erupted that prompted high-ranking army officials to seek efforts to deactivate the WAC Band 2. To counter the army’s intent, however, Skinner convinced her band members to enact a writing campaign; she notes this experience in the following correspondence: After returning to the Barracks, we assembled a meeting without our officer. Having worked with Mr. A. Phillip Randolph in planning and organizing the 1941 March on Washington, which was called off when President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive order 8802, the Fair Employment Practices Act, I suggested a plan for action. We launched a letter writing campaign. We sent letters to important and influential persons we knew soliciting their support in our effort to keep the band from being deactivated. Personal letters were sent to A Phillip Randolph and Earl B. Dickerson with whom I had worked. Letters were sent to: Walter White, Adam Clayton Powell, Daddy Grace, and approximately 90 others. We spent the evening writing these personal letters and then took the trolley into the city to mail them to avoid any action by the Army against us. At the same time, Major Charity Adams was also working hard to have the action reversed. (Skinner, WW II Military Experiences, 4)

In her correspondence, Skinner discussed the vigilant letter writing campaign that she initiated in an effort to keep the WAC Band 2 activated. She sought the assistance of prominent community activists, namely A. Phillip Randolph who was responsible for the 1941 March on Washington and latterly in 1963 and Walter White of the NAACP. Though not noted above, she additionally sought the assistance of other prominent leaders such as Lester Granger of the National Urban League, and Mary McLeod Bethune whom Skinner noted had access to President Roosevelt and his wife (Skinner 2005). Consequently, several of these activists responded by planning a meeting with Secretary of War, Henry Stimson. Interestingly, this initiative to deactivate the Black WAC Band ultimately was brought to the attention of Col. Frank McCoskrie, the person under whom the band first made its debut. Colonel McCoskrie not only recommended that the WAC Band 2 remain active, but also be reestablished as the 404th ASF Band. Now given a new identity that was equivalent to that of their White counterpart, the 404th ASF Band continued to perform and remained just as active and popular as it was prior to the deactivation initiative. Very important to note is that Skinner attended to matters of racial discrimination and inequality even in spaces that most people would certainly hesitate to challenge. Perhaps this event speaks to her adamant

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determination to challenge unfair cultural norms and ideologies, even those that are perpetuated in spaces such as within our nation’s wartime military forces.

AS AN EDUCATOR Skinner worked at several governmental jobs following her army discharge. After marrying a postal employee, Herbert Skinner in 1947, shortly thereafter she gave birth to her first child, Herbert “Bert” Skinner, Jr., in April, 1948. Several years later, she entered the field of education as a school library clerk for the Chicago Board of Education at the Manley Vocational High School. Skinner worked at Manley for several years and was the only African American faculty member assigned to this vocational high school that consisted of a predominantly White student body (2/3 white and 1/3 Negro). In 1953, Skinner gave birth to her second son, Kenneth, and, soon after he was ready to begin school, she began her college career at the age of 41, completing courses in journalism and television at the Wilson Junior College (now known as the Kennedy King College) and receiving an Associates degree in 1959 (Skinner 1995). Shortly thereafter, she enrolled in the Chicago Teachers College (CTC, now known as Chicago State University) at which she received a Bachelor of Education degree in 1960. Three years later, she earned a Master of Education degree, also at CTC, and from which she received the honor key, a prestigious academic award. For the next nine years, Skinner would complete more than fifty hours of graduate study at the Chicago Teachers College, the University of Chicago, and Loyola University (Soria 1999), and, in 1976, she received an Ed.D. from the Nova University in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She was sixty years of age at the time of this accomplishment. Skinner’s first appointment as a certified teacher began in September, 1960, when she was assigned to a teacher-librarian position at the Wadsworth Elementary School. After serving there for several years, she transferred to Kenwood High School in 1969 at which she opened the new Kenwood High School media center with the assistance of her best friend, K. Celeste Campbell. Skinner would be very successful in launching several literacy programs that would have an enormous impact on teachers and students throughout the district. In one of her short autobiographical manuscripts, Skinner describes how her love of people and passion for books motivated her as an educator to improve the literacy programs of schools. Her love of and interest in books and people motivated her to build an outstanding collection of books (covering a wide range of subjects, interests,

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and levels of reading) and initiate meaningful programs to bring children and books together. Her program included children at the kindergarten primary level: intermediate—upper grade level, and those in special education. She amassed an outstanding collection of Afro-American books and audio-visual materials for the use of students and teachers in the school. (Skinner 1995, 3)

During her role as teacher-librarian, Skinner worked avidly with teachers helping them to develop curriculum and reading materials that incorporated African American culture. She additionally developed reading laboratories and programs, and African American History courses, among others, in efforts to assist teachers in meeting the social and cultural learning needs of the students. By incorporating books and literature that expanded the curriculum to include the voices of other cultures, namely African American culture, Skinner paved a way for African American students to become more successful and more interested in schooling. She added a perspective to their education that included their culture. In addition to working to improve the reading achievement of students, Skinner also attended to their writing needs, and, for approximately ten years, sponsored the school newspaper, the Wadsworth Review at Wadsworth Elementary at which she encouraged and inspired young students to become avid writers. This literary initiative was immensely successful and frequently won first place each year in the Columbia Press Association’s annual competition (Skinner 1995). In 1970, Skinner was appointed Curriculum Director and Special Assistant to the principal at South Shore High School. There, she continued to assist teachers in developing curriculum materials in reading and African American history in order to meet the cultural needs of their students. Her accomplishments at South Shore included “supervis[ing] the installation of a reading laboratory, promot[ing] a photography program which in its first year won eight national awards, and pioneer[ing] in the development of the first closed circuit television system in a Chicago Public school” (Skinner 1995). Skinner was also very active in local and national teacher organizations. Serving as a member and officer of several professional organizations, she was very influential in encouraging students to enter the field of Library Science and to participate in organizations such as the Chicago Teacher Librarians club, the High School librarians of Chicagoland, the Illinois Library Association, the American Library Association, the Children’s Reading Round Table, and the Chicago Area Reading Association. Skinner initiated other successful programs to promote the success of students during her tenure as an educator in the Chicago Public Schools. She organized a mentoring program, the “Living Witness” program, which solicited successful African Americans in the fields of business and

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industry to build mentoring relationships with students in efforts to encourage and inspire them to complete their education. She also assisted in writing proposals for gifted programs in Foreign Language, Art and Photography. Skinner assisted the Chicago Public School District 22 with staff development, served as a member of the planning committee, and assisted with disciplinary issues while serving in the role of Dean of Students at South Shore High School. Skinner was very active within her school, and served her district and community diligently. Consequently, she was recognized for her leadership contributions in education and received several awards in 1972 including the Dedicated Teachers Award by the Citizens Schools Committee, and the Chicago Area Reading Association “for her inspiration and leadership in the use of library resources for the enrichment and extension of the education of young people in her school, the community, and the state” (Skinner 1995).

KAPPA DELTA PI INVOLVEMENT Skinner was initiated into the Theta Rho chapter of Kappa Delta Pi (KDP) during her undergraduate studies in 1960. As Soria (1999, 191) notes, Skinner’s involvement in Society functions “led her to earn prominence in Kappa Delta Pi’s prestigious educational institution” both at the local and national levels. A charter member of the Greater Chicago Alumni Chapter, she served in several administrative capacities, including as the first vice president, the second president, and historian-counselor. In addition to her local commitments, Skinner served KDP at the Society level. Before her appointments, she served as a chairman and speaker at regional and national meetings at colleges and universities from 1963-1980 (Skinner 1995). She also served as a charter member of the Society’s President’s Advisory Committee in 1963, Chairman of the National Resolutions Committee, and member of the National Nominations Committee in 1968. At the Boston Convocation in 1970, Skinner was elected to the position of Alumni Counselor and served in that role for two terms. She was elected President-elect of the Society at the New Orleans Convocation in 1974. Skinner was the first African American to serve as an officer of the Society and also was the first African American and only the fourth woman to be elected to its presidency at the time (Skinner 1995). Skinner became president of Kappa Delta Pi at the Orlando, Florida, Convocation and served from 1976-78. In addition to the racial and gender accomplishments that her nomination achieved, she was also one of the first school-based practitioners to ever serve in the capacity of president of KDP. Richard Judd, one of KDP’s former presidents, noted in reference to Skinner’s presidency, “[b]ecoming president of KDP as a school leader

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was a quantum leap for KDP” (Judd, pers. comm.). Throughout her latter years and as a life member of KDP, Skinner’s additional responsibilities at the national level included serving as advisory counselor and member of the Publications Committee. During Skinner’s tenure as president-elect and president of the Society, she attended to several important issues, namely identifying and contacting delinquent chapters, Convocation planning, and, during her tenure as president-elect, assisting the president, A. Keith Turkett, in attending to the Budget Committee, the Executive Secretary Selection Committee, and the editorial board of The Educational Forum. Skinner worked earnestly with the Headquarters staff—the executive secretary, Richard McElheny, the assistant executive secretary, Jay Hostetler, and the administrative secretary, Judy Young, in accomplishing the aforementioned goals. Although reducing the number of delinquent chapters and stimulating membership were successful accomplishments, Skinner’s primary attention was to provide a “strong teacher orientation focused on students” (Judd, pers. comm.). Frank Marsh, one of Skinner’s closest friends and an advisory member of KDP during her tenure, noted that Skinner was successful with several initiatives during her tenure as president of KDP. During a transitioning and historical era, Skinner worked with McElheny in the establishment of a budget system that, according to Marsh, “would be sustaining over a period of time” (Marsh, pers. comm.). In addition to contributing to the financial success of KDP, Skinner also sought to expand their theory and research emphasis to a more practical perspective by including the voices of student members. As a practitioner in the Chicago Public School System, Skinner recognized the significance of helping teachers, particularly student teachers, navigate some of the challenges attributed to the professional roles and world of teacher education. Consequently, she promoted workshops and presentations during the Orlando Convocation for and by student members in efforts to “develop their creative leadership” (Marsh, pers. comm.). Marsh further noted that since Skinner was very effective in the involvement of student and alumni members in KDP and encouraging them to remain active members, she was therefore directly responsible for broadening and stabilizing KDP’s economic base and financial health. In sum, Skinner was very instrumental in “bringing the society closer to the students” (Marsh, pers. comm.) by shifting the perspective of KDP from emphasis on the professorship to the needs of the students. Other accomplishments Skinner established during her tenure as president included recognizing the retirement of Richard McElheny, KDP’s Executive Director, at the Chicago Convocation and introducing Jay J. Hostetler as his successor (Davis, pers. comm.). Skinner additionally

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assisted with the creation of two student-centered offices on the Executive Council (Marsh, pers. comm.). One of the issues that Skinner appeared to have realized as an educator was the pressing reality of race and its tremendous impact on the success of students of color, particularly in urban environments. During the June, 1976 executive meeting, one of the Convocation resolutions attended to during Skinner’s presidency involved the issue of urban education. The resolution noted, “… it was agreed that this problem [of urban education] be stressed through whatever means [are] available to us —KDP Record, The Educational Forum, and speeches” (Executive Council Meeting notes, June 26, 1976). As a visionary and practitioner in the Chicago Public School system, Skinner appeared to have realized the significance of addressing matters of race and culture, now pressing issues in current research regarding urban education, and attempted to deal with the topic through dialogue. Perhaps as a result, in the 1978 Convocation, one of the invited guest speakers, Charles Smith, Professor of Sociology at Florida A&M University, presented a session entitled, “Development, Identity and Survival in the American Democracy: Problems of Race, Ethnicity and Socialization.” In addition, the prominent Texas Congressperson, Barbara Jordan, was her special guest speaker at the Convocation. In current research, one of the major movements in education centers on the idea of race and culture and its significance to the social, cultural, and academic achievement of students (e.g., Carter 2001; Gadsden 1995; Ogbu 2004; Smitherman 2000; Williams 2007). Skinner appeared to have been well aware of the impact of race and culture on the success of students, and attempted to initiate such conversations in a congenial fashion during her tenure with KDP. With regard to special relationships that Skinner developed with members of KDP, in addition to working with the national staff, she also developed a collegial relationship with prominent members of the Executive Council. Skinner was a dedicated leader of KDP, a visionary, and a highly competent and rational person who, according to Marsh, was well respected by her colleagues. He and Judd both noted that Skinner was good at making people feel comfortable, and according to Marsh, never used race as a way to make people feel obligated or to act in a manner that was inconsistent with their traditions. Perhaps as a result of her love of people, Skinner appeared to have had a good way of building rapport with people who were vastly different, socially and culturally, in order to accomplish her agenda. Skinner is vastly renowned and remembered for being a good leader and a good friend. In sum, Marsh noted the following which appears to capture the essence of her character: “Skinner was a logical, intelligent, rational person and you could have a discussion with her. I never felt there was any friction between us or anyone as far as that’s

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concerned. All of the people I knew who knew her respected her tremendously” (Marsh, pers. comm.). COMMUNITY CONTRIBUTIONS AS A HISTORIAN Skinner was equally as active in the community as she was adamant in her role as educator. In the community, while she participated in several community activist initiatives including planning for the March on Washington in 1941 and actually participating in the March in 1963, Skinner was nonetheless more active in ensuring that children and families had access to literature as well as real and accurate accounts of African American History. Skinner worked closely with others in the community, including Madeline Stratton Morris, to “conceptualize and revitalize” (A Woman Called to Serve, 43) the Chicago branch of the Association for the Study of Afro American Life and History (ASAALH), an organization “founded by Dr. Carter G. Woodson ” (Skinner 1995, 4). Skinner served as president and first vice president of the Chicago branch, as well as a member of the Executive Council of the Society. One of her primary contributions involved assisting in making sure that libraries in her community contained books by and about people of color. She was also diligent in recognizing the efforts of distinguished African Americans, and was a part of the initiative to commemorate Woodson through a memorial, the Carter G. Woodson Memorial Building. In addition, Skinner worked closely with Vivian Harsh and was also instrumental in the development of the Vivian Harsh Collection at the Chicago Public Library, one of the largest collections of African American literature and resources. In addition to ensuring that African American literature and culture was available in libraries, Skinner also served in the capacity of a historian, documenting the contributions of prominent African Americans, and sharing such stories across the community. For example, she compiled and researched a short biography on local African American people, entitled “Chicago’s Very Own Greats,” where she wrote biographical sketches of African Americans who contributed to the growth and development of the city. Skinner also frequently shared accounts of her experiences as a WAC Band member during World War II. She was additionally known for adamantly promoting African American history and culture and often solicited the mayor and governor of Chicago to issue proclamations recognizing African American History month, and then distributing such proclamations to each Chicago public high school. She was an avid supporter of ensuring that even historical information about African Americans was preserved in national museums. As such, she wrote a letter to Senator Paul Simon in support of the National African American Museum Project and requested that

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information pertaining to distinguished African Americans such as Solomon G. Brown be preserved at the Smithsonian. Skinner also made remarkable strides as a member of the Sixth Grace Presbyterian Church in Chicago. She assisted with building initiatives at the church and with a housing development project in the community, and served on several committees including an administrative and search committee for an executive Presbyter. Skinner was also elected to prominent positions within the Presbytery, including Moderator-elect in 1986. The following year, she was elected as the Moderator of the Presbytery at the First Presbyterian Church in Illinois. Her election into this prominent position made her one of only ten elders elected to serve as Moderator, and the fifth woman in the 150 plus years of the church to ever serve in this position (Skinner 1995). A LASTING LEGACY On February 27, 2006, Clementine Anna Deborah McConico Skinner died from complications related to breast cancer. Throughout her life as an educator, community activist, and historian, she received numerous awards in honor of her efforts to serve her community. Such awards include: the Mary McLeod Bethune Service Award presented by the ASALH, among others. Even in death, she continues to receive awards posthumously. In June, 2006, Skinner was honored during a Juneteenth Celebration at which her family was presented with a document that reflected her contributions as an educator, historian, church member, and community activist. An additional honor, Skinner’s papers are a part of the renowned Harsh Collection at the Carter G. Woodson Branch of the Chicago Public Library. Skinner was frequently writing and, even in her old age, literacy was still an important avenue to share ideas and memories to friends and loved ones as well as update them on issues near and dear to her heart. Skinner typically sent annual Christmas well wishes to friends in which she would share some of the things that had occurred over the year with her and her family. In a 2004 Christmas correspondence, she shared several of the honors that she had received throughout the years, including the Lifetime Emeritus Board Member award by the Retired Teachers Association of Chicago, and an Alpha Gamma Pi Sorority award for twenty eight years of service, among others. CONCLUSION Skinner was big on empowering people through literacy, but her overall objective was helping others—White Americans and other cultures within

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America’s society—realize the value of African American cultural identity. Skinner’s life work and contributions frequently evolved around a literacy act which surrounded some issue of African American cultural identity. Perhaps one of the major themes in her life, therefore, was that she wanted others to realize that African Americans had a place in America’s culture and additionally had meaningful and positive contributions for society that should be realized. In addition, she not only worked on behalf of the African American community, but she also worked to empower the unsung voices of others that were frequently unheard. As an educator and Kaldepian, she worked to better the lives of the students that she served, but also to ensure that teachers, whose perspectives were generally unregarded in particular spaces in higher education, shared their perspective and was integral in contributing to the direction of issues at national organizations. Only a few people can be considered as a literary “great,” one who has the ability to inspire others to pursue impossible challenges. Clementine Anna Deborah McConico Skinner is one of those “greats” and was truly an impressive activist, historian, and educator. She not only sought to help others become productive citizens through the pursuit of education, but she also exemplified the life that she so adamantly promoted to others.

REFERENCES Carter, Stephanie Power. 2001. The possibilities of silence: African-American female cultural identity and secondary English classrooms. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Vanderbilt University. Gadsden, Vivian and Daniel Wagner, eds. 1995. Literacy among African American youth: Issues in learning, teaching, and schooling. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press. Franklin, Susie. 2006. A Woman Called to Serve: Dr. Clementine McConico Skinner. Chicago: Woodson Regional Library. Kappa Delta Pi. 1977. President Skinner issues call for thirty-first biennial convocation. Convocation News, 6(1): 1-9. Ogbu, John. 2004. Collective identity and the burden of “Acting White” in Black history, community, and education. The Urban Review, 36(1): 1–35. Skinner, Clementine. 1994. Resume. Skinner, Clementine. 1995. Autobiographical Correspondence. Skinner, Clementine. 1995. World War II Military Experiences. Skinner, Clementine. 2004. Christmas Correspondence. Skinner, Clementine. 2005. Autobiographical Correspondence. Smitherman, Geneva. 2000. Talkin that talk: Language, culture and education in African America. New York: Routledge. Soria, H. Michelle. 1999. Clementine Anna Skinner: Tapestry of an African American educator. Journal of the Midwest History of Education Society 26(1): 188-192.

Clementine Skinner (1976-1978) 171 Vivian Harsh Collection, Carter G. Woodson Branch, Chicago Public Library. Williams, Cynthia Hansberry. 2007. The “sound” of Blackness: African American language, social and cultural identities, and academic success in a middle school language arts classroom environment. Unpublished Dissertation, Vanderbilt University, Nashville.

CHAPTER 16

RICHARD LOUIS JUDD (1978-1980) Creating a Foundation for the Future Elizabeth Smith Harrison

Richard L. Judd 1978-1980 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 173–182 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Richard L. Judd is a man with a wide range of interests and talents that weave together to form the tapestry of his life. His earliest academic interests were biology (which became his undergraduate major) and teaching (so he attended Teachers College of Connecticut), but his extracurricular activities in college included theatre and politics. As a graduate student, he added psychology (the focus of his master’s program) and student life (as director of a dormitory). In his first “real” job in higher education, he kept the psychology and student life interests and added emergency services to his expertise. As an administrator in higher education and in his doctoral studies, Judd added constitutional law as a specialty. Later in his career, he expanded his interests to include international relations. He was able to make each of his areas of interest and expertise complement the others and, in doing so, make significant contributions to better his community of New Britain, Connecticut; his university, Central Connecticut State; his “adopted” profession, the field of emergency services; and his life-long profession of teaching. The sixteenth president of Kappa Delta Pi, Richard L. Judd, was born on March 22, 1937, in Bridgeport, Connecticut, to Wilbur and Priscilla Judd. Wilbur Judd worked as a mechanic in a factory; his wife had immigrated to New Jersey from Hungary with her family at age nineteen. Richard was the third of their four children, two boys and two girls. His boyhood years were spent in Fairfield, Connecticut, an old town that would become a bedroom community for New York City. During the 1940s and 1950s, when he was a boy, the city was home to between 30 and 40 thousand people. Judd attended Fairfield Public Schools, where he believes he received a great education and had “the best” teachers. Recalling the end of World War II as a highlight of his early school years, he described people celebrating by banging pots and pans and sounding their car horns. In fact, young Richard honked his family car’s horn so long that he ran down the battery. He still remembers that his father, elated by the cause for the celebration, did not chastise him for his actions (Judd, pers. com.). At Fairfield High School, Richard Judd’s favorite subject was biology. A self-described “skinny kid,” Judd ran cross country and track and served as the manager of the football team (Judd, pers. comm.). As a member of the high school Class of 1955, he “missed” the wars of the mid-twentieth century: he was a child during World War II, a junior high/high school student during the Korean War, and a husband and father during the Vietnam Era. After his high school graduation in 1955, Judd chose to matriculate at a school that he could afford and to which he could be admitted—Teachers College of Connecticut in nearby New Britain, Connecticut. Little did the new college freshman know, in the fall of 1955,

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that his association with that institution would dominate both his adult life and professional career well into the 21st century (Judd, pers. comm.). As a college freshman, one of about 1500 undergraduates at Teachers College of Connecticut, Judd chose biology as his major. He believes that the college environment caused him to “blossom intellectually” (Judd, pers. comm.). Giving up athletics, he expanded his interests during his college years to include acting in the college theatre, participating in a state-wide mock legislature, and serving as class president all four years. Judd was inducted into the Epsilon Mu Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi during his undergraduate years at Teachers College of Connecticut. When he graduated in 1959, Judd was unsure of his plans but knew that he wanted to stay in the field of education. He had opportunities for graduate study in psychology at the University of Iowa and at George Peabody College for Teachers but, instead, chose to take an assistantship at The Ohio State University (Judd, pers. comm.). At Ohio State, Judd’s assignment as a graduate student was to serve as the director of a new combination stadium and dormitory, built to house bright students with financial need, who worked to maintain the dormitory in a co-op situation. Eleanor Roosevelt came to the campus for the dedication of the dormitory, and Judd met her. In his two years in Columbus, Ohio, while earning a master’s degree in Counseling Psychology, Judd also met the legendary coach of the Buckeyes, Woody Hayes. Describing Hayes as a great coach and historian, Judd enjoyed access to an inside look at the Buckeye football program through his association with Hayes. Judd remains a devoted fan of the Buckeyes more than fifty years later (Judd, pers. comm.). Following his first graduate school experience, Judd’s future was still undecided. He considered joining the Navy. Instead, he joined the staff of a small college in West Virginia, once again in charge of a dormitory. At Shepherd College (previously Shepherd State Teachers College), Judd also taught twelve hours of psychology as half of a two-person department. Shepherdstown, West Virginia, home to about 1000 people with a college about the same size as the town, was more Southern than Northern in its culture. Schools were still segregated when Judd moved there in the early 1960s. During his three years in West Virginia, Judd developed two interests that would change the course of his future: public safety and his future wife, Nancy. His public safety interest began with his participation in the Volunteer Fire Department and service as the chief of the ambulance squad (which he founded) and as a teacher for the American Red Cross (which was primarily First Aid at that time). He met Nancy Fox, who would become his wife, a native of Washington, DC, who grew up in Iowa when her father moved there for a position with an aircraft company. After her graduation from Iowa State University, Nancy had

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returned to DC with her journalism degree, and Judd met her there. They were married in 1963 (Judd, pers. comm.). A few months following his marriage to Nancy, Richard Judd received a call from then Central Connecticut State College President Herbert Welte, who had known Judd during his undergraduate years at Teachers College of Connecticut (which had become CCSC in 1959). Welte wanted Judd to return to his alma mater to manage the newly-constructed student center and serve as an instructor in the Psychology Department. Judd readily accepted and moved back to New Britain, where he would spend the remainder of his career in higher education and where he continues to live today. When he returned to CCSC, the enrollment was approximately 8000 students, much larger than when he first attended there a decade earlier. Judd accepted the position as Co-Counselor to the Epsilon Mu Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi when he returned to the campus as an administrator and instructor (Judd, pers. comm.). In 1966, Judd began doctoral studies at the University of Connecticut (UConn) in Storrs. He first attended only part time while teaching psychology and managing the student center and later as Associate Dean, a position he attained in 1968. At UConn, a land-grant institution, Judd studied Higher Education Administration with an interest in Constitutional Law in the College of Education. The university required a year of residency for the doctorate, so Judd reduced his work load at CCSC to part-time during the 1969-70 academic year to fulfill the requirement. During those years, Nancy Judd became the dormitory director of an offcampus dormitory and cared for their two children--Sarah, born in 1965, and Jonathan, born in 1970. Judd’s PhD degree was awarded in 1971. His dissertation, The Extracurriculum and the Federal Courts: An Analysis of Decisions and Their Impact on Higher Education, traces the movement of First and Fourth Amendment rights in case law, and was directed by Arwood Northby from the College of Education at UConn. After a year as Acting Dean, Richard Judd was named Dean of Student Affairs for CCSC in 1970, a position he would hold for a decade (Judd, pers. comm.). That a university dean of students would have an interest in Constitutional Law and choose that as the topic for his dissertation makes sense in the context of the turbulent times on university campuses during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Even small New England colleges like CCSC were impacted by the civil unrest of the time. As dean, Judd was faced with the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), known for their radical views and disruptive actions. It requested recognition as a campus organization, but Dr. Don James, President of CCSC at the time, denied the SDS organizers’ petition, rejecting the recommendation of the Student Affairs Committee chaired by then Dean Richard Judd. The SDS filed suit in the District Court, claiming that James’s actions violated their First and Four-

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teenth Amendment rights. The District Court upheld James’s decision, and the SDS plaintiffs appealed the decision to the Second Circuit, where James’s decision was again validated. The petitioners then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which heard the case in March, 1972 (Healy vs. James). The decision, announced in June of 1972, reversed the lower courts and remanded the decision for reconsideration. Also during this time, the campus administration building was taken over by Black students, angry over civil rights violations that they felt were present on the campus. Even campuses like CCSC, with very small African American enrollment (3-4%), were not immune from the radical politics that characterized many American college campuses during the 1960s and 1970s (Judd, pers. comm.). During this era, Judd became involved with Kappa Delta Pi counselor leadership and ran for national office. He served as Vice-President for Chapter Activities, attended regional conferences, and, subsequently, was nominated for the presidency of the Society by his own chapter as well as the chapter at Northeastern University led by Frank Marsh. He served as the national president of Kappa Delta Pi from 1978-1980. At his first Executive Council Meeting, newly-elected President Richard Judd outlined the responsibilities of the council: “(1) the responsibility of the Executive Council is to set policies of the Society, and (2) the responsibility of the National Office is to execute the business of the Society”. Subsequent discussion brought agreement that “formal policies should be adopted in many areas now regulated by mere custom” (Executive Council Minutes, June 23, 1978). Minutes of the meetings of the Executive Council during Judd’s tenure as Kappa Delta Pi President reflect the struggles within the leadership regarding the future of the organization, both in terms of membership expansion and financial stability. Concerns about the establishment of chapters at small institutions and whether or not it was appropriate for the organization to “solicit” the formation of chapters on the campuses of major institutions were recurring topics of discussion. During this time of national “double digit” inflation, Kappa Delta Pi experienced financial difficulties. In September, 1978, the financial report showed a deficit of $22,500 even though $55,000 had been paid during the biennium to cover Convocation bills from the previous biennium (Executive Council Minutes, September 28, 1978). Early the next year, the Executive Director Dr. J. J. Hostetler reported a “healthy cash flow” and no bills, in contrast to “having started the fiscal year holding $119,000 in bills” (Executive Council Minutes, January 20, 1979). At the mid-point of his tenure as president, Judd expressed concern to the Executive Council regarding the Society’s policies—“where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re going.” He reported having met with Dr. O. L. Davis, Jr., President-Elect, and Executive Secretary Dr. J. J. Hostetler to

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confront this problem. Minutes indicate that “it was generally agreed that policy and practice need to be separated and defined, with policies drawn up for much of what is now governed only by practice” (Executive Council Minutes, June 16, 1979). At the same meeting, members discussed the establishment of an educational foundation, with Dr. Judd suggesting that more information be gathered for the next meeting. At the next meeting, Judd reported that he, President-elect Davis, and Executive Director Hostetler had met with Phi Delta Kappa officials in Bloomington to study its foundation. Although the Kappa Delta Pi constitution did not require it, the leadership agreed that a proposal to the Biennial Convocation to establish an educational foundation should be accompanied by sets of facts regarding such a foundation (Executive Council Minutes, September 1415, 1979). In his final Executive Council meeting as President of Kappa Delta Pi, Judd announced that he, Dr. Frank Marsh, Dr. Clementine Skinner, and Dr. John J. Harton would meet to prepare the resolution proposing the formation of the Kappa Delta Pi Foundation for presentation at the Convocation, culminating the discussions that had occurred during his tenure as president (Executive Council Minutes, April 8, 1980). In his President’s Message published in the April 1980 Kappa Delta Pi Record (which has this cryptic subtitle “Dr. Judd wrote this article with the assumption that the RECORD would be published before Convo ‘80. If it wasn’t, blame the Editor”), Judd previewed the major issues that the Convocation would address. First, he explained that inflation had created the necessity for an increase in dues to maintain the fiscal stability of the organization. Even though every effort to reduce costs had been made (national staff was half its number five years earlier, even though membership and costs had risen sharply), the “increased costs and general rise of inflation” made an increase in dues necessary. A request for an increase of six dollars (with two dollars going to a special publications program) would be presented at the Convocation. In order to help attract and retain membership in Kappa Delta Pi, the leadership proposed the publication of six publications (in addition to the The Education Forum and Kappa Delta Pi Record) to be distributed to all members during the biennium—two booklet-length publications on “practical, ‘how to do’ subjects” and one “of a more reflective nature” each year. Finally, Judd reported that the Executive Council had authorized the introduction of a resolution to establish an independent non-profit organization to receive tax-free donations to support scholarships, research grants, and awards. Frank Marsh was named as the chair of a special committee on the establishment of the Kappa Delta Pi Foundation (Judd 1980b). Unlike his Presidential message, administrative and political in tone, Dr. Judd’s Presidential address, “In Quest of An Ideal,” delivered to the

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Convocation in April, 1980, sought to inspire listeners. Judd urged Convocation attendees to seek to be not only teachers but leaders who by example would both inspire and disturb. He further encouraged a quest for the “quality of intelligent dissatisfaction,” citing constructive criticism as the only certain device for achieving excellence. Reflecting on the state of education in the 80’s, Judd prophetically mused, “It is likely that every student can have at a very reasonable cost, a home computer console.” He concluded by urging teacher/leaders to develop the capacity to deal with the unexpected in their quest for the “ideal” in education (Judd 1980a). Richard Judd remembers his years as Kappa Delta Pi president as immensely enjoyable, particularly the opportunity to associate with the “stars” of the profession. He believes that, during those years, the organization was beginning to undergo a shift in focus from being an honor society based on ceremony to a substantial entity that contributed to the education profession. Judd takes pride in his role in establishing the Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation (of which he was the first Chairman of the Board) and considers it his greatest legacy to the organization. The support that the Foundation provides to the educational community in scholarships, grants, and professional development awards, Judd believes, enhances the role of the Society as a service organization. Judd recalls that establishing the Foundation was a controversial step for the organization, requiring a long “floor fight” at the Memphis Convocation in 1980, but a venture that has proved to be a success (Judd 1980a). From 1980 until 1992, Richard Judd served CCSU as Executive Dean for Institutional Advancement and University Affairs. In addition to continuing to teach at the University during these years, Judd’s involvement in the education of medical professionals, including physicians, already an extensive situation, expanded. He was chosen by the American College of Surgeons for its National Education Faculty to deliver short but intensive courses designed to train surgeons to teach other physicians in urgent life support following critical trauma. He delivered sessions in medical pedagogy at hospitals and medical schools across the nation. Judd authored books, articles, and monographs on emergency medical topics, as well as making many presentations—in person and on videotape—on the topic. Clearly, he was considered preeminent in the field of educating emergency medical professionals, particularly in the areas of behavioral and psychological emergencies, death and dying, dealing with geriatric patients, and testing and evaluation (Judd 1980a). In 1992, Richard Judd was named Vice President of University Affairs and Professor of Educational Leadership for CCSU. He served in this capacity until he was named President of the university in 1996. Judd considers that his becoming president of the institution at which he was an undergraduate student the nadir of his career path. During his time as

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president, the university continued to grow both in enrollment (to about 12,000) and in physical plant. Judd presided over a $300,000,000 capital building and renovation program which changed the campus substantially, including development of a campus mall to create a place “where students would want to be” (Judd, pers. comm.). Addition of a doctoral program in educational leadership is among his proudest accomplishments as president. Advised by senior educators, including Laureates Thomas Sergiovanni and O. L. Davis, Jr., Judd helped implement the Ed.D. program for education practitioners, utilizing a cohort model and summer residency, along with a project with direct application to the school setting as its capstone (Judd 1980a). Clearly, Judd’s priority in his role as a university president was the students the university served. Calling himself “the students’ president,” Judd commented to an interviewer following his retirement that his biggest joy was “seeing students succeed.” He elaborated, “You can’t impact every life that comes to campus, but you can certainly hope that they come out a better person, they benefit from it, they change their views, they experience some things that they wouldn’t have otherwise (Central Focus 2005)”. Ironically, Richard Judd’s presidency at CCSU ended as the result of an incident involving one of those students. In February 2004, the Hartford Courant published an op-ed piece submitted by Judd about the political situation in Cyprus, which has been divided between the Greek majority and Turkish minority populations for 40 years, asserting that peace between the two groups might be an attainable goal. A CCSU alumnus of Greek descent noted similarities between Judd’s editorial and other previously published sources and alerted the Chancellor of the university, contending that Judd’s editorial was plagiarized. He believed that Judd favored the Turks and gave incorrect information in his editorial. He further objected to Judd’s using his position with the university to promote his personal views. The Courant later published an apology and a correction of some inaccuracies in the editorial. The CCSU Faculty Senate voted that Judd should keep his job following his apology to them. Judd accepted responsibility for his mistake, noting that he had “consulted many sources” for speeches he was preparing on the topic and made notes that he later assumed were his own ideas. “I mistakenly assumed notes I had made were my own, and I thus incorporated them without attribution. As an author of many texts and articles, I should have done a better job of vetting my text. I had no intention of using another’s words or misleading readers in describing my sense of events in Cyprus” (June 2004). Judd later commented, “There is not a day that goes by—even up to the present—that I do not think about the op-ed and about not having been more careful in its drafting.” Judd retired in July 2004 and was named President Emeritus by the Board of Trustees (Judd, pers. comm.).

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Dr. Norton Mevinsky, retired CCSU history professor, observed, “This attack against President Judd was most unfortunate and should not be allowed to infringe upon his exemplary career. The individual who initiated the attack was not motivated by an issue of plagiarism but rather by a strong, political bias against the faculty and student exchange agreement between CCSU and Eastern Mediterranean University (EMU) in North Cyprus. President Judd had signed and furthered the agreement. As part of the Greek American lobby, the person who charged Judd with plagiarism opposed the Turkish Republic of North Cyprus in which EMU was located and advocated that the CCSU-EMU agreement should not have been made. In his op-ed article, published in the Hartford Courant, President Judd advocated peaceful resolution of the Cyprus problem. The article was substantive and positive; it did not qualify as plagiarism” (Mevinsky, pers. comm.). From the time he returned to CCSC (which became Central Connecticut State University in 1983) until his retirement as President in 2004, Richard Judd served as both an administrator and professor at the institution. From his early years as a psychology instructor, Judd expanded his area of teaching expertise to include parliamentary law in the Department of Communication as well as courses related to emergency medical education. For the past 40 years, he has delivered instruction in various aspects of emergency medical care to a wide range of audiences outside the university as well. Judd’s entire professional life has been devoted to education, as have the professional careers of his family members. His wife Nancy has also held numerous leadership positions in their community, including presidencies of the Junior League, New Britain Symphony and New Britain YWCA trustees. Her career spanned 20 years as Director of Admissions and Acting Headmaster of an independent school in Connecticut. Daughter Sarah, a graduate of Johns Hopkins University and Northwestern University, is a learning specialist at an independent school in Annapolis, Maryland, as well as the mother of two daughters. Son Jonathan, a graduate of Syracuse University and Central Connecticut State University, is a graduate program manager at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Hartford, CT (Judd, pers. comm.). In addition to his contributions to education, Judd has an extensive record of civic involvement that includes his areas of expertise (emergency medicine and law) as well as areas of interest (the arts—including theater and music). He has held leadership roles in a number of local, state, and national organizations and has been awarded honorary degrees in a variety of disciplines as well: Lincoln University (CT), Doctor of Laws; Kyung Hee University (Korea), Doctor of Medicine; and Eastern Mediterranean University, Doctor of International Relations (Cyprus).

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REFERENCES June, Audrey Williams. 2004. President of Central Connecticut State U. is accused of plagiarism. Chronicle of Higher Education March 10 [online]. Judd, Richard. 1980a. In quest of an ideal. Kappa Delta Pi Record 17(2) 34-35, 39. Judd, Richard. 1980b. President’s message. Kappa Delta Pi Record 16(3): 98. Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1978. June 23. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1978. September 28. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1979. January 20. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1979. June 16. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1979. September 14-15. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1980. April 8. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Richard L. Judd: Postlude for a president. 2005. Central Focus Spring: 6.

CHAPTER 17

O. L. DAVIS, JR. (1980-1982) Nurturing Scholarship and Honoring Excellence in Education Ron W. Wilhelm

O. L. Davis, Jr. 1980-1982 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 183–194 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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O. L. Davis, Jr., the Catherine Mae Parker Centennial Professor Emeritus of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education, The University of Texas at Austin served as president of Kappa Delta Pi from 1980-1982. In Davis’s more than 60-year involvement with the Society he has consistently promoted a core understanding that Kappa Delta Pi as a society of educators exists to honor high academic achievement (Davis 1986). This biography displays Davis’s steady toil throughout the years to nurture high standards of scholarship in his students, colleagues, and professional educational organizations as well as in the Society. The specific factual information of Davis’s biographical background data and career milestones was derived from his curriculum vita and personal communications with the author. A native Texan, Davis was born November 20, 1928, in Amarillo, Texas. At the time, his father, O. L. Davis, Sr., was Superintendent of Schools in Shamrock, Texas. By the time O. L., Jr. entered kindergarten in North Ward Elementary School, his family had moved from the Texas Panhandle in the northern most part of the state to the Valley, on the state’s southern border with Mexico where his father served as Superintendent of Schools in San Benito. His family moved again in 1939 as Davis was about to enter the fifth grade. This relocation brought him to central Texas, where his father served as Superintendent of Schools of Lometa and the family lived in the countryside where they farmed and ranched part-time. As a high school student, young Davis became an Eagle Scout and lettered in basketball and other sports, district speech contests, edited the school newspaper, and graduated as Valedictorian of his class (Davis, pers. comm.). His mother, Viola Mae Maxwell Davis, was a native of the Lometa area and taught in schools in Texas and New Mexico until her retirement in 1961. Her strong interest and preparation in history must have influenced her son who later would establish himself as a curriculum historian. After graduation from Lometa High School in 1946, O. L. Davis, Jr. enrolled at his parents’ alma mater, North Texas State Teachers College (NTSTC), now the University of North Texas (UNT) in Denton, Texas. As an undergraduate student at NTSTC, Davis was initiated into Alpha Iota chapter of Kappa Delta Pi and served as a chapter officer during his senior year (1948-1949). On March 17, 1949, he and three fellow classmates formed a local fraternity, Phi Alpha Tau, which later became the UNT chapter of the national fraternity Sigma Phi Epsilon. A firm believer in the value of community, this fraternity was the first of numerous organizations that O. L. Davis, Jr. helped organize throughout his life. Notably, a second career marker also emerged during that senior year. Davis served as editor of the 1949-1950 edition of NTSC’s yearbook, The Yucca, which received “All American” acclaim.

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Following his graduation with honors in 1949 with a bachelor of arts in government and minors in English, history, and economics, Davis began his teaching career in higher education as a teaching fellow in the School of Education and Psychology at NTSC. He completed his master’s of education in public school administration with minors in government and economics in 1950 and traveled to west Texas where he taught English and speech at Ozona High School (1950-1951). The following year Davis served as an elementary school principal in Burleson, Texas (1951-1952), south of Fort Worth. His public school career ended when the U. S. entered the Korean Conflict. Davis, a U. S. Navy reservist, served on active duty (1952-1955) in various Naval Security Group assignments in Washington, D. C. and Cheltenham, England. He rose in rank from Seaman Apprentice to Lieutenant (jg), USNR. On inactive duty (1955 -1976) he was promoted from Lieutenant (jg) to Captain and served as Commanding Officer of three different Naval Security Group reserve components and was also as a member of Reserve Group staffs at five different naval reserve training centers. His naval duties notwithstanding, Davis found time to court and marry Joan Elizabeth King of Parkersburg, West Virginia, at the U.S. Naval Chapel, U.S. Naval Security Station, Washington, D.C., on May 26, 1953.  The couple has two sons, O. Luke Davis III, a partner with the Dallas law firm of Glast, Phillips, and Murray, P. C. and Dr. Matthew D. Davis, an associate professor of educational leadership and policy studies at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. All the Davis men as well as Luke’s wife, Paula, are life time members of Kappa Delta Pi. In 1955 Davis was granted early release from active duty in the U.S. Navy in order to move from Cheltenham, England, where he was stationed with the United Kingdom Government Communications Headquarters, to begin doctoral studies at George Peabody College for Teachers in Nashville, Tennessee. While at Peabody, Davis transferred his Kappa Delta Pi membership to the Alpha Pi chapter and served as chapter president for the academic year 1955-56. As a Peabody doctoral student, Davis taught eighth grade in the Peabody Demonstration School (1955-1957) and served as a teaching assistant (1957-1958). He successfully defended his dissertation, titled “Learning about Time Zones: An Experiment in the Development of Certain Time and Space Concepts” and received his PhD degree in 1958.

CAREER MILESTONES After completing his doctorate in curriculum and teaching with a minor in history, Davis became the Associate Secretary for the Association for

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Supervision and Curriculum Development, National Education Association, Washington, D.C., (1958-1960). As ASCD Associate Secretary, Davis coordinated the work of and provided support to the Cooperative Action Program for Curriculum Improvement, a two-year special project established at the 1958 ASCD Annual Conference. Additionally, he coordinated the activities of the Association’s committees and commissions, essentially work groups established for special purposes (e.g., Curriculum Research, Crowding in Our Schools) and he participated in special projects (e.g., ASCD-DAVI New Educational Media Project). Davis’s connection with ASCD did not end in 1960 when he became Associate Director of the Fifth Year Program in Teacher Education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1960-1962). He served on several ASCD councils and commissions, edited the Association’s landmark yearbook Perspectives on Curriculum Development 1776-1976 (1976), served as Association president (1982-1983), and edited the ASCD Journal of Curriculum and Supervision (JCS) from 1993-2005. At its demise JCS was the largest circulation academic, refereed journal in the curriculum field in the English language. The Association recognized his many contributions to the Association with its “Award of Excellence and Achievement” in 2005. From the University of North Carolina, Davis moved to Kent State University (KSU), at which, as an associate professor in education (19621966), he served one year as Acting Director of the Bureau of Educational Research and directed the launch of the KSU doctoral program in curriculum and instruction. In 1966, he moved back to Texas as an associate professor of curriculum and instruction at The University of Texas at Austin, where he remained until he retired in 2007. During his last six years at UT, Davis held the Catherine Mae Parker Centennial Professor of Curriculum and Instruction. He also established and directed the UT Oral History in Education Program (1976-2007). For this project, Davis and his students set about collecting oral histories of teachers active during particular periods of the early 20th century (e.g., the Progressive Era in American education, The Great Depression, and World War II). Over the years, he and a few of his students added to the collection oral history interviews with individual leaders of several major professional/scholarly organizations including (a) the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, (b) the National Council for the Social Studies, (c) Kappa Delta Pi, and (d) the International Reading Association.   Although retired from teaching, Davis continues to pursue his most recent research interests in the areas of contemporary U.S. curriculum policy, the school curriculums in the United States and the United Kingdom during World War II, the work of Texas’ State Agents for Negro

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Schools (1919-1950), Rosenwald Schools constructed in Texas, and the Texas Curriculum Development Project (1933-1937).

PROFESSIONAL LEADERSHIP Throughout his career Davis has contributed, frequently in leadership roles, to numerous professional organizations in addition to Kappa Delta Pi and ASCD. He served as Vice-President of Division B (Curriculum Studies) of the American Education Research Association (1971-1973) and founded two AERA Special Interest Groups, the Research in Social Studies Education SIG and the Teaching History SIG. In addition to the two AERA SIGs, Davis has been a synergizing force in the creation of other professional organizations especially focused on curriculum history. His efforts as a founder and leader of these organizations evince his belief in the importance of collective historical consciousness to foster democratic ideas and practices. Davis is a founding member of the Society for the Study of Curriculum History and served as the organization’s secretary (1978-1979) and president (1979-1980). He also is a founding member of the American Association for Teaching and Curriculum and served as the first president (1994-1995). He continues to be an active member of the College and University Faculty Assembly of the National Council for the Social Studies, is a founding member of the Foundations of the Social Studies, a Special Interest Group of NCSS, and served as its chair (1995-1996). Davis served as secretary (2001-2002), vice-president (2002-2003) and president (2003-2004) of the Midwest History of Education Society (now the Organization of Educational Historians). He was elected to membership in the Professors of Curriculum (1964) and has served as the organization’s factotum on three occasions. His international professional activities include election as a Fellow in the College of Preceptors of London, England (1984) and in the Royal Society of Arts (1988). Davis has been Visiting Professor at numerous institutions including University of Virginia (Spring, 1960), Laredo State University (Summer, 1976), University of Calgary (Summer, 1982), Purdue University (Summer, 1984), Baylor University (Summer, 1987), Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland (October, 1987), University of Central Florida (Summer, 1988), University of Colorado at Denver (Summers, 1989, 1992), University of Coahuila (February, 1993); Eastern New Mexico University (Summer, 1993); University of Washington (Summer, 1995). He delivered the Hixson Lecture in Christian Education at Baylor University in 1990 and presented the Mary Ann Raywid Lecture to the Society of Professors of Education (2002).

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Davis’s talent as an editor grew as he served on the editorial boards of journals such as The Educational Forum (1971-1974), Journal of Educational Research; Journal of Curriculum and Supervision (1984-1992), International Journal of Social Education (1985-Present), Baylor Educator (1987-), The Curriculum Journal (UK) (1989-Present), Revista Mexicana De Pedagogia (1990), Theory and Research in Social Education (1995- 2001); Editor-at-Large, American Educational Research Journal (1973-1976); Encyclopedia of Educational Research (5th edition, 1980-1982); Educational Research Quarterly (1996-2007). He presently is a series editor on research on curriculum and instruction for Information Age Publishing. Under his editorship, the series includes eight published books with eight more in press or under contract.

PROFESSIONAL HONORS Throughout his career, Davis has received recognition from numerous bodies for his scholarship and contributions of service to the profession. His honors include: Distinguished Alumnus of Peabody College of Vanderbilt University (2004) and the University of North Texas (1999), the AERA Division B Lifetime Achievement Award for Outstanding Contributions to Curriculum Studies (1996), the first NCSS Citation for Exemplary Research in Social Studies Education (1974) and the NCSS Distinguished Career Research in Social Studies Education Award (1996). Kappa Delta Pi awarded an Honor Key to Davis in 1975 for his exceptional service to the Society and in 1994 he was elected a Kappa Delta Pi Laureate.

TEACHING BY MENTORING Early in his career at The University of Texas at Austin, Davis coordinated the introductory course in secondary school teaching (18 sections) and directed the development of a teaching laboratory (based on micro-teaching principles) integral to this course (1967-1985). Later he offered undergraduate courses in teaching elementary school social studies and the history of American education as well as graduate courses and seminars in curriculum policy analysis, historical perspectives on the curriculum, analysis of teaching, analysis of textbooks and printed materials, research in social studies education, secondary education, and curriculum development in local school systems. His seminars on the analysis of teaching and curriculum history were the second such seminars offered on these topics in the United States.

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Mentor is an apt title often applied to Davis for he has supervised more than 160 completed PhD dissertations and ten completed MA or MEd theses in his career. Within the past twenty years, of the dissertations supervised, seven have been named Distinguished Dissertations by Kappa Delta Pi; one received the Distinguished Dissertation Award from Division B, American Educational Research Association; one received the Distinguished Dissertation Award from the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development; four have received Outstanding Dissertation Awards by the Society for the Study of Curriculum History; one received the Distinguished Dissertation in Curriculum award from the American Association for Teaching and Curriculum; one has received the New Investigator Award from the Council for the Society for Research in Nursing Education; and three have been honored as Outstanding Dissertation by the Graduate Studies Committee in Curriculum and Instruction (UT Austin). Former doctoral advisees hold or have held tenured appointments at a number of universities, including two who have become university presidents: one (now deceased) at The University of Texas at Brownsville and another at Texas A&M International University at Laredo; one was Interim Provost, Eastern New Mexico University, and one is Vice-Chancellor, Texas A&M University System. Several former advisees hold or have held key system-wide administrative posts (e.g., superintendent, assistant superintendent for curriculum, principal) in school districts in Texas, Louisiana, Illinois, California, North Carolina, and Washington; some others have or have had major appointments in state agencies (e.g., Texas Education Agency), private foundations (e.g., Junior Achievement), textbook publishing, church ministry and missions, and government (e.g., US Navy, Texas House of Representatives).

SCHOLARSHIP Davis’s scholarship can be organized into three major categories: curriculum development, teaching and teacher education, and human communication and educational technology. His work in the broad area of curriculum development has focused on practice and theory, curriculum history, and social studies education. He has authored, co-authored, edited, or co-edited thirty books, fifty chapters or sections, and more than 160 professional and scholarly articles. A constant theme running through Davis’s writing is his insistence on the importance of collective conversation about the knowledge worth knowing. In particular his work in curriculum history and social studies education has emphasized the role of communal remembering, that is, the observance of matters of

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importance and the imperative to engage one another in the practices of democracy as essential elements of curriculum. In one editorial titled “Marks and Markers of Remembrance” in the Journal of Curriculum and Supervision, Davis reveals his passionate concern for exercising civic memory. He comments, “A people knows itself by what it remembers together. … When any people—a family, a nation, and, certainly, a profession–fails to observe matters of importance, it is diminished and its fragility is magnified. Marking and remembering significance matter” (Davis 1995a, 189). For Davis, collective remembrance represents an inherently pedagogical act that nurtures democratic ideas and practices. His work and that of many of his doctoral students highlights individuals, groups, and issues often omitted from traditional treatments of U.S. educational history. The contributions of women scholars to social studies curriculum development, along with curricular initiatives for Mexican American and African American children, and the role of curriculum in times of war have received particular attention in Davis’s body of work. By such a focus, Davis brings these scholars and ideas into the present moment so as to promote a civic memory that reemphasizes democratic principles and ideals in discussions about educational policy and programs. Davis believes attending to the language of democracy constitutes a curricular imperative because otherwise, as he states, “… the silence of the language of democracy accompanies the deemphasis of democracy in the fabric of the nation” (Davis 1995b, 2-3). The significance of Davis’s work lies in his reemphasizing the language of democracy in the school curriculum as a means to foster development of a collective awareness of “We, the People” in order to find common ground on which to further our nation’s democratic experiment.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO KAPPA DELTA PI The year of his retirement marked O. L. Davis’s 40th year as counselor of Delta chapter at The University of Texas at Austin (1967-2007). During his tenure the chapter received the Award in Chapter Excellence (ACE) and almost yearly since the establishment of the Educational Foundation scholarship program Delta chapter members have received scholarships. Davis’s contributions at the national level began with his service on the editorial board of The Educational Forum (1971-1974). During the same period he served on the President’s Advisory Committee (1972-1974). He became a member of the Executive Council as Vice-President for Chapter Development (1974-1976), President-Elect (1978-1980), and President (1980-1982) of the Society, followed by a term as Advisory Counselor

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(1982-1984). Davis participated in several policy decisions and program initiatives during the 1970s and 1980s that laid the foundations for the modern era of growth and development for the Society. As President-Elect during the first year of Richard Judd’s presidency, Davis (1978) advocated a recruitment campaign to establish new chapters in large universities as way to promote KDP’s prestige and national visibility. True to his commitment that a professional body should remember together, Davis (1978) also proposed conducting oral history interviews with national past presidents and other officers. As part of the modernization movement, Davis and other leaders sought to clarify the Society’s policies, management practices, and bylaws. One controversial issue was related to an apparently extra-constitutional practice of reduced membership renewal fees for retired members. Davis opposed continuation of the policy in the absence of a constitutional amendment to authorize the action. The matter would be resolved at a subsequent Convocation. As president of KDP, Davis pursued three other initiatives to move the Society further along the path to becoming a major national professional organization. He advocated that the KDP laureates play more active roles in the Society and that they along with members of the Executive Council host Laureate Lectures and receptions at the annual conferences of other professional organizations such as the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education (AACTE), the American Educational Research Association (AERA), and the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD). Laureate Dr. Bettye Caldwell delivered the first KDP Lecture at the 1981 conference of AACTE. Davis also urged Executive Council members to attend KDP conferences in their regions. Another significant initiative during Davis’s presidency derived from the white paper study by Jack R. Frymier, Editor, The Educational Forum, and Jan Jeter regarding possible roles for Kappa Delta Pi in what appeared to be an emerging trend toward the centralization of U.S. education. The Executive Council agreed to fund a series of Frymier-led workshops for local chapters around the country on the status of education in America. For the two-day workshops, Frymier offered training in the use of the Annehurst Curriculum Classification System (Frymier, 1977) on the first day and “research training in the areas of motivation, curriculum and instruction and centralization in American life” on the second day (Executive Council Minutes June 5-6 1981, 2). The Executive Council approved a workshop focus to educate Kadelpians about “the centralization, continuation and improvement of U.S. education” and stipulated that “local chapters be involved in selecting their choice of offered alternative workshop foci” (Executive Council Minutes June 5-6 1981, 6).

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Not surprisingly, attention was given to KDP publications during the Davis presidency. Based on discussions begun during the presidency of Richard Judd, the Executive Council established a Publications Committee as a standing committee to oversee all KDP publications. The Council followed that proposal by authorizing a newsletter to be issued on an as needed basis to counselors and chapter presidents. In another effort to improve chapter functioning, the Council charged the Vice President for Chapter Activities and the Executive Secretary with developing a Chapter Manual to be issued each biennium to presidents and counselors. Publication policies and procedures for the KDP journals, The Forum and KDP Record, as well as for new venues such as booklets, cassettes, recordings, a newsletter, and a periodical for pre-service teachers also received the Executive Council’s attention during this period. Arguably one of the most important initiatives for Kadelpians during the presidencies of Judd and Davis was the creation of the Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation in 1980. Davis spent much time and energy developing the proposal that became the Foundation and, against prominent opposition by several active and former Society leaders, he helped organize the support for the proposal at the 1980 Convocation in Memphis. Debate on the merits of the authorization of an independent KDP Educational Foundation extended the scheduled business session, but, when the debate ended, the proposal passed handily (Davis, pers.comm.). As Society President the following year, Davis served on the Foundation’s Board of Directors and was party to the establishment of a set of major Laureate Scholarships for doctoral students in education who also are members of the Society and a procedure for the establishment of other types of scholarships. The Executive Council selected Foundation Board members Richard Judd, Deborah Wolfe and Laureate Counselor William Alexander to review the first scholarship applications. In an essay celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Society, Davis argued that “nurturing scholarship should take many forms” (Davis 1986, 28). In addition to the development of a scholarship program, Davis proposed the Foundation should include an outstanding dissertation award program because such initiatives would foster the national prestige and visibility of the Society in the educational community. The Society reinstituted its international activities in 1981 by sponsoring its first international study tour for educational professionals in quite a number of years. This tour focused on the Republic of China. Laureate Gerald Read of Kent State University had established such tours as early as 1957 when the Society cosponsored a study tour to the Soviet Union. For now unknown reasons, these and other international activities of the Society ended a few years later (Davis, pers. comm.). The China tour was so successful that the Executive Council agreed “that foreign study is a

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good service to offer the membership of the Society, and that negotiations should be entered into as soon as possible for subsequent tours” (Executive Council Minutes June 5-6 1981, 3). For several years, the Society continued these study programs and extended their foci to a number of different countries. Davis attempted to limit international chapter development to Canada, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands due to differences in standards of instruction and language; however, his opinion was not supported by the majority of the Executive Council. The Executive Council approved a chapter at The University of Calgary in Alberta, Canada, and Davis represented the Society as the installing officer in 1981. As international membership presently includes Kadelpians in 30 nations and two newly installed Asian chapters (in Hong Kong and Taipei), Davis now believes that too little attention has been given to the nature of some problems about international chapters. They include problems, for example, of monetary exchange, the seeming exclusion of international concerns (or concerns for education in other countries, especially those with KDP chapters) in Society publications and the Convocation, and the involvement of KDP members in other countries in activities of the Society (Davis, pers. comm.). After his presidency ended in 1981, Davis served on the Executive Council as Advisory Counselor throughout the presidency of Jerry Robbins. Several initiatives during this period in which Davis was involved included the creation of a Society banner, guided by the efforts of Dr. Ruth Gibson (Omicron Gamma Chapter at Georgia State University); the creation of a Society medallion; and the establishment of the KDP Award for Distinguished Book of the Year in Education. Recognizing the vital importance of creating a collective memory for Kadelpians, Davis continued to advocate the establishment of the Living Archives series. In 1994, Davis’ former doctoral students, a number of friends, and members of his family funded the O. L. Davis, Jr., Laureate Doctoral Scholarship in Curriculum and Instruction within the KDP Educational Foundation. It targeted several specific emphases that exemplified his research career. Since then, the corpus of the scholarship has grown by the addition of funds from these and additional sources. The Society honored his long service as a local chapter counselor by establishing in 2007 the O. L. Davis, Jr., Counselor of Distinction Award to honor outstanding faculty members who have served as local chapter counselors and who have demonstrated exceptional service, personal scholarship, professional development, outstanding leadership of a Society chapter, and mentorship of the chapter’s student scholars and leaders. The initial awardees were recognized at the 2009 Convocation (Davis, pers. comm.). Davis also provided significant

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contributions to endow the Kappa Delta Pi Doctoral Scholarship in Curriculum and Instruction at his alma mater, the University of North Texas. Davis’s contributions to the Society now span six decades. His legacy is well grounded in 40 years as counselor of Delta chapter at The University of Texas at Austin. The mentoring he provided his doctoral students has produced numerous chapter counselors, chairs of national committees, editors of KDP Record and The Educational Forum as well as Society presidents and vice presidents and Educational Foundation board members. In his years of service on the Executive Council, O. L. Davis, Jr. helped lay the foundation for a modern Kappa Delta Pi that continues to nurture scholarship and promote excellence in education.

REFERENCES Davis, O. L., Jr. 1986. Honor, scholarship, education: Reflections on Kappa Delta Pi’s central purpose. Kappa Delta Pi Record 23(1): 27-28. Davis, O. L., Jr. 1995a. Marks and markers of remembrance. Journal of Curriculum & Supervision 10 (Spring): 189-190. Davis, O. L., Jr. 1995b. Fifty years after World War II: Toward the reemphasis of democracy in American schools. Journal of Curriculum & Supervision 11: 1-5. Frymier, Jack R. 1977. Annehurst Curriculum Classification System; A  Practical Way to Individualize Instruction.  West Lafayette, IN:  Kappa Delta Pi. Meeting of the Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1981. June 5-6. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL).

CHAPTER 18

JERRY H. ROBBINS (1982-1984) Modernizing the Society Brenda Wheat Whiteman

Jerry H. Robbins 1982-1984 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 195–207 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Jerry H. Robbins came from a family of educators. His father, Hal Robbins, a long-time high school principal in De Queen, Arkansas, spent the summers in the 1940s working on teaching certification and administrative credentials. As a consequence, the entire family spent a great deal of time at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock during the summers. Although his mother, Barbara Rogers Robbins, was a stay at home mother during his early years, she later attended college and became an elementary school teacher. All three of the Robbins’ sons became professional educators. Jon Robbins was a high school science teacher in North Little Rock, Arkansas, and Don Robbins was a high school social studies teacher in North Little Rock. Jerry H. Robbins began his secondary teaching career as a mathematics and music teacher and moved almost immediately into administrative positions, beginning with an appointment as a High School principal, followed by a University faculty position, Department Chair, and Dean of several Colleges of Education. Jerry Robbins was born February 28, 1939, in De Queen (AR), the oldest of three boys. De Queen was a typical small town in Southwest Arkansas and home to both sets of Grandparents as well as a number of other relatives. In 1949, as Jerry was entering 6th grade, his father was offered a job at Conway (AR) High School and the family relocated to Conway, where Jerry completed Junior and Senior High Schools. He was a strong student academically, earning A’s in his courses and showing aptitude in mathematics and science in addition to language and social studies. He was actively involved in a variety of student organizations as well as the music and drama programs, and particularly in the band, in which he played trombone. He was less inclined toward sports, but made up for this with involvement in other activities. Although Robbins had a long-time aspiration of attending college, money was tight as the family of five lived on his father’s principal salary. He was able to attend Hendrix College in Conway, with the compromise that he would live at home and work his way through school. Perhaps because his father was an educator, his parents did not initially want Jerry to become a teacher. He remembers his mother frequently saying: “You’re smart enough to make a whole lot more money than that” (Robbins, pers. comm.). Despite his strong aptitude and performance in music, his parents insisted that he study something more lucrative than music. He chose mathematics as a major and was able to test out of a number of required courses, thereby enabling him to take music courses. Through summer school and correspondence courses, he was able to graduate at the young age of 21 with a Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics, and also certified in Arkansas for mathematics as well as choral and instrumental music.

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EARLY PROFESSIONAL As a first year teacher in 1960, Robbins secured a job with the Clinton, Arkansas public schools teaching 7th grade mathematics as well as junior and senior high band and choir. During this time, he immediately began graduate school by enrolling in the evening courses. In 1961, he applied for and received a position as Principal of Adrian (MO) high school, a small school of one-hundred-fifty students, in which the posted position noted that the principal should also be able to teach mathematics courses. While Principal at Adrian (MO) High School in 1962, Robbins completed an M.Ed. degree in Educational Administration at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. After this early experience as a high school principal, he aspired to become the principal of a larger school, but his young age and relatively meager experience made this prospect unlikely without additional qualifications. Thus, he returned to the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville and enrolled in the EdD program in Educational Administration and completed a dissertation on Trends in Student Activity Offerings in the Public Secondary Schools of Arkansas. The University required doctoral students to be full-time students, requiring that he resign his position in Adrian (MO) and lived on savings, part-time work, and help from his family until his Ed.D. degree was conferred in 1965. Upon graduation, he initially searched for a position as principal of a larger high school. College and university teaching had not yet crossed his mind, but his major professor arranged for him an interview for a faculty position at the University of Mississippi. He was encouraged to go to the job interview in Oxford, MS, and was extended an offer to teach graduate courses in educational administration as well as some undergraduate courses. A prestigious offer, with summer teaching stipend, the salary was $10,000 per year, an extraordinary compensation for 1965. Robbins stayed at the University of Mississippi for nine years, moving quickly through the ranks and receiving promotion to professor and chair, Department of Educational Administration and Foundations of Education. During the years at the University of Mississippi (1965-1974), his scholarly production was significant. Robbins published seven books, chapters in two additional books, seventeen articles, ten book reviews, fifteen ERIC documents, seventeen unpublished papers and reports, eleven major papers and presentations, and directed twenty-four dissertations. He received two large grants to investigate issues related to educational administration within the state of Mississippi. The first, in 1967, was a $12,000 grant from the Mississippi Department of Education to develop maintenance and custodial handbooks. The second investigation, conducted from 1972-1974, was a $20,000 grant from the Mississippi Governor’s Office of Education and Training to compile legal materials on the

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rights of children and youth. From these two grants came a number of publications along these themes, including two versions of a School Custodian’s Handbook, two versions of an Administrator’s Manual of School Plant Administration, and two books on Mississippi Law. A number of the reports published during this time dealt with contemporary issues and school laws relevant for the time—state laws concerning institutional commitment for mental health problems, legislation on child abuse and neglect, legal status of sex education, the rights of pregnant students, confidential and privileged communications among professionals, child labor laws, health rights of children, students rights to an education, students rights on dress and grooming, and laws regarding teaching dismissal for incompetence. In addition to the reports published on school law during this time, Robbins wrote some about predictors of school quality and personal characteristics of teacher education. These early writings were the foundation for a career in Educational Administration and they positioned Robbins as a generalist in his field, with a broad knowledge of many contemporary issues. This general background in Educational issues, policy, and law became the foundation for the later years in which he became more actively involved in shaping educational policy through universities, state organizations, and federal legislation: Early on in my academic career, I was doing some teaching of undergraduates, and deliberately choose to teach an introductory survey course at the University of Mississippi—last time I taught an appreciable number of undergraduates, and that was many years ago. We had then an introduction to Education course. I had great fun doing that. I have always considered myself a generalist. I have always enjoyed teaching survey courses. At the University of Mississippi for thirty-six consecutive semesters I taught an introduction to Educational Administration course and enjoyed that because it gave me a chance to dabble in all aspects of administration in a survey course. At the beginning, I was a generalist. Over time, my interests have gradually shifted. (Robbins, pers. comm.)

After a successful tenure at the University of Mississippi for almost a decade, an opportunity arose to move closer to his hometown in Conway, AR. Through a friend from graduate school, Robbins was asked to apply for an appointment as Dean, School of Education, the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. After a formal interview process, he was offered the position and served as Dean for five years (1974-1979), supervising six departments and the Center for Child Development and Education. He was awarded tenure at the University of Arkansas in 1976. During this time, his scholarship continued to focus on topics of contemporary relevance—educator preparation programs, forced desegregation in Little Rock, educational quality, and innovations in schools. As Dean of a Col-

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lege of Education in the late 1970s, he received funding to investigate issues related to mainstreaming the handicapped and operating a sex discrimination institute. During the 1977-1978 academic year, Robbins was awarded one year of leave to serve as an American Council on Education Fellow. The University of Arkansas agreed to pay his salary for a year under the condition that he completed the fellowship at Georgia State University in Atlanta, which was considered to be a larger and more prestigious University. Under this arrangement, he was charged with reading about and studying the administration of an urban university. At the end of this year, he returned to Arkansas for an additional year to share the knowledge he gained. Not long after the Fellowship ended, Georgia State created a new administrative position, Vice President for Academic Affairs. Robbins was invited to apply for this position and after an interview process, was awarded the position. He spent twelve years in Atlanta from 1979-1991. The years at Georgia State were a time of continual growth and change. During the first five years that he served as Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, Robbins was assigned to a series of one or more full-time jobs as people resigned and retired, including supervising the Research Office, Interim Director of the Division of Continuing Education, Interim Dean of Admissions, and Interim Dean of the College of Education. After a year as Interim Dean of the College of Education, he was appointed Dean College of Education at Georgia State University and remained in that capacity for six years. Although in many ways returning to the position of Dean was not a new experience, it offered a break from the burn-out of changing positions each year, and came with an attractive salary offer.

KAPPA DELTA PI During the years at Georgia State University, Robbins became highly visible within the leadership of Kappa Delta Pi. His initial involvement with the society began when he was induced as a member in 1964 while engaged in doctoral studies at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. During the next forty-six years, he became extensively involved in the local chapters at the University of Mississippi, The University of Arkansas at Little Rock, Georgia State University, and Eastern Michigan University, as well as in the Executive Council of the Society. He served first as a cocounselor of the chapter at the University of Mississippi and was instrumental in organizing and serving as the initial counselor of new chapters at the University of Arkansas Little Rock and Georgia State University. On accepting the faculty appointment at the University of Mississippi, he immediately was asked to serve as co-counselor in order that he might

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accompany any male student presidents to Convocation. Through this arrangement, he was able to attend Convocation on several occasions and become familiar with the operations of the Society. He served as a delegate for Convocation twenty-two times between 1966 and 2009, enabling him to become immersed in the workings of the Society and serving on the Resolutions Committee, and the Constitution and Bylaws Committee before holding the office of Vice President for Chapter Development from 1978-1980. During these years, he published thirteen book reviews on topics of the day in The Educational Forum. Many of his writings were rebuttals to conservative reform efforts of the time (Robbins 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1976). His first major initiative with the Society was simplification of the petitioning process for new chapters. On moving to the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, he discovered that no local chapter existed there. He assumed the task of organizing a new chapter. At that time, requirements for organizing a new chapter included sizeable amounts of paperwork that took months to collect. The process of organizing the chapter became an annoyance, particularly because the basis of Kappa Delta Pi membership relied on local chapters, although the process seemed almost prohibitive to the straightforward petitioning for new chapters. After much consideration, he chose to run for Vice President of Chapter Development and was elected in 1978. As Robbins explained, prior to the 1970s, requirements for organizing new chapters had been added and piled onto the process without consideration of the consequences for chapters at the local level. For instance, the Society required that transcripts be sent to KDP Headquarters for every potential student to be inducted in the initial ceremony, a process that was extremely time consuming—identifying individuals, permission for transcripts, securing transcripts, and sending them all to Headquarters. Another requirement for new chapter applications was to write lengthy description about the campus and campus facilities (Robbins, pers. comm.). During his tenure as Vice President for Chapter Development, Robbins challenged the Executive Council to consider the purpose and rationale for the process. Although concern was expressed about ensuring the induction of appropriately qualified people, the council ultimately agreed to simplify and streamline the process for organizing new chapters. Robbins later organized a chapter at Georgia State University, and commented that the process was indeed much simpler than the earlier one he completed at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. (Robbins, pers. comm.) A number of new chapters were chartered in the years following this policy change and the records indicate that the Society installed several chapters each year rather than one or two only. Minutes of the Executive Council in 1982 indicate that sixteen chapters were installed during

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the 1980-1982 biennium, nine additional chapters were approved but not yet installed, and the council received letters of inquiry from six more (Meeting of the Executive Council, September 14, 1982). These initial appointments exposed him to the Executive Council and the areas of his interest as an Educational Administrator – policy, administration, and finance—and lead to his successful candidacy for Presidentelect in 1980 and the four year cycle that followed as President (19821984) and Past President (1984-1986). A major focus of the Executive Council during Robbins’ presidency was the revision of and documentation of the Society’s policies and procedures. Robbins observed that the Society had grown over the years in terms of numbers, finances, and scope of activities without enough attention to formalization of systems and establishment of written policies to govern actions of the Executive Council, officers, and Headquarters staff. At the time, most procedures were informal and kept “in the executive secretary’s head” rather than written down (Robbins, pers. comm.). No formal policies guided operations and all record keeping was done manually rather than with technology. During the Presidency of O. L. Davis, Jr. (1980-1982) the council had begun to identify areas in need of greater structure. During Robbins’ Presidency, he led the Council to make deliberate choices (1) to put its decisions in writing, (2) to evaluate efforts that it undertook, and (3) to revise policies to reflect any changes made (Robbins, pers. comm.). These efforts were intended to provide a written record for future executive councils and secretaries that would clarify the Society policies and procedures. For the time, these acts were an unusual and progressive move and lay the foundation for the Society to operate on a more modern basis, and this decision triggered a number of amendments to constitution and bylaws. The minutes from the executive council meetings during this biennium are quite detailed, including more than one hundred pages of formally typed minutes. During this time period, a number of the executive council meetings included discussion of automating some of the chapter record keeping through computer programs. Initially, Lafayette Automated Data Services was contracted to generate “the Society’s computer work” and the financial statement indicated an expense of $2450 per month as well as the need to invest in a printer and several terminals. Other micro computer systems were considered from competitors IBM, CADO, and Basic IV for purchase prices ranging from $75,000-$100,000. The CADO system was accepted and the council recommended that all staff members be trained to use the new system, which included word processing. The terms included lease of the hardware, due to the rapid changes in technology. Throughout this period, the council pressed for improved and automated record keeping.

202 B. W. WHITEMAN The Executive Secretary is hereby directed by the Executive Council to cause to be entered to the Society’s record-keeping procedures, preferably in the computer, such that it can easily be retrieved and analyzed, all the information received from the chapter annual reports. (Minutes of the Executive Council, February 4, 1983)

Agenda items covered the range of practical business matters of the Society during this time period, including installation of new chapters, approval of chapter counselors, approving pins, stationery, and tokens of expression, a variety of budgetary items, liability insurance, repairs to the headquarters building, and a discussion of the development of a staff evaluation system. Robbins appointed a committee of the three presidents to develop the evaluation system. During these years, Jack R. Frymier (The Ohio State University) edited The Educational Forum and Gerald Ponder (University of North Texas) was appointed to edit Kappa Delta Pi Record. Marcella Kysilka, Vice President for Chapter Development, developed a handbook to guide counselors through the procedures of installing chapters (Minutes of the Executive Council, June 4, 1982). A theme for the biennium leading to the 1984 Convocation was Beyond 1984: Education for Freedom, Strength, and Peace. The Executive Council commissioned an artist to develop a poster advertising the Convocation in Montreal. The Posters were distributed to each chapter as well as attendees at the 1982 conference and the Regional Conferences in 1983 at a cost to the Society of less than $2 per poster. In addition, a committee was established to implement the Convocation theme, and to develop a “Theme Implementation Booklet.” Robbins published three articles in the winter, spring, and summer 1984 editions of the Record based on the theme used for Convocation and comparing the current educational condition to Orwell’s famous novel. In the first, he discussed the challenges of science and technology and urged the use of responsible technology and the importance of personal writings and physical ownership of books as essential to education. The automated and computerized process should not replace the older print forms in an educated and free society (Robbins 1984). The second, published in winter 1984, emphasizes clarity of language, arguing that slang and jargon distort thinking and distract from larger meanings (Robbins 1984). The third, published in summer, urged academic excellence and the development of strong minds as essential for education for freedom, strength, and peace (Robbins 1984). Members of the executive council spent a great deal of time together throughout the biennium, meeting at the Society Headquarters in West Lafayette, IN, twice in Atlanta, GA, Hilton Head, SC, New Orleans, LA, and at the Convocation in Montreal, Canada. Meetings generally lasted two full days from early morning until late at night. Three members

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served as President during the terms immediately before or after Robbins’ term: O. L. Davis, Jr. (1980-1982), Ross Palmer (1984-1986), and Marcella L. Kysilka (1986-1988). Also on the executive council during that time were John Merryman, William Alexander, and Mack Welford. Robbins has kept in contact with most of these council members throughout the years with the exception of Linda Shepherd, the student counselor at the time. Although the group dealt with and accomplished substantive things during this time period, in his own words, the things most remembered tended to be humorous and offbeat (Robbins, pers. comm.). Mack Welford, Alumni Counselor at the time, had injured his back and could only sit up for short periods of time. Somehow, he managed to get to the Executive Council meeting, and immediately announced that he needed to go to bed and must be flat on his back. We said, well, we need you to participate in this meeting. Finally, the compromise we reached was we had a bed rolled into the meeting room and Mack stretched out on that bed. We conducted our business for quite a few hours with him stretched out on a bed. I had to change the seating arrangement where I could see that his hand went up if he wanted to speak. We still joke about his doing it from his bed. Several things like that are basically what we remember from that time. We were doing substantive stuff, but we remember the offbeat things like that. (Robbins, pers. comm.)

Serving on the executive council came during the mid-phase of his career. However, his involvement with Kappa Delta Pi has extended for more than fifty years, beginning with his initiation in 1961. After holding offices in the executive council from 1978-1986, Robbins has remained active in the Society through the publications committee, search committees, and serving as a juror for the scholarship foundation. He continues to attend Convocation each biennium and serve as a delegate, is actively involved with the History Committee for the Centennial Celebration at Convocation in 2011, and maintains regular communication with the Society Headquarters. Recently, he established the Jerry Robbins Scholarship within the Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation. It will be available competitively for an outstanding undergraduate who intends to teach instrumental music in schools. The first recipient has yet to be named (Robbins, pers. comm.). LATER PROFESSIONAL In 1991, Robbins accepted a position as Dean of the College of Education at Eastern Michigan University, the nation’s largest producer of educators, and spent 14 years as Dean before retiring in 2005. As a Dean, he was actively involved in the National Council for accreditation of Teacher

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Education process by leading Colleges of Education through the process, and also by writing visiting team reports for other universities. At Eastern Michigan, he edited the Institutional Report submitted for NCATE accreditation and submitted the nation’s first totally electronic submission of materials. During this next phase of his career, he continued to demonstrate leadership in the field and began to focus even more on influencing policy and large scale decision making. He wrote and presented conference papers on issues in higher education, best teaching practices, highly qualified teachers, teacher preparation, influencing state policy, instructional use of the Internet, professional development, test results for program improvement, and reform legislation. He has engaged in extensive consulting for public schools, and served in leadership roles in countless professional organizations, including the Presidency of the State Association of Colleges of Teacher Education in Arkansas, Georgia, and Michigan. At each phase of his career, he was involved in educational policy, serving on educational committees, and lobbying for policy decisions in education. He has testified for numerous educational organizations, State Boards of Educations, and before the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on 21st Century Competitiveness to influence policy and decision making. In 2010, he was pulled from retirement to mentor and to serve as a consultant for a promising interim dean at Eastern Michigan University at which he currently is Dean Emeritus. When asked about his greatest professional achievement, not surprising perhaps, Robbins mentioned the construction of a new Professional Education Building at Eastern Michigan University. At one point I became interested in working with school buildings. You’ll find various references to working with K-12 districts in various ways to plan for school facilities in various ways—planning large-scale district wide, or planning for an auditorium in a particular high school, and things of that sort. I went through a phase when I was particularly interested in school buildings. That came in handy when we were planning for a new building at Eastern Michigan. I was in good shape to talk with architects because I knew all the jargon and that sort of thing. We ended up not building a new building, but totally remodeling an existing building. I had fun doing that. (Robbins, pers. comm.)

He explained that the facilities at Eastern Michigan at the time he arrived in 1991, had been some of the worst in the nation—scattered throughout the campus and all in very poor condition, without appropriate classrooms, offices, or technology. The physical environment made it very difficult to foster creative and innovative professional education programs. The remodeling of an older building into a state of the art building in 2000 took years to complete through fundraising, planning, and construction. In

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many ways, this is a fitting capstone project for an Educational Administrator—leaving practical and tactical legacies for the thousands of individuals who will follow. His career has grown steadily through a series of practical and tactical projects—manuals of operation, guide and procedure books, buildings and facilities, record keeping and automation, technology, establishing policy, securing funding, student legal rights, school quality, evaluation instruments, program reports, accreditation reports, and most importantly, leading others to work together in groups to accomplish larger goals. In many ways, these practical and tangible legacies embody his leadership in Kappa Delta Pi. After a long and varied career, serving in many capacities, Robbins remains a leader in professional education. He has served in multiple institutions, states, and professional organizations and seen a great deal of change throughout the decades. One theme that runs throughout his career is his involvement in the application of technology to the field of education and to the ideal of science. When he spoke of his own K-12 education, he mentioned that no modern technology was available—he had not even seen an overhead projector before graduate school. This limited creativity and innovation in teaching pedagogy and forced a textbook and teacher-centric curriculum. He has stayed current with technology, mentioning that early in his career, he was often the only person in the entire school that could thread a 15 mm movie. During his years as Kappa Delta Pi president, he led in moving and maintaining Society records into a computer data base. In his work with facilities, he took care to see that appropriate technology was available for educators so that it would not limit creativity and innovation in pedagogy. In his most recent professional activities, he was a member of the Michigan Association of Computer Users in Learning from 1992-2004. He was even the first in the nation to submit an entire NCATE accreditation application electronically. At the same time, his writings from the 1984 theme in The Forum indicate that despite his proficiency with technology and the usefulness that he saw with it, he urged caution to use science and technology responsibly. He argued then that thinking, personal thoughts and writings, and physical books are essential for education and freedom. As technology continues to develop and spread into the 21st century, there is much discussion of 21st century skills and learning—one of the topics he addressed with the United States Congress. His philosophy of education is still one that argues for a liberal arts education, rather than one driven by technology skills and workforce preparation (Robbins, pers. comm.). In his retirement, Robbins continues to be a life-long learner and to nurture his own curiosity and intellect. He is actively involved in community music programs through conducting instrumental ensembles and playing his trombone. Although he spent only one year as an instrumental music

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teacher, he has continued to teach music by directing community bands and staying actively involved in the music programs of the United Methodist Church. He has traveled extensively throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands, and internationally in the Caribbean, Central and South America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the South Pacific, China, and Canada.

REFERENCES Minutes of the Executive Council, Kappa Delta Pi, Telephone Conference. September 14, 1982. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Minutes of the Executive Council, Kappa Delta Pi, West Lafayette, Indiana. June 4-5, 1982. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Minutes of the Executive Council, Kappa Delta Pi, Telephone Conference. August 13, 1982. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Minutes of the Executive Council, Kappa Delta Pi, Atlanta, Georgia. February 4-5, 1983. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Minutes of the Executive Council, Kappa Delta Pi, Hilton Head, South Carolina. June 3-4, 1983. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Minutes of the Executive Council, Kappa Delta Pi, New Orleans, Louisiana. December 1-3, 1983. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Minutes of the Executive Council, Kappa Delta Pi, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. April 3, 1984. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Robbins, Jerry. 1968. Professional student teaching programs. The Educational Forum 32: 525-526. Robbins, Jerry. 1969. The teacher and administrative relationships in school systems. The Educational Forum 33: 253-254. Robbins, Jerry. 1969. Administering elementary schools: Concepts and practices. The Educational Forum 33: 549-550. Robbins, Jerry. 1970. Bureaucracy in education. The Educational Forum 34: 263264.

Jerry H. Robbins (1982-1984) 207 Robbins, Jerry. 1970. In-service education: A guide to better practice. The Educational Forum 35: 127-128. Robbins, Jerry. 1971. The economics and financing of education. The Educational Forum 35: 225-226. Robbins, Jerry. 1971. Private wealth and public education. The Educational Forum 35: 557-559. Robbins, Jerry. 1972. The art of negotiation: Roles, games, logic. The Educational Forum 37: 122. Robbins, Jerry. 1973. Economics and education. The Educational Forum 37: 366367. Robbins, Jerry. 1974. When parochial schools close. The Educational Forum 38: 372-373. Robbins, Jerry. 1975. Quality education for less money. The Educational Forum 39: 368-369. Robbins, Jerry. 1976. The case against college. The Educational Forum 40: 378. Robbins, Jerry. 1977. On the meaning of the university. The Educational Forum 41: 380-382. Robbins, Jerry. 1984. Nineteen eighty-four--the use of language. Kappa Delta Pi Record, 20(3): 68-72. Robbins, Jerry. 1984. Education for freedom, strength, and peace. Kappa Delta Pi Record 20(4): 100-103. Robbins, Jerry. 1984. Beyond nineteen eighty-four: The challenges of science and technology. Kappa Delta Pi Record 20(2): 35-39.

CHAPTER 19

WILLIAM ROSS PALMER (1984-1986) Standing in Front of Lions Antonio J. Castro and Sarah B. Shear

W. Ross Palmer 1984-1986 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 209–219 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Kappa Delta Pi has a long tradition of commitment to excellence—as a Society, in the local chapters, and, most importantly perhaps, personally. Let’s be proud of what we’ve accomplished and where we’ve been. Let’s be proud of what we are accomplishing and where we are. And with Knowledge, Duty, Power, let us plan what we can accomplish and where we can be as we continue our quest for excellence. (Palmer 1984a)

William Ross Palmer served as president of Kappa Delta Pi from 19841986, leading the society towards its 75th year anniversary. During the 1986 Convocation in Denver, Colorado, the theme, “75 Years of Commitment to Excellence in Education: Continuing the Quest” was present in all aspects of the meeting, from the presentations and speakers to the Tshirts and gold-trimmed coffee mugs which were for sale at the event (Palmer 1986a). For Ross Palmer, these lines from the KDP initiation ceremony embodied the ideals of excellence: “We greet you as fellows in the quest for a full, knowledgeable, and useful life. We are united in a profession whose challenge is to inspire young and old to grow by using their heritage” (Palmer 1984b, 96). Rather than simply being knowledgeable, excellence requires making a contribution to one’s society and community. In making such a contribution, the professional educator exhibits not only competence, but caring and diligence. Hence, only good persons, those concerned with the betterment of children and society, make for great teachers. Palmer’s ideas about excellence in education evolved from his experiences of growing up in the small, rural Mississippi town of Crystal Springs (Hardcastle 1983). “I grew up thinking education was important,” he said (Palmer, pers. comm.). Both his parents and the teachers in his school expected academic achievement and excellence. Indeed, his own parents had attended the same school and had been taught by many of his same teachers. With such strong communication between parents and teachers and even among neighbors, Palmer confirmed that “In a small town you knew if you didn’t do right, your parents were going to know about it” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Early on, his first grade teacher, Ms. Esther Magners, defined for him the qualities of the ideal teacher. He recalled, “She made you feel comfortable, and she inspired you to do what you should do. She worked hard with you, and I really do credit her with giving me a love of school” (Palmer, pers. comm.). In speaking of her character as a teacher, Palmer asserted, “if a lion got out of the Jackson Zoo and came running down in our classroom, well Ms. Esther would stand between the lion and us … for a six-year-old, you get the notion that it was important that we felt, that I felt, she really had our interests at heart” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Having

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such high expectations and genuinely caring for one’s students represented the hallmark of excellence in teaching. Throughout his educational career, Ross Palmer worked to model these qualities for his students, colleagues, and fellow Kadelpians.

THE JOURNEY OF A TEACHER After graduating from Crystal Springs Consolidated School in 1957, Palmer attended Mississippi College, a small private school of about 1,000 students and affiliated with the Mississippi Baptist Convention. His studies focused on secondary mathematics education. According to Palmer, his professors instilled within him a love of teaching. “I had good teachers at Mississippi College … who cared,” he said (Palmer, pers. comm.). These positive experiences at Mississippi College cemented his beliefs that professors of education ought to be models of good teaching. Ross Palmer graduated early from college in 1960 and acquired his initial teaching position in Jackson, Mississippi, at which he taught junior high mathematics for four years. His school consisted of mostly middle class White students at a time prior to integration. The majority of the teachers at the school were young, enthusiastic, and student-centered, creating an atmosphere centered on creativity and learning. Palmer reveled in his teaching, forming life-long relationships with many of his students. In fact, today Palmer remains in contact with a number of his former students through Facebook. Palmer remarked that even though some of these students are now 62 years-old, he still imagines them as 12year-olds. During his initial years of teaching, Palmer acquired a M.Ed. degree in mathematics education in 1962 from his alma mater, Mississippi College. By 1964, the space race ushered in a new age for mathematics education. Having studied New Math as a graduate student, school administrators sought out his expertise to implement a New Mathematics curriculum for their school district. Palmer took the position of curriculum assistant for the Jackson public schools, delivering in one year more than 20 speeches and workshops on the implementation of New Math for elementary teachers and principals. He also offered training on the use of educational media in elementary and secondary classrooms. In addition to the New Math movement, the Jackson School District increased its efforts to integrate students in its classrooms. The district hosted the first racially integrated Parent Teacher Association meeting in Mississippi at which Palmer served as the first speaker, informing parents about the New Math initiative. Although the school district’s plan

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for integration took some time to accomplish, Palmer developed an interest in socio-cultural influences on learning. Palmer saw his work at the curriculum office as “a wonderful learning experience” (Palmer, pers. comm.). He had opportunities to visit numerous teachers and schools and to engage in conversations about improving public education. However, he longed to return to the classroom as a teacher. “I missed teaching terribly,” he admitted (Palmer, pers. comm.). He knew of teachers who had acquired doctoral degrees and considered pursuing college level teaching. He said, “I saw the doctorate as a legitimate way to get back in the classroom” (quoted in Hardcastle 1983, 85). In 1966, Palmer applied for and received a scholarship at the University of Florida to pursue a doctoral program in the Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education. In his graduate studies, Palmer explored further his interest in socio-cultural influences, taking coursework in sociology, philosophy, and anthropology. In his dissertation, he investigated differences in how African American and Anglo American educators responded to various hypothetical situations. Palmer felt ready to return to the classroom; he said, “I really missed teaching … and I wanted to get a doctorate, and that was a good way to get back into teaching” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Palmer accepted a position as Instructor in the College of Education, University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. When he completed his dissertation and was awarded an Ed.D. degree in 1969, he was promoted to Assistant Professor. When asked what drew him to Alabama, he recalled being questioned by the chairperson of the department about why he liked teaching. Palmer replied that he wanted to help students in his classes achieve their goals. The chairperson challenged him, suggesting that many professors enjoyed showing students how smart they were. Palmer reaffirmed his commitment to serving his students. When offered the position, his chairperson said he appreciated how Palmer stood firm on his beliefs about teaching. Ross Palmer served as professor, associate dean, assistant dean, and interim dean over the course of his tenure at the University of Alabama. He retired in 2005.

THE HEART OF A TEACHER As a professor at the University of Alabama, Ross Palmer taught both undergraduate and graduate courses in the social foundations of education with titles such as Foundations of Education, Intercultural Understanding, and Humanism and Education. “I don’t call myself a major researcher,” he has said (Palmer, pers. comm.). Rather, he understood himself as a teacher first, helping his students, most of them future educators, to acquire the essential qualities of understanding, caring and com-

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mitment to excellence that make for exceptional teachers. He explained, “I like to think most of my decisions were based on what’s good for the kids and what’s good for the school, what’s good for the society” (Palmer, pers. comm.). His ethic of caring transcended his teaching practices, his decision making as an administrator, and later his involvement with Kappa Delta Pi. Palmer’s proudest moments in his university teaching career occurred when his students achieved their own personal success. For example, Joyce Sellers, who was actively involved in both the university’s Xi chapter of Kappa Delta Pi and later at the national level having served on the 1986 Convocation Committee, was recognized by the University of Alabama as a distinguished Alumnus in 2003. Sellers also acquired her doctoral degree at University of Alabama. Palmer described Sellers in the following way, “Joyce was a fantastic teacher, a fantastic person, and a great administrator. … Her total motivation was always what’s good for kids, what’s good for teachers, what’s good for the school” (Palmer, pers. comm.). For Palmer, these qualities formed the heart of the successful teacher. “Maybe I influenced her somehow,” he hoped, “That’s one of things that I feel good about” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Palmer recounted the achievements of many of his former university students, expressing satisfaction at their success. One of Palmer’s duties at the university required him to hear the appeals of undergraduate students who failed to maintain the minimum grade requirements to remain in the college. As he considered each appeal, he often asked, “Is there anything I can see here that would make me think that this person would be a great teacher and do I think that enough to think I would want him or her to teach my children or grandchildren?” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Palmer consistently drew on his commitment to serving others as the basis for many of his decisions in this capacity. If a student demonstrated personable qualities, he often would make agreements to assist them to increase their GPA by permitting them extra time and support. Throughout his career at the university level, Palmer recognized the influence that he (and all the teachers) had on students. He believed that as a professor “you have some sort of influence on those people directly and people they touched indirectly as years go by” (Palmer, pers. comm.). When he visited the classrooms of many of his former students, he noted how many of them applied some of the strategies he taught them, such as using grade contracts or building relationship with students. However, Palmer constantly worked to improve his knowledge and practice as a teacher educator so as to contribute to the betterment of his students. During the ninth year of his employment at the University of Alabama, Palmer returned to the public school classroom as part of a sabbatical. For

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that year, Palmer taught in his former school district. He asserted, “Although college-level teachers certainly should be able to stay abreast of changes in theory, there is a vast difference between knowing theory and having recent experiential knowledge obtained from being ‘on the firing line’ in a classroom each day” (Palmer 1982, 212). His year-long return to the classroom, which he documented in his article, “A View from a Sabbatical,” enabled him to refine his work as a teacher educator at the university level (Palmer 1982). He argued, “We must make our courses as relevant to the problems of education and teaching as possible” (Palmer 1982, 219). Palmer acknowledged that universities should address more practical concerns in addition to theoretical issues associated with teaching. As a result of his sabbatical experience, he realized that “it was necessary as much as you could to know what was going on in the schools” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Even now, Palmer’s teaching certificate remains current and up-to-date. As a university educator, Palmer strove to help each of his students become highly qualified teachers, treating each person individually. “My bottom line,” he remarked, “would I want this person to teach someone who was related to me?” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Excellence in education always began with the teacher as a good person. Teachers ought to develop not only excellence, but also a strong character. This concern led Ross Palmer readily to accept and pursue the ideals of Kappa Delta Pi.

THE PATHWAY TO LEADERSHIP Ross Palmer first encountered Kappa Delta Pi during the completion of his M.Ed. degree. He was initiated into the Mississippi College’s Iota Beta chapter in 1961 and soon became an officer. By 1962, Palmer was elected president of his chapter and attended his first Convocation in Chicago. He recalled feeling a spirit of excellence in education at the event. “That was just exciting,” he said (Palmer, pers. comm.). At the Convocation, he saw and heard E. I. F. Williams, the Society’s Executive Secretary and, at the time, the editor for the organization’s publications. This experience reaffirmed his interest in KDP, or as Palmer put it, “I kept up my membership” (Palmer, pers. comm.). Upon arriving at the University of Alabama, Palmer became the associate counselor, then counselor, for the Xi Chapter, a position he held for some 35 years. The Xi chapter flourished. It grew in membership, hosting three initiations a year, and building a strong corps of leaders. “I think association with other like-minded people is invaluable,” Palmer spoke of the chapter (Palmer, pers. comm.). He characterized the officers as outstanding examples of leadership and teaching. Each year the leadership placed tremen-

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dous importance on the initiation ceremony for new members. According to Palmer, “We tried to have a really impressive initiation to make it look like the quality organization that we believed that it was” (Palmer, pers. comm.). The chapter officers included both experienced teachers, as well as novice teachers “who bring new blood and new ideas” to the chapter (Palmer, pers. comm.). The success of the Xi chapter gained the attention of other leaders in KDP. In fact, while attending a regional meeting in St. Louis, Palmer shared a taxicab ride back to the airport with a staff member from the Society Headquarters who encouraged him to run for a leadership position in Kappa Delta Pi. In 1980, Palmer became Vice President for Student Activities and a member of the Executive Council. In 1982, he was elected to the position of president-elect, and then served as president, 1984-86, and Past President, 1986-1988. Throughout his leadership at the Society level, Palmer promoted the ideals of leadership and excellence in education. He and his colleagues, for example, offered strategies for other chapters in their 1982, “Beyond 1984: Education for Freedom, Strength, Peace—A Chapter Manual for Theme Implementation” (Cockriel et al. 1982). Later, in 1983 Palmer and others offered financial advice for chapters in their article “Some Tips on Filing the Annual Financial Report: Being an Non-Delinquent Chapter is Easy!,” in Kappa Delta Pi Record (Palmer, Van Every and Sellers 1983). In 1984, Anne Tishler and he contributed a thought-provoking article comparing the ways in which Kadelpians and principals viewed effective teaching. They concluded that “Kadelpians and principals agreed on some generic teaching skills, but differed over the importance of humanistic versus management behaviors” (Tishler and Palmer 1984, 111). Palmer also wrote about how to conduct initiations and elect chapter officers (Palmer 1985a, 1985b). These writings both assisted chapter leaders with how to improve their organizations, as well as provoked discussion about important ideas related to teaching. After he became a Society officer, Palmer looked to others for guidance. “You sort of watch the things happening and you get into the swing of things,” he recalled. Jerry Robins, a former president of KDP, served as a role model. Both worked well with the staff at Headquarters and with others on the Executive Council. When Palmer became president, he inherited a growing and dynamic organization, with experienced and supportive colleagues on the Executive Council. Palmer described the Council as having a “good spirit,” one in which persons were willing to make whatever sacrifice for the greater good of the organization (Palmer, pers. comm.).

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75 YEARS OF EXCELLENCE: THE 1984-1986 BIENNIUM In 1984, Palmer presided over the first meeting of the Executive Council during his presidency. As one of the first items on the agenda, he announced that the Society had ordered an Apple IIe word processor and corresponding printer. This announcement marked a transition from the days of typewriters to the use of computer processing. The early and mid1980’s represented a time of beginning technological advancements for society at large, while also a period of growth, expansion, and stabilization for KDP (A Brief History of Kappa Delta Pi). By 1986, Kappa Delta Pi included some 399 chapters and more than 43,000 members. The Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation, chartered in 1980 under the leadership of President Richard L. Judd, awarded its first Laureate Doctoral Scholarship in 1985. The first non-U.S. chapter was chartered at the University of Calgary in 1981 under the leadership of President O. L. Davis, Jr., and the 1984 Convocation had been held outside the US for the first time in Montreal, Canada (Kappa Delta Pi: 100 Years of Excellence Timeline). Given the dramatic growth of the KDP, Executive Council meetings often dealt with a series of issues. Often meetings lasted over an entire weekend. Palmer wrote, “items considered by the ‘real people’ attending the most recent Executive Council meeting were many and varied, ranging from the minor, relatively routine considerations to decisions which have far-reaching implications for Kappa Delta Pi” (Palmer 1985c, 6). Under Palmer’s leadership, the Executive Council faced the challenge of managing relationships with the various chapters and its membership, planning for the future of the organization, and sustaining the viability of its current programs and ideals. Palmer defined the first major task facing the Executive Council as “fine tuning” the Society (Palmer 1986a). With chapters increasing in size to as many as 406, several policies needed to be created to prevent abuses from occurring in some chapters while also promoting the development and improvement of other chapters (Palmer 1985d, 1). The modest restructuring of the organization became the focus of a special meeting called a “blue sky” meeting held in Texas at which the Executive Council met to deliberate about the future of the Society. As part of the restructuring, the Executive Council adopted of a series of new policies which included the suspension of membership, impeachment of officers, removal of committee and board members, and removal of chapter counselors. Further examples of this “fine tuning” of the organization included closing loopholes in existing policies and creating contingency plans for the organization as whole. As a second goal of this “fine tuning” initiative, the Executive Council sought to facilitate greater chapter development and continuity. By the

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spring of 1986, the Society established established the Leadership Update newsletter to improve communication between Headquarters and chapter counselors and presidents. Furthermore, the Executive Council authorized and distributed the Leadership Manual, a binder of policies, guidelines, strategies, and resources for KDP chapters, and established a tollfree phone line for chapter counselors and officers to use when contacting Headquarters. Finally, plans included providing leadership training and workshops for counselors and officers and provisions for a chapter field representative (Palmer 1986b). The efforts of the Executive Council under Palmer’s leadership helped set the stage for the breath and depth of resources which are now available to chapter counselors and officers on the KDP website today. The Executive Council also promoted initiatives to capture the interest and motivations of Kadelpians. Study/Travel tours welcomed Kadelpians to learn about other countries and to broaden their appreciation for global differences. Palmer served as a co-leader for Study/Travel Tours to China, South Africa, and East and West Germany. Writing about a trip to South Africa, Palmer affirmed that these tours primarily were about study and not pleasure. He described his observations about apartheid in South Africa as being complex and difficult to understand. While he and others on the tour encountered some signs of apartheid, they also witnessed integration, collaboration, and interaction between Whites and Blacks. Palmer reported having more questions than answers after his experience of visiting South Africa. As a result of this fact-finding tour, Palmer admitted that “the facts oftentimes seemed contradictory” (Palmer 1986c, 50). This study tour facilitated deeper consideration of complex issues and global differences. The Executive Council in 1985 also sponsored a series of five regional conferences at Jacksonville, Florida; Las Vegas, Nevada; St. Louis, Missouri; Houston, Texas; and Long Island, New York. The conferences purported three major goals: professional improvement of members, chapter development/training, and professional fellowship among members and others. The conferences in 1985 featured a job fair program, in which school district personnel officials attended the conference to recruit potential teacher applicants. In addition, the conferences also utilized Laureate Chapter members as keynote speakers. Despite the cost, Palmer believed that these regional conferences reached members not traditionally attracted to the biennial Convocation. In fact, in 1985, many of these conferences awarded professional development credit for practicing teachers (Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi 1984). “I do remember I had a fondness for regional conferences,” Palmer admitted, “and we worked pretty hard and had some really good experiences” (Palmer, pers. comm.).

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Perhaps the most visible legacy of Palmer’s tenure on the Executive Council was the approval of the use of graduation honor cords for its membership (Executive Council meeting, February 14, 1985). “One of the things I’ve noticed at graduations,” Palmer reflected, “is that kids are wearing honor cords. We all are humans to the extent that we [like to realize that] … we’ve done well” (Palmer, pers. comm.). For Palmer, the honor cord offered a visual representation at Commencements of the hard work and dedication of local members of Kappa Delta Pi. At the beginning of his presidency, Palmer wrote, “One of the most important elements involved in the proper functioning of any organization or group that strives for excellence seems to be planning” (Palmer 1984a, 1). He asserted that as president he would “stimulate and coordinate many aspects of the myriad planning efforts of the Society” (Palmer 1984a, 1). At the end of his presidency, Palmer acknowledged the tremendous responsibilities that weighed upon the Executive Council. While many achievements and accomplishments occurred during the 19841986 Biennium, Palmer expressed gratitude for the commitment of fellow Executive Committee members, writing that “One reason this [success] has been possible is that the ‘chemistry’ of the current Executive Council has been right, and the primary motivation of all attending has seemed to be the good of Kappa Delta Pi rather than any personal gain” (Palmer 1986b, 84). Echoing the sentiments of excellence established by Ms. Esther, his teacher many years ago, KDP embodied both the high expectations and strong ethic of caring that enables good people to become exceptional teachers.

THE HOPE FOR KAPPA DELTA PI When asked about the future of Kappa Delta Pi, Palmer stated, “I want it to be a strong influence on education. I want it to be an honor society into which the best and the brightest are inducted” (Palmer, pers. comm.). However, he also held that an organization must be measured not only by its accomplishments, but also by its ideals. Kappa Delta Pi, in Palmer’s assessment, brings together “the youngest undergraduate students to the most esteemed Laureates … [to] share membership, ideas, and fellowship together in our Society. Thus, the beginner and the master share our common goals, our common ideals, and our common commitment to excellence” (Palmer 1986b, 85). These goals, ideals, and commitments to excellence will sustain Kappa Delta Pi and the future generation of Kadelpians for the next 100 years.

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REFERENCES Cockriel, Irvin, C. Douglas, J. Fox, L. Mathis, John Merryman, Ross Palmer, Jerry Robbins, and E. Tway, Eds. 1982. Beyond 1984: Education for freedom, strength, peace—A chapter handbook for theme implementation. Indiana: Kappa Delta Pi. Executive Council of Kappa Delta Pi. 1984. Minutes of the Executive Council Meeting of Kappa Delta Pi, June 10-11. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Hardcastle, Beverly. 1983. Ross Palmer. Kappa Delta Pi Record 10 (3): 84-85. Kappa Delta Pi. No date. A brief history of Kappa Delta Pi. http://kdp.org/ aboutkdp/ourhistory.php. Kappa Delta Pi. No date. Kappa Delta Pi: 100 years of excellence timeline. http:// www.kdp.org/100years/KDP_timeline.html. Palmer, William Ross. 1982. A view from a sabbatical. Educational Leadership 22 (3): 211-219. Palmer, William Ross. 1984a. From the president: Planning for Excellence. Scroll and Stylus 2 (3): 1; 11. Palmer, William Ross. 1984b. The 75th Anniversary of the founding of Kappa Delta Pi: An Introductory Statement. Kappa Delta Pi Record 20(3): 96. Palmer, William Ross. 1985a. Conducting an initiation. Leadership Update 1: 4. Palmer, William Ross. 1985b. Election of chapter officers. Leadership Update 1: 4. Palmer, William Ross. 1985c. From the president: Potpourri II: Agenda, executive councils and real people. Scroll and Stylus 3(3): 5-6. Palmer, William Ross.. 1985d. From the president: Potpourri I: Did you know? Scroll and Stylus 3(1): 1, 6. Palmer, William Ross. 1986a. From the president. Scroll and Stylus 3(3): 1; 2. Palmer, William Ross. 1986b. The 1984-86 Biennium in (almost) retrospect. Kappa Delta Pi 22 (3): 83-85. Palmer, William Ross. 1986c. Impressions of South Africa, Suid-Afrika. Kappa Delta Pi Record 22(2): 49-52. Palmer, William Ross, Ivalyn Van Every, and Joyce Sellers. 1983. Some tips on filing the Annual Report: Being a Non-delinquent Chapter is Easy! Kappa Delta Pi Record 20(4): 89-92. Tischler, Anne G., and William Ross Palmer. 1984. Effective teaching: Kadelpians vs. principals. Kappa Delta Pi Record 20(4): 109-112.

CHAPTER 20

MARCELLA L. KYSILKA (1986-1988) Leadership, Professionalism, and Society Management Edmund C. Short

Marcella L. Kysilka 1986-1988 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 221–229 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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During her years of leadership in Kappa Delta Pi, Dr. Marcella L. Kysilka faced numerous challenges and helped change its focus from that of a largely undergraduate honor society in Education to one of a full-fledged professional association serving both educators in their pre-service and early careers as well as those in their mid- and later-careers. She was extremely well suited by temperament, professional experience, and personal and social skills to meet these challenges and to provide strong leadership in successfully reshaping the organization in new directions for the long term. Kysilka was born on June 19, 1941, and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, on the east side of the city, and attended Cleveland Public Schools, K-12. She participated in a gifted education program from early elementary school through graduation from John Adams High School in 1959. She and all her relatives worked in a dairy owned and operated by her parents, Catherine and Edward Kysilka. Her father and brother were marvelous salespeople and could “sell ice to an Eskimo,” she claimed (Kysilka, pers. comm.). Her experience balancing the dairy’s financial books laid the foundation for her later interest in mathematics and her exceptional grasp of financial matters which she was able to put to use in several professional associations, including Kappa Delta Pi, its budget committee, and its Educational Foundation Board. She attended Ohio State University for her BS degree (1962) majoring in mathematics and teaching and minoring in business education and psychology. She taught junior high school mathematics for two years in the Parma (Ohio) Public Schools and earned an M.Ed. degree in Education from Kent State University in 1964. She then taught mathematics for three years at Titusville (Florida) High School (1964-1967). From 19671969, she pursued a PhD degree in Curriculum and Instruction at The University of Texas at Austin. In 1969 she took a faculty position at the University of Central Florida where she moved through the ranks, served as Professor of Education, and took on a number of administrative roles until she retired as Professor Emerita in 2003. The full range of Kysilka’s career and her impact at the University of Central Florida (UCF) during her 34 years there is difficult to encompass. She joined the faculty in Education when the University (then called Florida Technological University and located in the growing metropolis of Orlando, Florida) was just a year old and had only two buildings and 100 faculty members. She left when it enrolled more than 45,000 students, employed 1700 faculty members, and had 125 buildings and 11 colleges on the main campus as well as 11 regional campuses throughout central Florida. The challenges facing this rapidly growing institution, in 2011 having the second largest student body of all universities in the United States, have been constant and at times almost overwhelming for faculty

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and administrators alike. Much of the work of the early faculty members such as Kysilka was not only to develop the academic programs from scratch for the new University but also to set in motion the operational procedures that would structure the activities and conduct of the University for the long-term. Kysilka was first and foremost a dedicated teacher of both undergraduate and graduate students. She taught courses for future teachers in mathematics curriculum and methods, psychological and social foundations of teaching, strategies of classroom teaching and management, school curriculum planning and curriculum theory, and gifted and talented education, among others. She taught courses for masters and doctoral students in research methodology, advanced curriculum theory, program planning for gifted and talented students, models of teaching, curriculum inquiry, dissertation preparation, and other topics. Always exemplifying good teaching herself, her students came to know her as a helpful but demanding professor whom they cherished and often turned to for guidance even after graduation. Her reputation as a doctoral dissertation advisor was legend. She chaired the work of 80 dissertation students across her long span of years at UCF, co-chaired an additional 22 dissertation students, and formally and informally counseled many others. She was the Coordinator of the Curriculum and Instruction doctoral program for 14 years from 1990-2003 and, thus, she was the primary contact person for hundreds of doctoral students. Her former doctoral graduates have gone on to serve in many roles as school leaders and master teachers, college professors of education, renowned collegiate administrators and researchers throughout the United States and across the world. She was able to nurture their careers long after they left UCF for which they constantly gave her praise. More than once (in fact, four times, in 1970, 1988, 1997, and 2000) she was named an Outstanding Professor and Leader at UCF. The administrative roles Kysilka took on throughout her academic career were located both within UCF’s College of Education and at the broader University level. In addition to the position of Doctoral Coordinator in C & I, already noted, she served five years (1980-1985) as the Director of the Institute for Research and Program Development in the College of Education for which her primary duties involved all aspects of administering research and training grants and leading initiatives in program development for the College. She also served for a short period as Assistant Dean of Academic Affairs for the entire University in which role she represented the Vice-President/Provost on the Deans Council and on several academic committees of the University. She also developed procedures and policies for dealing with conflicts arising among faculty, students, and administrators and acted as ombudsman in dealing with such conflicts. As the years progressed, as the number of students and faculty

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increased, and as deans and other administrators came and went, Kysilka often was the person to whom new people turned to recapture the institutional memory of “how we do things here.” In this capacity she attained a place of honor and respect unmatched throughout the College and the University. The record of Kysilka’s research and publications is notable for its extensiveness and for its breadth of topics: everything from student teaching processes and mathematics teaching strategies, to curriculum individualization and classification systems, to problem solving and thinking, to professional development and mentoring, to multicultural and global education, to national curriculum standards and testing, to instructional computing and quality in research studies, and more. Her students and colleagues often wondered how she could manage to produce so much good research and writing with all the other responsibilities she had at UCF and in schools and professional organizations outside the campus. She published nearly 100 articles and 15 books, among them, Annehurst Curriculum Classification System: A Monograph; Honor in Teaching: Reflections (ed.); The Thinking Teacher: Ideas for Effective Learning; The Adjunct Professor’s Guide to Success; Teaching College in the Age of Accountability; What Every Teacher Should Know about Multicultural and Global Education; Instructional Patterns; and Contemporary Readings in Curriculum (ed.). Always eager to share her knowledge and research with school teachers, administrators, and scholarly colleagues, Kysilka conducted workshops for educators, consulted widely, spoke at regional/national/ international conferences, presented the results of her studies before professional and research meetings, as well as writing for publications. Her speaking engagements numbered in the hundreds, sometimes as many as twenty per year. She often shared the platform with her students and colleagues. She traveled near and far to speak: throughout Florida; to Texas, California, Illinois, New York, Hawaii, and other states; to foreign venues such as San Juan, Toronto, Dublin, Oxford, Birmingham, Amsterdam, Louvain, Paris, Alcala de Henares, Kiel, Prague, Krakow, Sofia, Vilnius, Goteborg (some visited more than once). A good many of these speaking engagements were fulfilled as part of her participation in various professional associations in which she was active. Kysilka provided leadership to a whole host of professional and scholarly organizations to which she belonged, twenty in all. She served terms as President of Kappa Delta Pi and the International Study Association of Teacher Thinking, was Academic Editor of The Educational Forum and, for twelve years, was Associate Editor, Journal of Curriculum and Supervision. Her long-time service as Executive Secretary of the American Association for Teaching and Curriculum was marked by innovation, stability, and growth. She also served on major committees of organizations such as the

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Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development and the American Educational Research Association. Never one to remain a passive member of a group, Kysilka volunteered her time and talents to groups such that would expand and serve all their members. That this can be said of her work in not one but of several organizations is truly remarkable. Throughout all these years and in all these leadership roles Kysilka was known on a personal basis as “Marcy.” She was friend and colleague to nearly everybody she encountered. She possessed vast energy, kept on top of most every issue that arose, and could offer helpful guidance and insight to those with whom she worked. Ever the optimist, she could be a sharp critic when needed but was full of fun and laughter when appropriate. Seemingly never at loss for the right words, she could articulate with great moral authority what needed to be said, whether in conversations, in print, from the platform, at committee or board meetings, or as executive. No wonder people saw her as a splendid KDP President and educator. Parenthetically, it must be said that Kysilka had a busy private life in addition to her academic and professional activities. She enjoyed traveling with friends, tending to members of her extended family, attending theater and art festivals and other cultural events, reading, crocheting, and volunteering at her church and in the community. Even in retirement, she has been keeping busy at providing long-term counsel to PACE High School in Cincinnati where the staff and faculty face a challenging inner-city student body. Of all the professional associations in which she was active, Kysilka’s most extensive devotion and service was directed to Kappa Delta Pi. Between 1978 and 2011, a period of 33 years, she served as Budget Committee Member and Chairperson, Vice-President for Chapter Development, President-Elect, President, Past President, Executive Council Member, Convocation Chairperson, Editor of The Educational Forum, and Educational Foundation Board Member and Chairperson. Kysilka was nominated for the office of President-Elect in 1984 along with two other candidates. One of those candidates was Jack Frymier, a much more well known figure nationally than was she and Editor for eleven years of The Educational Forum. She assumed that Frymier, her friend and former colleague in the Annehurst Curriculum Classification System Network based at The Ohio State University, would win the office, but she permitted her name to remain on the ballot since “they had to have three candidates” (Kysilka, pers. comm.). To her surprise, she won the election. Her relationship with Jack Frymier became a bit awkward for a time. She thought her election might have been due to the fact that she had pointed out that women had served as president of KDP very infrequently up to this time. She was the 20th President of KDP and only the 5th woman president.

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She brought to her presidency eight years of prior experience with Kappa Delta Pi at the Society level. She had overseen the move to a more participatory budget-creating process in which the Budget Committee actually constructed the budget for the organization (not just approving it), presented it to the Executive Council, and with their approval, had the task of selling it to the membership at the Biennial Convocation. Membership dues had to be raised twice, once before she was President and once during her presidency, and she was able to successfully orchestrate these increases with the voting membership. Her other experience with chapter development brought in several new chapters and acquainted her with dozens of chapters through informal contacts with them. Her two years as President-Elect involved sharing official functions with President W. Ross Palmer, visits to install new chapters, planning with the Convocation Committee, assisting with between-Convocation regional meetings in which leadership training became the primary focus, and beginning to look at the role of KDP publications. During her term as President, 1986-1988, Kysilka undertook a series of initiatives that continued long after her term had ended. She helped draft a Training Manual (with Bruce Jorgensen, President-Elect) for use in consistent training of chapter officers at the regional meetings. This new focus prompted greater attendance at these meetings. She encouraged greater involvement in the Society by college faculty and Laureates, especially with Convocation presentations, conversations, and book signings, for example. These efforts were part of the attempt over several years to re-orient KDP from being solely an education honor society to a professional organization that would help both beginning and more experienced educators to become truly highly proficient professionals. She believed strongly in the need for this shift in KDP’s focus and assisted the organization in many ways during her presidency to move in that direction. Some on the Executive Council favored the status quo, others supported catering to students and their social interests, and some saw the need to appeal to alumni chapters and the mature members of KDP. Debates in Executive Council were sometimes heated, but she encouraged the Council and those in various committees to make the programs and Convocation more content-filled and professionally challenging. Review of publications offered another opportunity to shift their emphases in this new direction. Definite progress was made in this two-year period toward re-orienting the image of the Society. A few years later it fully attained the desired goal. Kysilka was also concerned to make the Kappa Delta Pi leadership reflective of the membership at large. Although a large number of African Americans were members of the Society, this fact was not evident from looking at its leadership and its programs. She met with the Black Caucus

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to see what it wanted to do within KDP and how individuals might take on leadership roles. Her concerns were perceived as genuine, perhaps because she knew quite a few people personally who comprised the Caucus and so she was able to see several of them take on committee assignments and other leadership roles in current and succeeding years. A high point was the election of Deborah Wolfe, the Black educator and activist, to KDP’s Laureate Chapter in 1988. Perhaps the greatest challenge KDP faced during Kysilka’s presidency concerned the issue of control of the organization. Noting that certain decisions were being made between Executive Council meetings on issues in which officers and the Council had no involvement, as well as other personnel and management decisions that seemed to be arbitrary and unilaterally decided by the Executive Director, Kysilka and the Executive Council determined that the rules governing how the Executive Director, at that time J. Jay Hostetler, was to function on behalf of the organization needed to be reconsidered and revised. They recognized that their basis for judging the performance of an Executive Director required specifying more clearly the duties and responsibilities of the job, and stating more explicitly the data and criteria upon which to judge performance than was typical in KDP prior to this time. A system of evaluation was established that would enable a fairer and more objective evaluation of the work of an Executive Director to be made. It listed and delimited duties expected of the person holding the position. It mandated gathering of certain data on a regular basis. Line-item budgeting was introduced. Discretionary funds that the Executive Director was authorized to spend outside of budgeted items were strictly limited. A process was set up by which expenditures over budget could be authorized by referral to the President and/or the Council for approval. All-in-all, the evaluation system for the Executive Director and the fiscal responsibility over the organization’s limited resources were more fully codified so that reasonable actions might be taken if evidence showed that decisions were made at any time which were not in the best interest of the organization. The evaluation system was piloted during Kysilka’s presidency and was invoked during Bruce Jorgensen’s presidency. As changes were discussed and implemented, J. Jay Hostetler announced his retirement from the position of KDP’s Executive Director in 1990. One can understand how challenging a time this was for Kysilka and the Executive Council; however, it was also a time to be proud of for establishing formal procedures and processes that would assure KDP’s integrity well into the future. In the years following Kysilka’s term as President, she maintained active roles in several Society programs. As Past-President she continued to assist with officer training for chapter leaders and encouraged greater numbers to take on leadership roles at the Society level. She was very

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pleased to find that she and Bruce Jorgensen, the new President, worked well together, held similar views about the direction KDP should take, and supported the upgrading of internal accountability systems which at the end of the 1988-1990 biennium brought in a new Executive Director, Michael Wolfe. In 1990 she ended her eight years on the Executive Council although she later had several occasions to confer with them on matters of business in which she was involved for the organization. She also took up the major task of chairing the Convocation Committee from 1992-1994. The 1994 Biennial Convocation was held in Orlando, her hometown, so she was able to provide local input during the planning process. She was instrumental in resisting pressure to pay Convocation speakers huge honoraria (which at that time was getting to be quite common at other professional conferences); their expenses were allowed, however. KDP felt that its audiences deserved top speakers but that they should speak as colleagues in Education and not drain the limited resources of a professional association such as KDP. She recalled with pride that this Convocation began and ended with a festive ceremony, a Parade of Flags, in which Laureates and Past-Presidents carried flags of the world into the hall accompanied by music from many countries (Kysilka, pers. comm.). New thrusts such as these at the Convocation bolstered KDP’s image in the minds of members and attendance grew accordingly. In 1994, Kysilka was selected to become Academic Editor of Kappa Delta Pi’s premier journal, The Educational Forum, a position she held until 2002. In this exceedingly important role, she was able to assure the quality of the content of KDP’s most visible voice within and outside the organization. Editors often labor without much recognition, but her work was heralded by KDP year after year. When KDP acquired its new headquarters building in Indianapolis in 1998, she co-chaired the capital campaign to obtain funds for physical improvements to the building, such as a Conference Center, Laureate Library, Presidents’ Conference Room, and a Center for Excellence in Teaching. Kysilka began her tenure on the Educational Foundation Board in 2006; it still continues as of this writing. She was Chairperson from 2009-2011. The Educational Foundation is responsible for receiving gifts and endowments, raising funds for scholarships, and supporting the mission/programs/activities of KDP. She noted some of the Board’s achievements over these last few years (Kysilka, pers. comm.): (1) better management of investments by using advice of professional investment counselors, (2) increased receipt of funds for scholarships and endowments through targeted solicitation, (3) increased consultation with KDP to restore line-item budgeting and thereby be better able to determine when and where Foun-

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dation funds need to be given to KDP for specific purposes, (4) rebuilding of reserves that had been reduced by earlier withdrawals for KDP operating expenses, and (5) establishing the Legacy of Scholars Society to honor those who provide planned gifts as a part of their estate planning. She believes that the Foundation is now in a much better position to perform its responsibilities following the inauguration of these changes. One can see her financial know-how at work in the affairs of KDP and the Foundation. KDP was very fortunate indeed to have had Dr. Marcella L. Kysilka in the various leadership roles outlined in this chapter across the 33 years of her service to the organization. Her hard work, honest dealings, cheerful and persistent inspiration, and her dedication to the ideals of Kappa Delta Pi will long be remembered.

REFERENCES Brown, Susan, and Marcella L. Kysilka. 2003. What every teacher should know about multicultural and global education. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. Holt, Larry C., and Marcella L. Kysilka. 2006. Instructional patterns: Strategies for maximizing student learning. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Kysilka, Marcella L., 1982. Annehurst curriculum classification system: Theory, research, implementation: A monograph. Columbus, OH: ACCS Network. Kysilka, Marcella L., ed. 1990. Honor in teaching: Reflections. West Lafayette, IN: Kappa Delta Pi. Kysilka, Marcella L., and Karen L. Biraimah. 1992, 1993. The thinking teacher: Ideas for effective learning. New York: McGraw-Hill. Lyons, Richard E., Marcella L. Kysilka, and George E. Pawlas. 1999. The adjunct professor’s guide to success: Surviving and thriving in the college classroom. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon. Lyons, Richard E., Megan McIntosh, and Marcella L. Kysilka. 2003. Teaching college in the age of accountability. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon. Stern, Barbara Slater, and Marcella L. Kysilka, eds., Contemporary readings in curriculum. 2008. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

CHAPTER 21

BRUCE JORGENSEN (1988-1990) Practical Leadership Jared R. Stallones

Bruce Jorgensen 1988-1990 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 231–245 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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CHILDHOOD AND EDUCATION

Bruce Jorgensen was born in Moorhead, Minnesota on May 23, 1942. His father, Donald B. Jorgensen, was an airline pilot and businessman. His mother, LaVon Hugelen Jorgensen, was the hub of family life as she raised Jorgensen and his sister, Brenda. Donald Jorgensen learned to fly in the Army Air Forces during World War II, and successfully completed 104 flights over the treacherous “hump” route connecting Assam, India with Kunming, China. In 1944, Jorgensen’s division was awarded the first Presidential Unit Citation given to a non-combat force (Glines 1991; Tunner 1964). Bruce Jorgensen admired his father’s courageous wartime service, but felt that his talents and abilities were better suited to teaching underserved children in Los Angeles. For young men during the Vietnam War era, the prospect of military service posed moral dilemmas and constant anxiety. Jorgensen was no different, but his profession alleviated some concern by providing exemption from the draft. Jorgensen most admired his father’s honesty and reliability. Donald Jorgensen had a reputation for being true to his word, particularly in financial matters. Jorgensen sought to emulate that trait. From his mother, Bruce Jorgensen learned the value of family and unconditional love, the importance of valuing the people around you. These qualities made their ways into Jorgensen’s character and were evidenced throughout his career. Bruce Jorgensen’s first memories of school were of playing touch football on the playground surrounding an old school building. Sports figured heavily in his life from elementary school through college, but did not interfere with his studies. Throughout his school career Jorgensen was a good student, although sometimes casual about grades. Science was his favorite subject. Jorgensen recalls two teachers from elementary school who impressed him. One was his third grade teacher, who he described as “dynamic, fierce, … strict without being negative” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). The other was his sixth grade teacher, who also served as school principal. He recalled that she was “calm, never raised her voice” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). She created a supportive, positive, and orderly learning environment for her students, which provided a model for Jorgensen once he became a teacher. Jorgensen found her calm all the more remarkable after serving as an elementary principal himself. The junior high school Jorgensen attended was a one-mile walk each way from his home, but that hardly fazed the young athlete. He recalled that high school basketball was an especially important part of community

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life in Moorhead, as it was throughout the Minnesota. Field houses were jammed on cold winter evenings with families and supporters rooting for their local teams. Jorgensen played on his junior high school basketball team while the high school coaches watching from the stands commented favorably on his skills. He looked forward to playing for the Moorhead High School Spuds, but financial exigency changed those plans.

TO THE WEST Donald Jorgensen had been a pilot for American Airlines, but by the late 1950’s he was looking for new opportunities. The Jorgensens visited a family friend who had resettled in Southern California and were entranced by the mild climate and dramatic scenery. In 1957 they left Minnesota and Donald Jorgensen found work in a car dealership in Pasadena. The family settled in nearby Temple City. Bruce Jorgensen was a high school freshman that year and he entered Temple City High School. Despite the nearly 2000 miles and vast cultural differences that separate rural Minnesota and Southern California, Jorgensen recalls little difference between Moorhead High School and the school in Temple City. Evidently, the American high school of that era was indeed a common school. He recalled that his new school was “not all that hard” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). Algebra was one exception. Jorgensen recalled that difficulties in Algebra caused him to really study for the first time. Jorgensen was surprised to find that basketball did not command the following in California that it had in Minnesota, but he was pleased to find that golf is a year round sport in the west. He played both sports for the Temple City Rams. Temple City High School also afforded Jorgensen the opportunity to pursue his interest in public speaking and leadership. Jorgensen had first developed an interest in drama and public speaking in elementary and junior high school. During his junior year in high school, he entered a speech competition, delivering a talk on government. As a result, he was selected to participate in the American Legion’s Boys’ State program. Jorgensen’s development as a leader and the growth of his interpersonal skills during this time began to point toward his ultimate career. Bruce Jorgensen graduated high school in June 1960 and entered California State University, Los Angeles (CSULA). The California Master Plan for Higher Education was enacted that year, giving the state colleges greater prominence and a clearly defined mission (Gerth 2010). Jorgensen, however, had no clear idea of what path he should pursue. He played basketball and golf for the CSULA Golden Eagles during his freshman year, but aside

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from these constants he had little direction. He recalled, “I floundered during my first two years in college” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). This difficulty was due in part to normal adolescent uncertainty about life goals, but also because Jorgensen, like many Cal State students, had meager means. He lived at home and had to work in order to buy books and pay college fees. As a result, he generally took less than a full load of courses. Finally confronted with the need to choose a major, Jorgensen took a diagnostic test that pointed toward an aptitude for science. Science had always interested him, so he chose to major in Biology. This decision slowed his progress even further, because science students typically spent many more hours in labs than they were credited, but Jorgensen was persistent and graduated CSULA in 1966 with a BA in Biology. CAREER IN EDUCATION Southern California experiences chronic shortages of fully credentialed teachers to fill its classrooms. In the most recent reporting year, 2008-09, nearly 5% of Los Angeles County teachers held something less than a full credential. In the years before the No Child Left Behind Act defined a “highly qualified” teacher as one holding a full credential, the number ranged as high as 26% (Education Data Partnership). California filled the gap with a patchwork of intern programs and temporary teaching permits. The teacher shortage was especially acute during the rapid growth in school populations seen in the 1960’s. Many of these new additions were school age children. From 1935 to 1967, the number of schools in the state nearly doubled while school enrollment increased 800%. A considerable amount of this growth occurred in the 1950’s and 1960’s (Hendrick 1980). Census tables show California’s population in 1950 as 10.5 million. By 1960, that number had grown to 15.7 million, an increase of nearly 67%. The 1970 count showed another jump of 79%, to 19.9 million people, nearly double the population two decades before. Los Angeles County experienced similar explosive growth, from 4.1 million people in 1950 to over 7 million in 1970, a nearly 60% increase in twenty years (Forstall 1995). It was at this time that Jorgensen saw a television commercial encouraging viewers to pursue careers in teaching. He answered the advertisement and was in front of his own classroom in just three days, without significant professional preparation. TEACHING In 1966, Jorgensen began teaching fifth and sixth grades at Eagle Rock Elementary School in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Eagle Rock was designated as a training school for novice teachers, but the training

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was sparse. Jorgensen observed other teachers for two days, and then was assigned his own classroom. He recalled that his room was in the school basement and the building’s main plumbing lines ran through it, providing the constant noise of running water. Still, he survived the year and even served on a first year teachers’ panel because he was “one of few who finished the school year” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). In fact, Jorgensen did more than survive. He thrived. He was named the outstanding first year teacher in Los Angeles for 1966-67. The following year, Jorgensen transferred to Eastman Elementary, a large school in a predominantly Hispanic area of East Los Angeles. He stayed at Eastman for four years, teaching first, fourth, and fifth grades. Eastman served many poor children and Jorgensen recalls visiting students’ homes without glass in their window frames, only curtains. While at Eastman, Jorgensen took evening courses at CSULA and earned an M.A. in Health Education, along with secondary teaching credentials in health and biology, in 1970. He added an elementary teaching credential the following year. Jorgensen left the Los Angeles Unified School District in 1971 and moved east. He successfully taught Biology and Health at San Gabriel High School in the Alhambra Unified School District for a number of years. He even gained some local celebrity when one of his students saved a family member in distress using first aid skills he learned in Jorgensen’s health class. Jorgensen also authored two textbooks while at San Gabriel. Science 310: Physical Changes and Science 409: The Planet Earth were textbooks published by Alpha Omega Publications and marketed primarily to private and home schools. During these years Jorgensen attended San Gabriel Union Church, a non-denominational body engaged in missions to Indian communities in Arizona. He met Lynne Lundelius on one of the missions trips. The two fell in love and married in 1972. They later added children Joy, Jennifer, and Jeffrey to their family. More recently, four grandchildren have joined them. While at San Gabriel High School, he completed his M.A. in Education at CSULA, and in 1973, his Life Standard Supervision Credential, which authorized him to serve in a number of administrative positions. He initially applied for an assistant principal position at the high school, but district officials encouraged him toward elementary school administration and Jorgensen soon became assistant principal of William Northrup Elementary School in Alhambra. SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION Northrup was a large school that housed kindergarten through eighth grades. Recognizing the importance of parental involvement, Jorgensen

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sought to bring the school and community together. He launched parent education programs and found an ingenious way to ensure good attendance. He organized movie nights, performances, and other fun activities for the children, complete with popcorn and refreshments, but in order for the children to attend they had to bring their parents. The plan worked and he routinely packed the house. He led Northrup Elementary for six years. Jorgensen’s next stop was about ten miles east of Alhambra, to Monrovia Unified School District. There he served as principal of Wild Rose Elementary School from 1986-1991. He recalled it as an old school with internal hallways, unusual in the open-air school architecture of California. There he continued his successful parent education programs. He also added a new dimension to his leadership repertoire. As a teacher, Jorgensen had been interested in the affective domains of education and had seen how attention to those elements can improve the classroom environment. Now he turned that interest and experience to the school as a whole. At the end of his first year at Wild Rose, Jorgensen arranged a “blue sky” meeting in one of the teachers’ homes. In that informal environment, the teachers relaxed and shared their dreams for the future of the school and their students. Jorgensen recalled one teacher in particular who never spoke up in regular faculty meetings. In the casual, interactive atmosphere of the blue sky conversation, she came alive, sharing a number of good ideas. He realized from that experience what he knew intuitively, that different people need different structures to express themselves. He also realized that school leaders must have a vision for the direction their schools should take, but that vision is only a starting point. It cannot become a mandate. The following year, Jorgensen held faculty meetings with large groups, small groups, grade levels, and across subject areas, many different configurations, in order to draw the best ideas out of people. He remembered it as a tremendously positive experience and sought to implement techniques for open communication in every institution he has served since. In 1991, Jorgensen left the public schools to launch a consulting firm. He admitted that part of his motivation was his tendency to seek new challenges every five or six years, but also that he had a vision for helping leaders learn to guide people positively toward common goals. His success in schools certainly showed the efficacy of his methods. He founded California Leadership Development to provide management training to small business and school leaders. Unfortunately, he launched his venture in the midst of a serious recession and with his three children headed for college. By 1993, Jorgensen was back in the schools full time after being

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offered a position and salary he “couldn’t refuse” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). From 1993 until his retirement in 2010, Jorgensen played a number of roles in the Moreno Valley Unified School District. Moreno Valley is located 70 miles east of Los Angeles in Riverside County, California. The community grew quickly in the decades surrounding the turn of the century and the growth was not always smooth and harmonious. Many families from inner city Los Angeles migrated to the far suburb in search of safer, saner surroundings in the aftermath of the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Unfortunately, many inner city problems came with them and long-time residents of the once-rural community did not always welcome the new neighbors warmly. Jorgensen recalled that periodic daytime and nighttime shootings occurred in the city, some just blocks from the school district office where he worked. The urbanization of Moreno Valley also brought contentious politics to the school district. Jorgensen began the latter part of his career as a teacher at Alessandro Middle School but it did not take long for the Moreno Valley administration to realize Jorgensen’s managerial talents and he was increasingly pulled out of the classroom to work on special projects. By the end of his first year at Alessandro, he was reassigned as Coordinator of the School Improvement Program, a state-funded initiative to raise student achievement. Over the next few years, he held a number of district positions mentoring other teachers, conducting professional development programs, and writing and managing grants to address special needs. One of the projects that Jorgensen was most passionate about was developing magnet schools in Moreno Valley. From 1998-2004 he served as Director of Magnet Grant programs, organizing specialized programs across the district. Federal grants lavishly funded magnet programs across the country at the time because magnets were seen as a politically feasible means to desegregate schools, and educational equity was a major goal of Moreno Valley’s magnets. Jorgensen recalled that so much money came to the district through these grants that it was sometimes “hard to spend it all” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). The thrust of Moreno Valley’s magnet program was five-fold. Magnets focused on curriculum alignment, infusing technology, specialized themes, distinctive programs, and attracting students. To that end, they encompassed all grade levels. Several elementary and middle schools were entirely given over to the specialized curriculum, including an elementary school devoted to aerospace technology and one housing a preInternational Baccalaureate program. Other magnets focused on Mathematics, Science, Technology, the Arts, and Global Studies. At the high school level, Moreno Valley’s magnets were not organized campus-wide, but more on a department-by-department basis. This

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“school within a school” model has been criticized as inequitable as the magnet students benefit from an enriched curriculum and greater resources invested in the magnet while the general school population may be limited to district funding (Stallones 1996). Jorgensen conceded that this could be a weakness of the “school within a school” format. In fact, he frequently had to work with the United States Office of Civil Rights to ensure that all students had equal access to magnet programs. He also cited faculty resentment as a problem, recalling that faculty members in non-magnet departments sometimes begrudged the magnet departments the additional attention and resources they received. Despite all of the resources and hard work invested in the magnet school programs, Moreno Valley’s efforts were not entirely successful or enduring. Jorgensen recalls that while the district’s school board was largely supportive of his efforts, some in the senior administration never caught the vision of magnets as a vehicle for wholesale school improvement. In his view the Superintendent at the time saw the federal grants simply as another temporary external funding source. Building longterm, sustainable programs was not an integral district goal. Consequently, after six years the grant funding ended, Jorgensen was reassigned, and the district’s commitment to magnets evaporated. Moreno Valley has no active magnet schools today (Moreno Valley Unified School District). Jorgensen’s passion for the magnet school concept led him to serve on the Board of Directors of Magnet Schools of America (MSA) from 20032005. MSA is a non-profit organization founded in 1994 to support and advocate for the nearly 4000 magnet schools across the country (Magnet Schools Association). Jorgensen served as Western Regional Director for MSA, working with a number of school districts in the region. In that role, he facilitated communications and promoted the magnet school concept. He remains convinced that magnet schools are a viable way to reinvent schools, engage student interest in learning and produce better outcomes across all curriculum areas. Jorgensen’s final years in the education profession saw him serve as a science and health instructor at Moreno Valley High School in 2004-2005, principal of Butterfield Elementary School in 2005-2006. He recalled Butterfield as a “tough school,” housed in a repurposed middle school building that was not really suitable for younger children (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). At Butterfield, Jorgensen continued the team-building work that had brought him success in his earlier school positions. An admirer of Richard DuFour’s work, Jorgensen encouraged his colleagues to meet together to seek solutions to common problems. Teachers met in grade level teams to address student needs and adopted DuFour’s “whatever it takes” approach (DuFour, et al. 2004). Teachers ended their historic isola-

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tion in the workplace, and it seemed to yield a modest increase in academic achievement for some grade levels as measured by the California Standards Tests (California Department of Education). The period from 2006 until his retirement in 2010 saw Jorgensen back in the district office as Coordinator for Child Welfare and Attendance. This final post was among his favorites because it provided him the opportunity to truly serve students and their families, especially the homeless. He thrived on trouble-shooting and solving the problems that came his way and he enjoyed the opportunity to really specialize in one area of school administration in contrast to his long career as a generalist, on-site administrator. Jorgensen retired from full-time work in 2010, but remains active in educational causes.

SERVICE TO KAPPA DELTA PI Jorgensen was first inducted into Kappa Delta Pi (KDP) in 1974 when he was in graduate school at CSULA. One of his professors, Gloria Graham, introduced him to the organization, and Jorgensen served as president of the Iota Phi Chapter for the 1979-1980 term. Although there have been numerous efforts to sustain the chapter, it is currently inactive. Perhaps it fell victim to the increasing standardization and focus on quick outcomes in teacher preparation programs that run contrary to KDP’s values of professional reflection and scholarship. As a chapter president, Jorgensen traveled to Chicago to attend the 1980 biennial Convocation. There he met outgoing KDP President Richard L. Judd (1978-1980). Jorgensen was impressed with Judd’s personal touch and invited him to speak at CSULA. Judd’s example encouraged Jorgensen to get involved with KDP on the national level. He was selected to serve on the Constitution and By-Laws National Committee from 19821984, where he was instrumental in revising KDP’s purpose statement. He felt that it was important to stress Kappa Delta Pi’s encouragement and recognition of educational excellence, and that it is an honor society with academic requirements for membership, rather than an honorary society open to all, as are some other educational organizations. In 1986, the Nominations Committee asked him to stand for election to the Executive Council. Jorgensen was reluctant at first, concerned about the time he might have to be away from his school duties as principal to serve the organization, but he agreed and was elected President-elect that year. He became President of KDP for the 1988-1990 biennium. During his time on the Executive Council, Jorgensen’s understanding of organizational structures came into play. Ambiguity existed as to whether initiatives should come from the Executive Council as the elected

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leadership, or from the Executive Secretary and the professional staff. The resulting confusion impeded the smooth operation of the organization. Former KDP President Dr. Marcy Kysilka (1986-1988) recalled it as a time when “things were falling apart at HQ” (Kysilka, pers. comm.). Jorgensen felt that KDP Headquarters should take a stronger leadership role due to the unavoidable turnover of the elected leadership. He argued that a stronger role for the Executive Secretary would provide the organization with needed stability and consistency going forward. Jorgensen and Kysilka worked together to marshal evidence and arguments for a change in the leadership structure of Kappa Delta Pi. Then, in June 1989, KDP Executive Secretary Dr. Jay Hostetler retired. This presented a challenge and an opportunity for the Council. In the short-run, Jorgensen and other Council members had to take on some of the day-to-day tasks of the Executive Secretary. In the long run, however, Hostetler’s resignation allowed the Council to rethink the position and conduct a deliberate search for the right person to fill the new role. This proved a turning point in the organization’s history as the position of Executive Secretary was reconfigured. Former KDP President Jerry Robbins led a successful search and Dr. Michael P. Wolfe was hired in 1990 as the first Executive Director. He served Kappa Delta Pi in that position for fifteen years. Jorgensen’s other skills also impacted KDP during his presidency. Part of the President’s role is to promote the organization throughout the country. Jorgensen traveled widely during his biennium and gave at least fifteen keynote addresses. He also wrote articles and promotional materials for the organization, but none that were widely published. On one trip, to Anchorage, Alaska, he employed the “blue sky” meeting technique he had initiated at Wild Rose Elementary School. He recalls that the conversations dragged on with little result until the final hour allotted for the meeting. In that last sixty minutes, ideas began to gel and many good ideas to move the organization forward emerged. Kysilka attended that meeting and attributed much of its success to Jorgensen’s warm personality and sense of fun. The meeting had concrete results both for KDP and for Jorgensen himself. First, an organizational audit was launched to assess KDP’s strengths and challenges. Consultant Charles D. Rumbarger was retained as the external reviewer and significant recommendations for the organization’s future resulted. Among these was recognition that KDP’s past presidents represented a vast, untapped resource. So, Jorgensen reestablished a “retired presidents” group to create a network of institutional memory and talent. The group meets at each biennial Convocation and inducts the outgoing President in a mock initiation ceremony that Jor-

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gensen designed. The function is largely social, but the group also serves as a resource to mentor new presidents. Jorgensen also came to realize from the organizational audit that effective and meaningful communication among members of an organization takes time to develop. In fact, he concluded that the limited two-year term of KDP Presidents is too short to develop the relationships and expertise to accomplish significant and lasting change. The retired presidents group extends these relationships to serve the organization. Jorgensen did not belong to an alumni chapter during these years, but he spent considerable energy working with the people at CSULA to maintain the KDP chapter there in active status. He also continued to serve Kappa Delta Pi on the national level after stepping down as President. In summer 1990, he co-led an educational tour to the Soviet Union along with the Director of Phi Delta Kappa, a professional association for educators. Dr. Kysilka had led several such trips and encouraged Jorgensen to do the same, telling him that it would “open his eyes” and help him better appreciate the United States (Kysilka, pers. comm.). Over the course of ten days, the group of teachers, school administrators, and university professors traveled to major cities in Russia, as well as soviet republics to the south. The Soviet Union was embroiled in political soul-searching political over its future during their time there, and the group visited the Kremlin as the merits of glasnost were under debate. Jorgensen was unimpressed by some of what he saw on the trip. He enjoyed the treasures of the Kremlin and the beauty of St. Basil’s Cathedral on Red Square, but overall he recalls the country as dismal and gray, even in summer. He was surprised at the levels of poverty he saw and the stark, spare classroom facilities they encountered. He found the cultural diversity among the republics he visited striking. In one memorable stop, the group visited a children’s summer camp. The campers lined the drive into the camp and applauded their touring guests. Jorgensen later joked with his colleagues back home that every school day should start with the students greeting their teachers and principals with applause. Jorgensen led a similar trip to China in December 1993, and was far more impressed. The Great Wall, Xian’s Terra Cotta Warriors, and other cultural sites had their effect, but he also appreciated the stability and orderliness of the Chinese schools. The group met with officials from the Ministry of Education and Beijing University professors and heard the nation’s plans for its educational future. They also visited schools. Jorgensen came away with a renewed understanding of the fierce competition required to succeed in Chinese schools, and a deep appreciation for the single-minded devotion to learning embodied by Chinese students and their families.

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Jorgensen deeply loves Kappa Delta Pi and continues to work to revive and foster the leadership of local chapters. He credits the strength of individual chapter leadership as the key to the organization’s longevity. Toward that end, he and Dr. Kysilka worked together on training materials for chapter leaders, the precursors of today’s effective officer training webinars. She reported that they “worked beautifully together” on these projects and that she gained a deep respect for his wisdom, reliability, and grace (Kysilka, pers. comm.). Jorgensen feels that strong leaders are able to bring people together to work toward a common goal and see their efforts through to fruition. His greatest contribution to Kappa Delta Pi, and all of the organizations he has served has been his ability to do just that. Perhaps Jorgensen’s fondest affections for KDP, though, center not on what he has contributed, but what he has gained from the people he has met. When asked who stands out to him from his time in service to the organization, he cited several figures. He recalled Jerry Robbins as able and masterful in leading the search for a new Executive Director in 1990. Jorgensen relied extensively on the good counsel of former KDP President Marcy Kysilka (1986-1988) during that time, relating that she patiently took his frequent phone calls despite the fact that they frequently came to her late at night due to the time difference between California and her home in Florida. He remembered her as his “closest friend in leadership of the organization” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). Kysilka, in turn, fondly recalled Jorgensen’s unwavering support for her as the leadership crisis was brewing during her presidency. She cited his honesty, steadiness, and discretion as key elements in the successful leadership change during a “really touchy time in KDP” (Kysilka, pers. comm.). The two remain close and continue to work together on KDP projects, including those commemorating the 100th anniversary of the organization. Jorgensen saw in former president F. Morgan Simpson (1996-1998) the embodiment of that balance of interpersonal and management skills he considers so important for leaders. He fondly recalled having dinner with Laureate Chapter member Ned A. Flanders at his home in San Francisco when they served together on the Executive Council, and marveling at his knowledge of interaction analysis. Likewise, he recalled delightful conversations with Laureate Chapter member Harold D. Drummond, calling him a “fantastic person” and stating, “I miss him a lot” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). Jorgensen might well conclude that the strength of Kappa Delta Pi is in the people it attracts. CURRENT CONCERNS After a diverse career spanning more than four decades, Bruce Jorgensen has retired, but he continues to be a keen observer of the educational

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scene. He is not reluctant to share his views. He feels that the standards movement has been a helpful addition to American education, but that the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 proposed unrealistic goals. He warns that national standards must be general and minimal to be useful on the local level, and hopes that the new Common Core State Standards afford teachers more flexibility than they have had under the often prescriptive multiple state content standards. Jorgensen was one of the early implementers of Professional Learning Communities in the schools and he believes they are useful vehicles for school improvement. His experiences, though, have taught him that most schools do not allow adequate time for real deliberation among stakeholders. He is concerned that restrictive collective bargaining agreements sometimes hinder these efforts by insisting on strict contract hours for professional teachers. In any case, he believes that special managerial skills are needed to draw the best ideas out of all concerned parties. Jorgensen believes that school choice arrangements like charters and magnet schools are worthy of further investigation. Jorgensen claims that the charter school concept is sound, but its “implementation in many instances has been disastrous” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). He remains committed to the magnet school concept and would like to see it proliferate. However, he insists that the magnet model must be implemented wholesale, with the intention of completely renovating a school program. Piecemeal approaches, in his experience, prove inadequate. Jorgensen believes that international competition will drive the future of American education. We will have to refocus on curriculum areas in which we lag behind the international community. He also calls for renewed attention to the education of gifted and talented children. For too long, he asserts, those children have been ignored under the assumption that they will thrive in any environment. In order to compete in the modern world, we must challenge our most promising children. Likewise, he calls for renewed attention to the achievement gap between majority and minority population students. He believes that high expectations and smaller schools for all learners are necessary components in the future success of American education. Jorgensen has considerable experience in teacher preparation. He taught courses in local university programs and led professional development for his colleagues in local school districts, especially on effective classroom management. He has seen a historical disconnect between university expectations and the reality in schools, and he calls for greater collaboration between higher education and K-12 schools to bridge the divide. He believes that more university courses should be taught by active K-12 practitioners and that teacher candidates should spend far more time in school classrooms than is currently the norm.

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Finally, throughout his career as a teacher and school administrator, Bruce Jorgensen has seen wave after wave of education reform. He observes that the reforms never have time to take hold because we tend to jump from one thing to another too quickly. Jorgensen believes that a better approach is to choose fewer reform options and allow adequate time for effective implementation and thorough evaluation of results. Perhaps, he suggests, national organizations like Kappa Delta Pi should take an active role in these efforts.

CONCLUSION Bruce Jorgensen is one of only two Kappa Delta Pi presidents who have not held doctoral degrees, although he holds two Master’s degrees and three professional certificates. This seems unusual for an honor society that highly values academic credentials. Perhaps his innate restlessness made years of concentrated attention to scholarship on one topic distasteful to him. Or perhaps he saw more value in employing his talents and abilities as a practitioner/leader than as a scholar. Or maybe he was simply too much in demand as a gifted teacher and administrator to allow him the time for doctoral study. Whatever the case, the lack of a doctoral degree has not hampered him. His deep practical experience in schools has brought valuable perspective to KDP, and he currently serves as CoChair of the organization’s Centennial Celebration Steering Committee. In his words, “sometimes an anomaly works out well” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.). Neither has the lack of a doctoral degree hindered Jorgensen’s intellectual curiosity. From classroom teaching to school administration to organizational leadership, he has had a long, effective, and fulfilling career in service to others. His international travel sparked an interest in other cultures and he now works with a church in Irvine, California to promote mutual understanding and cooperation between Muslims and the larger community. Perhaps most important, Jorgensen remains deeply committed to passing on to future generations the values of honesty, reliability, and compassion that he learned from his parents. His simple summary of the rich experiences, opportunities, and relationships he has had over nearly 70 years is “life is good!” (Jorgensen, pers. comm.).

REFERENCES California Department of Education. Standardized testing and reporting (STAR) results. http://star.cde.ca.gov/

Bruce Jorgensen (1988-1990) 245 DuFour, Richard, et al. 2004. Whatever it takes: How professional learning communities respond when kids don’t learn. Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press. Education Data Partnership. Countywide profile: Los Angeles County. http:// www.ed-data.k12.ca.us/welcome.asp Forstall, Richard L. 1995. California: Population of counties by decennial census, 1900 to1990. http://www.census.gov/population/cencounts/ca190090.txt Gerth, Donald R. 2010. The peoples’ university: A history of the California State University. Berkeley: Public Policy Press. Glines, Carroll V. 1991. Flying the hump. AIR FORCE Magazine (March): 102-5. Hendrick, Irving G. (1980). California education: A brief history. San Francisco: Boyd and Fraser. Jorgensen, Bruce H. (1979). Lifepac science 310: Physical changes. Tempe, AZ: Alpha Omega Publications. Jorgensen, Bruce H. (1979). Lifepac science 409: The planet earth. Tempe, AZ: Alpha Omega Publications. Magnet Schools Association. Magnet schools in America: A brief history. http:// www.magnet.edu/modules/info/who_we_are.html Moreno Valley Unified School District. Schools. http://www.mvusd.net Stallones, Jared R. 1996. Democratic education and the magnet school. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the National Council for the Social Studies, Washington, DC. Tunner, William H. (1964). Over the hump. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pierce.

CHAPTER 22

JOHN RICHARD PETRY (1990-1992) A Transformational Leader Karon N. LeCompte

John Richard Petry 1990-1992 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 247–255 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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John Richard Petry served as President of Kappa Delta Pi from 19901992. He served during a time of change for our country and the Society. As America entered the 1990’s, Kappa Delta Pi entered a time of “reorganization and growth.” In his essay, “The Nature of Change,” Petry wrote that change is always occurring; it is a natural outcome of circumstances and it should be thought of as a natural course of events (Petry 1990). A member of Kappa Delta Pi since graduate school, he became a transformational leader of the Society. His personal philosophy, commitment to education, and professionalism characterized his leadership. John Petry was born in Columbus, Nebraska, on November 28, 1927. He began school at the age of four. Just before beginning the 4th grade, his family moved to Houston, Texas, at which he completed his public schooling at Stephen F. Austin High School. Subsequently he attended Hardin Simmons University from which he earned a B.A. degree (1948) in vocal music and a M.S. degree (1953) in religion. As well, he earned a MDiv. degree (1953) from the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Petry served as the Baptist Student Union Director for West Texas State University from 1954 until 1956. He continued campus ministry work in his role as Directory of Religious Activities at Hardin Simmons University from 1956-1963. Petry then pursued a graduate degree in education. His Ed.D. degree was conferred by George Peabody College for Teachers in 1973 (now Peabody College of Vanderbilt University). He followed these studies with a faculty position at Memphis State University (now University of Memphis). He accepted an appointment at the University’s Bureau of Educational Research at which he served from 19672008. He also was a member of the Department of Leadership at the University of Memphis for some fifteen years. Teaching responsibilities for Petry involved undergraduate courses in adult learning, leadership, and foundations of education. He also taught courses in policy studies and the history of higher education. Petry presented a paper at the 1985 American Educational Studies Association entitled “Historiography and the Peabody Experience, 1937-1945” in which he analyzed records from Peabody’s administration and identified problems facing the College during that period. During his career, he chaired 50 doctoral dissertations and served on many other doctoral committees. An influential person in John Petry’s academic career was W. Truett Walton, a Professor of Philosophy at Hardin Simmons University. Although he did not possess an earned doctorate, “Dean” Walton was recognized as a very learned person as well as the University’s Academic Dean. Petry admired him and from his influence pursued an interest in philosophy, particularly the philosophy of education. Petry sees himself as a combination of idealist and realist positivist. He admires Aristotle, Plato and Socrates and appreciates the idea of comparative philosophies. He is

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an idealist to a point; of course, he does not see how anyone could not be a realist. Petry took a course in the history of ideas during his studies at Peabody. He found it to be influential in the development of his own philosophical approaches to his work. Logicalism, positivism, existentialism, and any number of education practices stem from these philosophies. Petry believes that every person has a philosophy even if he or she does not realize it. Personal philosophies frame a person’s way of thinking, ways of making decisions and reasons for decisions (Petry, John, pers. comm. 2010). John Petry’s influence at the University of Memphis was based on his conduct of research for groups and for funding agencies. One project of which he served as director (including training projects) was the “career opportunities” program. The University of Memphis was one of forty plus program sites in the United States and served one hundred and seventyfive people. Petry directed the program for the University. He would write progress reports and provide materials for periodic updates on the program. It met the needs of undereducated people by giving them an opportunity to serve as aides in Memphis City Schools while they pursued a degree from the University. Several people in this program were initiated into the Lambda Gamma chapter at the University of Memphis. Petry also conducted more than fifty evaluation studies of school districts. School districts contracted with him to evaluate the needs of schools. For example, one school district’s need would be academic and another district might have a concern for more adequate facilities. The Bureau of Educational Research’s policy required as many as four on going projects at a time. He authored a biweekly newsletter for the Bureau. Petry also was involved in a Title Three program on the Improvement of Research Capabilities of faculty members in two area colleges – one was Harding University, associated with Churches of Christ, and Lane College, a historically black institution. The purpose of this federally funded program was to prepare their faculties to engage in research. Petry was aware of his own learning during that period. He posited that through all learning experiences, with each new change, you do not really know much about a new project until you actually engage it (Petry, John, pers. comm. 2010). Once again, the theme of “embracing change” may be seen in Petry’s work.

INITIATION INTO KAPPA DELTA PI Dr. Neil Amos, a faculty member at the George Peabody College of Teachers was responsible for Petry’s initial involvement in Kappa Delta Pi. Then a graduate student, Petry was invited to join the Alpha Pi chapter at the

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College. Dr. Amos further inquired if Petry had interest in becoming an officer in the chapter. Soon after, Amos asked if Petry would be willing to serve as President of the Alpha Pi chapter. Although Petry was new to the Society, he was an eager graduate student and willing to accept responsibility. Petry represented Peabody’s Alpha Pi Chapter at the Society’s Convocation in New Orleans. He met Dr. J. Richard McElheney, Kappa Delta Pi’s Executive Secretary, and Petry suggested to him a new system of dues collection. The system then in place called for chapters to collect annual Society dues from members and, then, forward them to KDP Headquarters. Petry proposed a simpler process whereby the Society would bill individual members for annual Society and chapter dues and, then, members would remit payment to HQ and, then, HQ would send chapter dues collected to the appropriate chapters. Subsequently, the Executive Council heartily approved implementation of this idea and, subsequently, the annual collection of dues increased.

KAPPA DELTA PI AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MEMPHIS John Petry attended a regional KDP meeting in Georgia with several members of the Memphis chapter. Then Executive Secretary J. Jay Hostetler and Petry discussed increased involvement of faculty from the Memphis chapter in offering professional development opportunities at regional meetings. This conversation led to Petry’s nomination for Chair of the Program Committee for the Convocation. Richard Judd was the President and O. L. Davis Jr., was President-Elect. Petry organized the Nashville Convocation by having education professionals make presentations. Previously, Kappa Delta Pi’s Convocations consisted of members meeting about the Constitution and other business matters. Each Chapter had a delegate and an alternate. Two people attended the business meeting. If the first person was unable to attend then the second person could substitute. Petry, as program chair implemented the idea of the presentations as an option for those members not involved in business meetings. With new professional presentations, chapters began sending more members in addition to the delegate. This trend increased the numbers of attendees at Convocation.

JOHN PETRY—PRESIDENT OF KAPPA DELTA PI Petry’s decision to seek the Society’s presidency followed his nomination from Lambda Gamma Chapter at the University of Memphis. He had

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served as Vice President from July of 1986 until July of 1988. In the 1988 election of officers at the Convocation in New Orleans, he was chosen to become President-Elect and, two years later was installed as President at the Indianapolis Convocation in 1990. Noteworthy accomplishments during the 1990-1992 Biennium included the implementation of a strategic planning process and the establishment of critical success indicators for monitoring the achievement of goals. Petry exemplified his leadership style by recognizing activities (such as the need for a strategic planning process) and then enabling others within Kappa Delta Pi’s organization to accomplish those activities. In alignment with Thomas Sergiovanni’s definition of leadership, Petry believed in empowering others through delegation (Sergiovanni 2001). He thoughtfully and consistently led Kappa Delta Pi in an era during which technology and the Internet were quickly altering our educational landscape. He initiated a pilot program with KiNexus, Inc. to test a Teacher Placement System and established an (BITNET) e-mail system. Other accomplishments were the installation of eighteen new chapters and the reactivation of three chapters and recognition of the National State Teachers of the Year (NSTOY) as an honorary chapter (Petry 1990). He was also President of MSERA (Mid-South Education Research Association), during that same period.

REORGINIZATION OF KAPPA DELTA PI Selection of an Executive Secretary to replace J. Jay Hostetler was a high priority decision during Petry’s presidency. Petry knew several of the candidates. After deliberations, the Executive Council decided to employ Dr. Michael Wolfe who had become a Kadelpian through the Alumni Chapter at Texas Christian University (1983). Coming to KDP from SUNY Plattsburgh, where he served as Director of Teacher Education, Wolfe impressed Petry and other officers with his vision for the Society in the foreseeable future. With Wolfe’s employment, the position title was changed to Executive Director from the former title of Executive Secretary. Petry and others had confidence in Wolfe to handle operational details although Wolfe was encouraged to seek counsel from the President and other officers (Petry, pers. comm.) The first notation of Michael Wolfe as Executive Director is in the September 29, 1990, minutes of the Executive Council which Wolfe prepared and submitted (Minutes of the Executive Council 1999). Michael Wolfe quickly became a respected Executive Director. His organization of Headquarters staff enabled some expansion of operations. Petry exhibited a transformative leadership style during his tenure as President. He recognized that competent professional people were

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indeed capable of doing their jobs to maintain the operations of a growing national organization such as Kappa Delta Pi (Petry, pers. comm.).

CHALLENGES WITHIN PETRY’S PRESIDENCY Since the formation of the Society in 1911, strong positions affected the kinds of institutions invited to and/or accepted as worthy of hosting Kappa Delta Pi chapter. Executive Council minutes reflect discussions on the types of colleges and universities approved for a KDP chapter. Petry contended that institutions that met the Society’s minimum standards and petitioned for a chapter, regardless of their size or circumstance, should be approved for a chapter. In some cases, Executive Council members voiced concern over small colleges or universities that might not be able to sustain their membership over a long period of time. Some of the largest institutions in the United States continue not to support a chapter. Petry insisted that one cannot predict how successful a chapter may become regardless of the size or sponsorship of the institution. He did not believe that an institution’s small size was relevant to the possible viability of a chapter there. One example to which he pointed was Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas (Minutes of the Executive Council 1991). Kappa Delta Pi’s Executive Council voted to deny Southwestern University’s initial request for a chapter installation due to the low number of students enrolled in Teacher Education. Today the Tau Beta Chapter at Southwestern University is a strong chapter. Liberty University is another example, one which Petry visited. The Phi Sigma chapter at Liberty integrated requirements for gaining service points for induction with College of Education service requirements (Petry, John, pers. comm.).

VISION OF LEADERSHIP As a University of Memphis professor, Petry served as President of the University’s Faculty Senate. In this role, he did not believe that his responsibility was to take ownership of Senate decisions. His leadership style enabled professors with whom he worked to voice their opinion and work together in positive and productive ways. Reflective of leadership as described by Thomas Sergiovanni (2001), Petry cultivated shared values with the people with whom he worked. His transformational style was again manifested in his work with Kappa Delta Pi. He was would also be analytical about policies of the Society and he was also willing party to change policies as situations arose. His vision of leadership was to enable everyone to fill their

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opportunities. Petry believed that teachers are professional persons and they should be treated like professionals. He looked to his Executive Council for ideas, criticisms, and policy changes. One policy change that Petry recognized was that of increasing the fiscal security of Kappa Delta Pi’s Educational Foundation. The mission of Education Foundation was to support Kappa Delta Pi through fund-raising, scholarships, and programs.

THE FOUNDATION AND FUNDRAISING According to Petry, fundraising was the responsibility of the Foundation. Petry compared the relationship of Kappa Delta Pi and the Foundation to a coin. It has two-sides. One side was the Kappa Delta Pi Society and the other was the Educational Foundation (Petry, John, pers. comm. 2010). He recognized that a fiscally sound Educational Foundation would be able to support Kappa Delta Pi scholarships and programs. Petry began a fund-raising initiative that assigned one dollar from each initiate’s dues to be donated to the Foundation. He wanted all new KDP members to become contributors to the Foundation. Petry believed that this mechanism would be successful for other chapters across the Society. As President, Petry had many opportunities to talk with chapter leaders to encourage them to support the Educational Foundation.

RELATIONSHIPS WITH KAPPA DELTA PI CHAPTERS Petry visited a number of Kappa Delta Pi Chapters across the county. He spent portions of about seventeen weeks in the spring semesters usually traveling towards the end of the week. He stayed busy by traveling to cities like Clarion, PA., El Paso, TX., and Providence, RI. Petry visited chapters, gave speeches, and presented awards. He enjoyed recognizing chapters for 25-30 years of existence. One of things that he devised during his travel and involvement in meetings was a set of criteria by which chapters could be judged and recognized by Kappa Delta Pi for their accomplishments as a successful chapter. Those ideas for criteria eventually became the foundation of the ACE (Achieving Chapter Excellence) award. Although not officially established until 1995, the ACE award recognizes chapters for their outstanding contributions to the mission and strategic goals of Kappa Delta Pi. A second innovation Petry devised was an event sheet developed for Convocation. Attendees could go the Convocation desk and find information about locations and time of various meetings.

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Petry led the 1992 Convocation on April 1-4 at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis, TN. Attendance was a record of approximately 650 participants. A new event for this Convocation was to afford each chapter an opportunity to make an award, entitled, “Excellence in Education.” He wanted to honor those who have contributed significantly of their time and talents to the purpose, aims, and objectives of education endeavors. Each chapter was asked to name three recipients for the national award. Some chapters honored governors for their work and some honored President’s of Universities. Other chapters choose Kappa Delta Pi faculty members, movements, or educational organizations that were touched by Kappa Delta Pi. The award increased attendance at Convocation and served as a venue for Kappa Delta Pi chapters to recognize support for their growth and success. CHANGES IN KAPPA DELTA PI PUBLICATIONS A budgetary concern of the executive leadership during Petry’s Presidency focused on Kappa Delta Pi publications. The editorships of The Educational Forum and the Kappa Delta Pi Record had been paid positions for a number of years. In 1990-1991, a publications task force was established. On its findings, the Executive Council directed the Executive Director to reorganize the Society's publications program (Minutes of the Executive Council, 1991). Petry concluded that the paid editorships of both journals were cost prohibitive and strongly encouraged their elimination and other major changes in publications operations. Subsequently, an in-house Director of Publications was added to the Headquarters staff and reorganization of the publications program eliminated payments to editors for service. New relationships were established between the newly styled Academic Editors of the journals and the staff Director of Publications. OPPORTUNITIES WITH LAUREATE MEMBERS Petry helped further develop opportunities for Kadelpians to interact with Laureate members at Convocations meetings. These opportunities continue to occur. Laureate members are well known and appreciated for the scholarly contributions the educational enterprise (Petry, John, pers. comm.). PETRY: A TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADER IN CHANGING TIMES Petry served as President of Kappa Delta Pi in times during which change was occurring in both incremental and dramatic ways. He believed that this climate of change offered opportunities for the Society to reorganize and

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build morale among its members. He wrote, “Let us guide our own destiny and shape our own future by actively participating in the governance of the Society through channels open to us ” (Scroll and Stylus 1990). Petry embraced his Presidency with an affiliation towards teamwork. Petry, although retired from academic work, continues to serve Kappa Delta Pi. REFERENCES Petry, J. 1990. The nature of change. Scroll & Stylus (Fall): 3. Sergiovanni, Thomas. 2001. Leadership: What’s in it for schools? London: New York: Routledge.

CHAPTER 23

GEORGE L. MEHAFFY (1992-1994) New Pathways Stephen S. Masyada and Elizabeth A. Washington

George L. Mehaffy 1992-1994 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 257–270 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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In many ways, education is the first line of defense against ignorance and tyranny. Soon after the birth of the Republic, Benjamin Rush wrote, “Freedom can exist only in the society of knowledge. Without learning, men are incapable of knowing their rights, and where learning is confined to a few people, liberty can be neither equal nor universal” (Rush 1786). In a later time, in a far different America, John Dewey, the first individual selected to the Laureate Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi (Explore the Laureate Legacy), argued that education is a vital element of personal and national growth, of civic responsibility, and of active citizenship in a growing and vibrant democracy (Dewey 1916). Dr. William Chandler Bagley, the founder of Kappa Delta Pi, suggested that education was about preparing life-long learners and “real world” thinkers (Null 2007). If we recognize that education is a barrier to tyranny and an obstacle to ignorance, as well as the heart of active citizenship and a democratic way of life, then it becomes the role of the teacher to build that barrier, to construct that obstacle, and to guide the children in their care toward developing democratic habits of the mind and heart and learning the joys and responsibilities of the engaged citizen. Helping educators at all levels succeed in the development of engaged learners and active citizens has been a major goal of Kappa Delta Pi’s 23rd president, George Lash Mehaffy. Currently involved with the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, Mehaffy has worked to encourage new ways of looking at the transformative power of teaching and learning. Whether developing local chapters of Kappa Delta Pi, guiding the national organization as a member of the Executive Council and national president, or serving in his current capacity as an advocate for the reform of undergraduate education, George L. Mehaffy has lived the KDP principles of knowledge, duty, and power.

THE EARLY YEARS On June 16, 1944, the child who would become Doctor George Lash Mehaffy was born to a lawyer father and a homemaker mother in Houston, Texas. One of six children, Mehaffy grew up in a middle class family that stayed relatively engaged in politics. Indeed, one of his favorite memories is preserved in a photograph of his father wearing a cutout in the shape of Texas that declared “Democrats for Eisenhower” when the Republican candidate and his wife visited the state during the 1952 campaign season (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). His family background contributed to Mehaffy’s love of learning about the world and about the principles of American democracy.

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As a student at Beaumont (TX) High School, Mehaffy—by his own admission—was no committed scholar, but he did graduate among the upper quarter of the class of 1962. Following his graduation, Mehaffy chose to leave Texas for the rainy clime of Portland, Oregon. There, he began his undergraduate work at Reed College, eventually transferring to the University of Washington at Seattle, at which he completed a history major and a political science minor. Graduating in 1968 with a BA degree, Mehaffy considered entering the legal profession, but his father, himself a lawyer, advised against it. He also considered and ruled out clinical psychology. Ultimately, he chose a career in the classroom, teaching history and government from 1969-1973. For him, the time was propitious to be an educator. South Park Independent School District in Beaumont was in the midst of court-ordered desegregation and the district selected a number of educators, among them Mehaffy, for transfer to Herbert High School, a predominately African American secondary school. This move, it seemed, would suffice as “integration” under the district court’s interpretation. By 1973, Mehaffy had decided that he had had enough of such political games, and that perhaps he could make a difference through higher education. It was time to move on (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). At this point in his life, Mehaffy was in fact already following two professional paths. Influenced both by his family’s political engagement and interest in education, he pondered ways in which he could serve his country. As an undergraduate, he was accepted into the Peace Corps for work on community development in El Salvador. Recognizing, however, that he would probably be drafted upon his return from service and sent to Vietnam, Mehaffy chose to enlist in the U.S. Coast Guard Reserve, in which he would serve for 33 years, retiring in 2000 with the rank of Captain. He described his time in the Coast Guard Reserve as one of his greatest experiences; he became a decorated officer and squadron commander. In 1994, Mehaffy received what he came to regard as one of the most significant laurels of his career: the Reinventing Government Award, issued by the Office of the Vice President of the United States. He was honored for his “pioneering efforts to reorganize the Coast Guard Reserve Program in San Diego, which resulted in a nationwide change in reserve program structure” (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). Ultimately, “reinventing” would become a key feature of Mehaffy’s career.

BACK TO SCHOOL While still serving in the Coast Guard Reserve, Mehaffy chose to leave teaching in Texas and return to school to pursue a PhD in Curriculum

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and Instruction at The University of Texas at Austin. As a new doctoral student, he found himself under the guidance of Professor O. L. Davis, Jr. Through Davis, Mehaffy was initiated into KDP at UT-Austin, eventually becoming president of Delta Chapter from 1976-1977 (University of Texas at Austin 2010b). As chapter president, he sought to shape Kappa Delta Pi into something more than a platform for recognizing quality scholarship within the education profession. Mehaffy saw KDP’s larger purpose as providing an environment in which educators could become leaders and organizers, role models and sources of inspiration. He pushed Delta Chapter to improve ties with the national organization, to pursue service opportunities within the community, and to broaden the scope of its work in education and scholarship. Mehaffy practiced what he preached as a doctoral student; for example, he collaborated with Professor Davis and others to create the Oral History Program at the Center for History Education within UT-Austin’s College of Education, and he served as its Assistant Director until he graduated in 1979. Also, he helped to develop what he called a “Great Debates”-style program, bringing to UT-Austin some of the key people engaged in contemporary critical issues. For example, during a contentious textbook adoption fight in Texas, Mehaffy brought Mel and Norma Gabler, two leading conservative critics who perceived an anti-American, anti-Christian bias in a variety of textbooks, and Madalyn Murray O’Hair, the atheist crusader, to campus under the sponsorship of the Delta Chapter (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). Mehaffy’s scholarly work as a doctoral student was as impressive as his service to the university. He published articles in Social Education, Educational Leadership, and Southwestern Journal of Social Education, and also produced a monograph (co-authored with Thad Sitton and O. L. Davis) that explored one of his first significant contributions to the field of social studies education: oral history. His 1978 dissertation, Symbolic and Occupational Functions of Curriculum Discourse: An Exploration of Curriculum Theory During the Disciplines Era, earned him the first ever Distinguished Dissertation Award at the 1978 Kappa Delta Pi Convocation (University of Texas at Austin 2010a). Whether discussing the Delta chapter at his alma mater, the chapter he founded at Eastern New Mexico University, the chapter he helped to reinstate at San Diego State University, or the counseling he provided to other chapters throughout the country, Mehaffy saw the role of the chapters as integral to the success of Kappa Delta Pi. Key to this success was something that Mehaffy himself continuously encouraged: networking. In his view, creating a strong network, both among chapters and between individual chapters and the national organization, would provide for financial stability and continued growth. Ultimately, he believed that the work of each chapter would be more than just recognizing scholarship, as

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important as that is, and could only improve the success of Kappa Delta Pi at the local and national levels (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). Mehaffy insisted that any discussion of his work as Kappa Delta Pi’s 23rd president and as a member of KDP must recognize the role that the organization’s 17th president, O. L. Davis, Jr., played in Mehaffy’s development as a scholar, educator, and leader. From the moment he stepped on the UT-Austin campus to begin his work in social studies education and curriculum and instruction, Mehaffy felt Davis’s guiding hand. He described Davis as going “far beyond” traditional mentorship, working to connect doctoral students under his care with significant figures and ideas in the field of education. Even road trips with Davis could be memorable; Mehaffy recalled that these trips served as bonding experiences and learning opportunities for both Davis and his students. Today Mehaffy credits his time under this “extraordinary mentor” as one of the most important experiences of his career, shaping both his scholarly work and his academic service (Mehaffy, pers. comm.).

SERVICE AND SCHOLARSHIP After graduating from The University of Texas at Austin in 1979, the newly minted Dr. Mehaffy moved on to Eastern New Mexico University, where he worked from 1980-1986. Beginning as an assistant professor, he rose to the position of Director of the School of Education. Furthermore, Mehaffy maintained his commitment to Kappa Delta Pi, establishing a new chapter at ENMU. Drawing on his experience as a chapter president and the example provided by Davis, Mehaffy developed the chapter, tying it to the national organization through conferences and contributions and acting as chapter counselor until his departure from ENMU in 1986. Moving on to San Diego State University, Mehaffy served as Director of the School of Education from 1986-1994, a time that overlapped with his national presidency of Kappa Delta Pi. At SDSU, he became an active proponent of the Professional Development School concept. Indeed, his leadership of the School of Education there contributed to the development of the nationally recognized Clear View Development School, established in collaboration with Chula Vista School District. Clear View served as a model for university and community cooperation and teacher development, though it was not without its struggles (Mehaffy 1992). His commitment to the Professional Development School (PDS) model tied perfectly into his work as national president of Kappa Delta Pi; the national organization, after all, stresses the ongoing pursuit of learning, and Bagley himself argued that teacher training was one of the most important purposes of the university (Centennial Celebration 2010).

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Mehaffy’s time at San Diego State University also reflected a component of education that would become important in his later work: technology integration in the classroom and corporate-community collaboration. His “Classroom of the Future” project, like his Professional Development School success, would serve as a powerful model and earn both Mehaffy and San Diego State University national recognition. Additionally, Mehaffy provided Kappa Delta Pi with a model of service in the pursuit of learning and community development by establishing the Santa Margarita Project. With a grant from the San Diego Housing Commission, he pioneered an effective tutoring program within a public housing project and modeled collaboration among the university, the community, and the public schools – a hallmark of Mehaffy’s career and an authentic reflection of the principles of Kappa Delta Pi.

SERVING THE SOCIETY Following in the footsteps of his mentor O. L. Davis, Jr., Mehaffy had by the early 1980’s become active at the national level of Kappa Delta Pi. Long before becoming national president in 1992, Mehaffy served KDP in a variety of capacities. As chair of the 75th Anniversary Committee, he presided over the development of various Founders’ Day celebrations, chapter and anniversary Convocation coordination, press and publications, and recognition of the 75 years of success of Kappa Delta Pi (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). Serving the Society prior to and during his presidency coincided well with his activities at Eastern New Mexico State University and San Diego State University, and reflected the Society’s goal of improving the quality of teacher education and professional development. For example, between 1987 and 1993, the Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education recognized Mehaffy’s efforts to streamline the integration of retired Navy officers into math or science classrooms and his development of a “fast track” program to provide instructional aides with the opportunity to become certified teachers. Collaboration within and across the profession has always been an important focus of Kappa Delta Pi, and Mehaffy pursued this collaboration throughout his service to the organization. As a member of KDP, he also played an important role within the National Council of the Social Studies (NCSS) and the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD). In NCSS, Mehaffy served three terms as either president or vice-president of the Special Interest Group on the Foundations of the Social Studies (1978-1979, 1981-1982, and 1984-1985). He also served on the editorial board of Social Education (1982-1986) and as a

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member of the Task Force on Teaching and Learning (1990-1991). In ASCD, Mehaffy was a member of the Journal of Curriculum and Supervision Editorial Board from 1986-1993.

BECOMING PRESIDENT Following his time on the Executive Council, Mehaffy chose to run for president of Kappa Delta Pi in 1992. Elected for the 1992-1994 term, he came into office not necessarily understanding “what it was all about at the time,” and he experienced something of a learning curve during the initial months of his leadership (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). While he had been involved in the work and deliberations of the Executive Council prior to the presidency, Mehaffy found that he had to be “far more intensively involved with the headquarters staff ” than he had expected to be when he decided to campaign for the job (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). An additional challenge that he faced as he assumed the presidency was coordinating the Executive Council to ensure that it continued to run efficiently and work as a team. This also proved a more difficult challenge than he had anticipated. The KDP Executive Council, the main leadership body of the National Society, is tasked with “ensuring viability of the Society, bearing fiduciary responsibility, and developing the strategic vision for Kappa Delta Pi” (Get Involved 2010). One of the most delicate balancing acts that Mehaffy had to perform during the opening months of his administration was with the assortment of personalities on the Council, each with their own visions for the organization. Indeed, one might describe the members of the Executive Council, including Mehaffy himself, as “unique individuals” comprising scholars, distinguished professors, experienced teachers, and even high achieving student members. The most senior member, Dr. Louise Berman, served as the Laureate Member of the Executive Council and provided President Mehaffy with the benefit of her experience and her scholarship. At times, Mehaffy felt his inexperience in managing a lay board, especially with regard to two individuals who would have no problem telling Mehaffy how to do his job: Dr. John R. Petry, who held the position of Past President on the Council, and Dr. Wallace D. Draper, who would follow Mehaffy into the presidency and thus had a place on the Council as President-Elect. Both of these men would pay close attention to how Mehaffy led, facilitated the transition to new leadership, and guided the Society into the 1990s. Fortunately, Mehaffy also believed that he had an excellent partner and guide in the form of KDP’s Executive Director, Michael P. Wolfe (Mehaffy, pers. comm.).

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According to the KDP Leadership Roles Handbook, the President of Kappa Delta Pi is obligated to work closely with the Executive Director to implement the policies of the Society and lead the governorship of the Executive Council and the national organization. Mehaffy has described the outsize role that Michael Wolfe played in helping him deal with the Council and the issues facing Kappa Delta Pi. Selected as the Society’s first Executive Director in 1990, Wolfe worked closely with the Council and the President in chapter development, Society management, and fund raising activities, among other important tasks. Wolfe also served as a buffer between the Executive Council and President Mehaffy. At the same time, he was a man with “a lot of ideas and a lot of energy,” and was the closest staff advisor to the President. One of the most pleasant tasks that Mehaffy recalled as president was sorting through the many ideas that Wolfe provided the leadership and determining what might be best for the Society. Today, Mehaffy considers Wolfe to be one of the most important factors in the success of his presidency, and they remain friends (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). Despite the tensions that Mehaffy experienced as he negotiated the pathway of leadership among the “robustly unique individuals” of the Executive Council, he maintained a positive working relationship with the members of the leadership team. As he described it, an esprit de corps developed among the Council members as they held meetings in retreat settings, which facilitated relaxed collaborations (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). This sense of camaraderie proved necessary as the Society faced significant challenges during Mehaffy’s presidency.

A TIME OF GROWTH AND CHALLENGE As president, Mehaffy identified two issues facing the organization that had to be dealt with as Kappa Delta Pi moved into the 1990s. The most pressing was the fiduciary responsibility of the Executive Council. According to the guidelines of KDP, the Executive Council, under the leadership of the President, has an obligation to ensure the financial stability of the Society. When Mehaffy assumed leadership, he had to deal with a number of pressing issues that arose unexpectedly from previous Council decisions. For instance, the compensation of the Executive Director became something of a point of contention, especially as Kappa Delta Pi faced increased expenditures and reduced income during the first part of the decade. What made this an especially thorny task was the good relationship that had developed between Mehaffy and Wolfe. This positive relationship, however, allowed for a successful renegotiation of the compensation package for the Executive Director, and exemplified

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Mehaffy’s leadership style: collaborative and courteous, with the best interests of Kappa Delta Pi in mind. This fiscal belt tightening also occurred while the Society was relocating its headquarters and operations from West Lafayette to Indianapolis, a process that had begun during Mehaffy’s initial stint on the Executive Council. The move was not inexpensive, and it necessitated close supervision of expenses to ensure that the Executive Council and the President adhered to their fiduciary responsibilities. By the end of his presidency, Mehaffy and the Executive Council had left the finances of the Society in a stronger position and established safeguards to support the future financial needs of Kappa Delta Pi (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). A second concern—one that Mehaffy had long viewed as necessary for the health and growth of Kappa Delta Pi—was reinvigorating the programming element of the Society at both the chapter and national levels. As president of Delta chapter at The University of Texas at Austin, Mehaffy had sought to involve its members in meaningful professional activities. Service and scholarship, he felt, were just as necessary as recognition and honorifics in order for the chapter and the Society to thrive. He carried this attitude into his national presidency, and worked to expand the Society through chapter growth, professional development opportunities, and a new consideration of what Kappa Delta Pi should stand for. For example, he asked, what about the Society’s involvement with the National Student Teacher/Intern of the Year Program, which began recognizing quality young educators in 1994? Mehaffy saw promise in the implementation of this award, but also a possible flaw in how Kappa Delta Pi inducted members. What if these fantastic teachers did not have the grades necessary to be considered for membership? If the Society stood for quality education, and sought to recognize quality educators, then should not the requirements for membership look beyond one’s academic record? Expanding the recognition of quality teaching had to be an important element of the programming pursued by Kappa Delta Pi, and flexibility in membership had to be considered. At the same time, he felt that KDP had to improve opportunities for professional development through the Biennial Convocation and other means (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). In pursuit of this goal, Kappa Delta Pi established the New Teacher Institute and expanded scholarships and professional development opportunities available to teachers. These ideals of expanding opportunities for membership in KDP, providing professional development, and moving the Society beyond its traditional boundaries was also reflected in the establishment of an honorary chapter in Chicago. This new chapter recognized the contributions of Golden Apple award winners to effective quality education, and was an example of the vision

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that Mehaffy sought to realize for the Society (Kappa Delta Pi: 100 Years of Excellence in Education 2010). Throughout his tenure as president, Mehaffy encouraged the chartering and reactivation of chapters at colleges throughout the country. Indeed, by the end of 1994, Kappa Delta Pi comprised more than 500 unique chapters, a record for the organization (Kappa Delta Pi: 100 Years of Excellence in Education 2010). At the same time as the Society was growing nationally, Mehaffy and the Executive Council looked beyond American shores for future growth. Although the Society had previously made an effort at international expansion (the Calgary chapter in 1981 was the first outside the United States), new opportunities presented themselves farther afield (International Initiatives). During his administration, for example, Mehaffy traveled to Australia to establish an active KDP presence in Oceania (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). By 1993, KDP had established several key chapters throughout the world. The legacy of this international outreach is evident today, with chapters and members now in about 30 different countries. By 2010, sixteen years after Mehaffy’s presidency, Kappa Delta Pi achieved the status of a non-governmental organization with the United Nations. (International News: KDP Moving Forward as an NGO 2010). Mehaffy spent nearly a decade in a KDP leadership position, either on the Executive Council or as president, and while he jokingly referred to this time as “a life sentence,” he recalled this service “with enormousness fondness and a sense of positiveness. … It was really an amazing experience” (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). Throughout this period of his life, he sought to maintain the highest standards of professionalism and to protect and bolster the reputation of Kappa Delta Pi. He built a solid financial base for the Society, recognizing that—as his mentor O. L. Davis, Jr. once told him— even non-profit organizations have to make money in order to survive. For Mehaffy,service on the Executive Council and in the presidency is about understanding that you are a “servant-leader” above all things, with legal, fiduciary, and most importantly, moral obligations. These servant-leaders must be what he referred to as ‘keepers of the flame,’ leading the Society into a new century while still recognizing the principles and values that have guided Kappa Delta Pi into its centennial year (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). With these principles and values in mind, Mehaffy has moved on to new adventures in the world of educational reform.

AFTER THE PRESIDENCY: REFORMING TEACHING AND LEARNING Since his time as president of KDP, Mehaffy has continued to be heavily involved in education and teacher preparation. In 1994, he returned to

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the place where he began his post-doctoral career and became Vice-President for Academic Affairs at Eastern New Mexico University. There he built on his prior work incorporating technology into the classroom and finding new ways to build collaborative partnerships among teachers, students, and the community. At a time when modern conceptions of distance learning were still taking hold, Mehaffy greatly expanded Eastern New Mexico State University’s use of technology and distance education to facilitate both student access and faculty productivity. As he had at San Diego State University, Mehaffy was nationally recognized for his work. His leadership of the campus team tasked with implementation of the Freshman Year Project and expansion of distance learning resulted in Eastern New Mexico University receiving the Pew Leadership Award for Undergraduate Education, a $250,000 prize that affirmed Mehaffy’s dedication to finding new ways to meet the needs of students and faculty in the modern university system. This pursuit of undergraduate educational reform would foreshadow the next phase of his career. Mehaffy left ENMU in 1999 to assume a leadership position in the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU); currently, he serves as AASCU Vice-President for Academic Leadership and Change. In the new century, Mehaffy has sought to deal with the forces of change impacting higher education. His strongest ties remain with the pursuit of undergraduate education reform, technology integration, and civic education. The American Democracy Project, which ties civic education to undergraduate and graduate education, is an outgrowth of his work with AASCU. In a related vein, the Red Balloon Project, also an AASCU venture, addresses the need for reform of undergraduate education throughout the nation’s universities and colleges (Mehaffy, pers. comm.).

THE AMERICAN DEMOCRACY PROJECT During his presidency of KDP and his time as an educator, Mehaffy continued to emphasize the importance of preparing students to be active citizens in a global world. This has not changed since he moved on from his leadership of the organization. Indeed, in the Foreword to the Center for Strategic and International Studies “Toolkit for Teaching the Seven Revolutions,” Mehaffy wrote, “We must understand the hopes and aspirations of others, the physical forces at work that threaten our lives and livelihoods, the social and political forces that hold the potential to disrupt our economic and political systems. Although we must act locally as American citizens, we must think globally to prepare ourselves for a future that we can only barely imagine” (Mehaffy 2010a).

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In 2003, Mehaffy created the American Democracy Project, and currently works with the National Coordinator, Ms. Cecilia Orphan. Believing that universities play a key role in sustaining democracy, the American Democracy Project seeks to restore a sense of community to both the national spirit and the universities of the United States (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). The project, implemented as a partnership with the New York Times and other universities nationwide, focuses on creating what it describes as the next generation of “Stewards of Place”—that is, active and engaged participants in American democratic society. With more than 230 university participants as of November 2010, the ADP has pursued change in campus practices and the development of new pathways of e-learning to facilitate education for democracy and civic development by offering workshops, teaching resources, seminars, and guided practice (American Association of State Colleges and Universities 2010).

THE RED BALLOON PROJECT Reflecting his work in reforming undergraduate education at Eastern New Mexico State University, Mehaffy is the intellectual father of The Red Balloon Project, an outgrowth of AASCU established in 2010 that is consistent with the Kappa Delta Pi vision of teaching and learning in the 21st century (Mehaffy, pers. comm.). Echoing KDP’s founder, William Bagley, Mehaffy argues, “Our first and most critical task is to educate a generation of students to be wise and knowledgeable architects of our future” (Mehaffy 2010b). Unfortunately, in Mehaffy’s view, we continue to prepare 21st century students using an almost medieval model, and we have reached a crisis point. The goal of the Red Balloon Project is to address this crisis and provide learning opportunities to ensure that undergraduate education programs continue to play a valuable role as producers of critical thinkers, democratic citizens, and engaged and knowledgeable learners in the new century (Mehaffy, 2010c). Spearheaded by Mehaffy, the Red Balloon project has proposed new funding paths and new models for undergraduate education. Recent research suggests that barriers to college admission, particularly cost, have been increasing as demands for access have skyrocketed (Carey 2008). By linking diverse campuses across the country, the Red Balloon Project seeks to reduce the costs without compromising the quality of education. Moreover, by reimagining the very nature of undergraduate education, the Red Balloon Project focuses on turning faculty towards the creation of strong learning environments to ensure quality learning outcomes, and on developing students’ sense of self-efficacy with regard to

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their own learning and appreciation of undergraduate education in the American democracy (Mehaffy 2010c).

GEORGE LASH MEHAFFY TODAY George L. Mehaffy remains actively involved in mentoring up-and-coming administrators and academics, leading reform movements such as the American Democracy Project and the Red Balloon Project, and he travels throughout the nation and the world finding new ways to pursue old dreams. It is a positive reflection on Kappa Delta Pi that his old dreams remain an important component of the organization’s principles and vision. He remains married to his wife of 33 years, Marilyn, and they have two sons; Scott lives in San Diego, while Sean, unfortunately, passed away in 2006. Mehaffy is an active bicyclist and traveler, and he enjoys photography and fly-fishing. Mehaffy remains a close observer of the Society that he once led. Looking at his life and career, we see a man who continues to live the Kappa Delta Pi ideals of science, service, toil, and fidelity to humanity.

REFERENCES American Association of State Colleges and Universities. 2010 The American democracy Project: About us. http://www.aascu.org/programs/adp/about.htm Carey, Kevin. 2008. Transformation 101. Washington Monthly http:// www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2008/0811.carey.html Dewey, John. 1916. Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York: The MacMillan Company. Centennial celebration, KDP History, 1911-2011: Kappa Delta Pi, The view at 25. 2010, http://www.kdp.org/100years/thespiritofkdp.php Explore the laureate legacy: John Dewey, 1925. 2010. http://www.kdp.org/ meetourlaureates/laureates/johndewey.php Get involved: Kappa Delta Pi executive council. 2010. http://www.kdp.org/ communities/getinvolved.php International Initiatives. 2010. http://www.kdp.org/internationalinitiatives/ International news: KDP moving rorward as an NGO. 2010. http://www.kdp.org/ internationalinitiatives/news.php Kappa Delta Pi international honor society in education: Leadership roles, Kappa Delta Pi executive council handbook. 2010. http://www.kdp.org/aboutkdp/pdf/ kdp_leadership_brochure.pdf Kappa Delta Pi: 100 years of excellence in education. 2010. http://www.kdp.org/ 100years/KDP_timeline.html

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Mehaffy, George L. 2010. Foreword to Educating globally competent citizens: A toolkit for teaching the seven revolutions, ed. Dennis R. Falk et. al. Washington DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies. Mehaffy, George L. 1992. Issues in creation and implementation of a professional development school. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, San Antonio, TX, February 25-28. http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/contentdelivery/servlet /ERICServlet?accno=ED346031 Mehaffy, George L. 2010. Medieval models, agrarian calendars, and 21st century imperatives. 2010. Teacher Scholar: The Journal of the State Comprehensive University 2(1): 1-6. Null, J. Wesley. 2007. William C. Bagley and the founding of essentialism: An untold Sstory in American Educational history. Teachers College Record 109(4): 1013-1055. Rush, Benjamin. 1968. A plan for the establishment of public schools (1786). The annals of America, vol 3: 1784-1796, organizing a new nation. Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica. University of Texas at Austin, Delta Chapter, Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society in Education. 2010a. Chapter History: A Short History of the Delta Chapter, 1916-http://ows.edb.utexas.edu/site/kappa-delta-pi /chapter-history-0 University of Texas at Austin, Delta Chapter, Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society in Education. 2010b. Past Presidents. http://ows.edb.utexas.edu/site/ kappa-delta-pi/past- presidents-0

CHAPTER 24

WALLACE D. DRAPER (1994-1996) Five New Plans Larry J. Kelly

Wallace D. Draper 1994-1996 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 271–278 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Thirty-two individuals have served as the president of Kappa Delta Pi since the Society’s inception. Dr. Wallace D. Draper served as the twentyfourth president, having served from 1994-1996, in the midst of a decade heralded for growth, increasing diversity, and innovation on many fronts. The 1990s in the United States of America bore witness to rapid changes which would have far-reaching impact, but several would bear unique consequence for the field of education. As in decades before, legislative changes in education policy mirrored changes in society and signaled changes for educational practice. This phenomenon of course was not new to the educational world. For example, one of the most formative periods of educational reform, the 1960s, will be remembered for several lasting federal legislative changes such as the Civil Rights Act, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, and the Higher Education Act, which revolutionized the practice of education. The 1990s dealt with issues of similar weight and import. Supreme Court rulings continued to focus on topics of intense societal interest such as the teaching of evolution, the practice of busing to achieve public school desegregation, and the rights of special education and minority students each of which impacted educational practices. The 1990s also witnessed the explosive expansion of the Internet, a continuous event that gained serious momentum in the mid-90s and had major impact on lifestyles, resulting in interconnected individuals and new avenues for education. Along with the growth of the Internet, educational technologies saw a distinct increase in both development and application. Wide implementation of personal computers and availability of eBooks paved the way for online education. A testament to the wild popularity of online higher education, the online campus of the University of Phoenix became the largest private university in North America during this time. The digital technology boom of the 1990s enabled information to be rapidly accessed and launched the first generation of digitally savvy students (University of Phoenix 2010). Accordingly, Draper led the Society through a period of growth and expansion that reflected the needs of the times. He was the last person to date to serve initially as an officer (Vice-President) before being elected President-elect. His total service on Society’s Executive Committee encompassed eight years. During his years as president, Draper was involved with several initiatives resulting in increased field services, publications, and business services. Wallace D. Draper, familiarly known as “Wally” to many, was born in Cobden, Illinois, on January 6, 1936, to Dean and Nancy Draper. Cobden, a town of about 900 inhabitants, is located thirteen miles south of Carbondale, Illinois. Resting in a valley off the main highway in the Shawnee National Forest, it remains a small farming town famous for growing fine

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fruits, strawberries, apples, and vegetables. The town’s agricultural heritage is evidenced by its pride in the school mascot, the Appleknockers, which typically makes any list of unusual mascots. One of the school’s major claims to fame centers on its basketball team’s appearance in the final game of the 1964 state championship tournament during a time when Illinois only had one classification for basketball (Amazing Appleknockers 2010). Draper attended all grades, K-12 of the Cobden school which boasted an enrollment of 130 students. He self-describes as a typical small town high school student, noting that he was active in most sports (including baseball and basketball), even helping teach sophomore girls PE one year. Added to the hectic schedule of extracurricular activities was his involvement in the Future Farmers of America (FFA). Because he lived in town, Draper could not raise and show large farm animals, so he raised rabbits for his FFA project. Showing animals provided him the opportunity to earn scholarships and to learn practical knowledge. Draper also remembered that he had the good fortune to make several trips to St. Louis during his last two high school year to watch the Harlem Globetrotters play and to tour the Purina Farm. After graduating from high school in May 1953, at the age of 17, he wanted a job, almost any job in order to earn money. So, he went to work for his father, Dean, who was a manager in a local factory which manufactured women’s shoes. Despite his family connection, Draper’s employment there lasted only six weeks. After his brief stint at the shoe factory, he applied for and began university studies at Southern Illinois University in August, 1953, having decided that college was more attractive than his previous position. His graduation from SIU in 1970 distinguished him as the first member of his family to attend and earn a degree from an institution of higher education. After two years at SIU, Draper followed his father’s example and voluntarily enlisted in the U.S. Army as a paratrooper in June, 1955. Although he was in the middle of university studies, Draper jokes that he could not resist the allure of the smart Army hat and shiny boots. In reality, his enlistment meant that he could pick the branch of service desired. After undergoing basic training in 1956, Draper joined the U.S. Army of Occupation forces in Germany, spending time both in Augsburg and Munich. He recounts his amazement at the amount of WWII rubble remaining in the German cities. The Army discharged him in 1958 in order that he might return to the U.S. and to re-enroll at SIU. His Bachelor’s degree in history and education was conferred in 1960. While finishing his degree, Draper especially enjoyed courses in social sciences offered by a Professor Boren whom he fondly remembers. Boren taught medieval history and impressed his students with charismatic lectures presenting the material in a way that made a difference in students’ lives.

274 L. J. KELLY Dr. Boren, a history teacher in Southern Illinois, was my best teacher. He was and enthusiastic, well-prepared, exciting, and positive teacher. His presentations included original content that held our attention. Students, in turn, were excited and enthusiastic about Dr. Boren’s classes. His methods were diverse; his activities, relevant; and his explanations guaranteed our success in his course. He certainly made a difference in my early life as a learner. (Educators Make the Difference 1996)

After graduation from SIU, Draper began his teaching career by returning to Cobden High School for his first teaching position (19601961). As a faculty member there, he taught several courses: American history, world history, civics, drivers education and even two sections of health. The health classes were packed with seventy-five students in each section and took place in the school auditorium. After teaching two years at Cobden High School (1960-1962), he accepted a position at Edwardsville (IL) HS. While at Edwardsville HS, Draper continued to teach classes similar to those he previously taught. His experience, however, was broadened by his assignment to several Advanced Placement classes in American history. As a high school teacher, he received a NEXT Steps scholarship that enabled him to continue to teach at the high school while attending the Southern Illinois University Edwardsville campus part time. His resignation from Edwardsville H.S. at end of the 1968 school year enabled him to return full-time to SIU Carbondale in order to continue advanced studies toward a graduate degree. After beginning coursework at SIU, he was awarded a National Defense Education Act (NDEA) fellowship which was intended to support graduate students in their pursuit of full time PhD studies. When he completed an EdS degree, he realized that most of his course work could be applied to a doctoral program. Consequently, he lacked credit for only three courses to complete course requirements for the PhD degree. He conducted the research for and the writing of his dissertation within the next two years and his PhD degree was conferred in 1970. At this point, Draper accepted a position as Assistant Professor of Education at Ball State University in Muncie, IN, teaching courses in the principles of secondary education. While at Ball State University, the U.S. military forces began an Academy in Europe to provide master’s and PhD graduate courses. Seeking to find instructional staff members, the military solicited bids from universities in the U.S. to provide the courses and faculty members for the Academy. Ball State was eager to join in partnership with the Academy offering master and doctoral degrees. Ball State supplied faculty members for several of these satellite campuses. In 1977, Draper accepted Ball State’s offer of a one-year teaching position at the academy in Europe. Most of the courses offered were in philosophy and psychology and Draper, hav-

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ing taken courses in these areas as part of his PhD program, taught similar courses in the Academy. Draper specifically recalls one of those courses being Deviate Behavioral Psychology. The coursework reflected what was needed for promotion by twenty-year career officers in the Air Force. The courses were taught at three different air force bases in West Germany. Because the courses were all taught in the evening, Draper had all days and two evenings during the week free for travel in Europe. Nancy, his wife whom he had met at dorm party while at SIU and had married in 1960, and their two sons, age 11 and 14 at the time, moved to Europe with him. The family took advantage of this time, visiting many historic places and museums and touring the countryside. According to Draper, one special memory from this time continues to stand out. When he arrived in 1977, he saw no signs of the rubble and ruins of the German cities that struck him so during his first visit in 1955 as member of the military occupation forces. Draper noted that West Germany had many outstanding museums that the family enjoyed visiting. However, he noticed that the World War II time period, from 1933-1945, omitted the Hitler years in all displays. On the other hand, East German schools focused on the mistakes and horrors of the Hitler era. This realization struck a chord with Draper. As an educator, he recognized that the erasure of past events through growth and new development and the censoring of history by omission were significant acts with powerful ramifications for youth. Returning to Ball State from his appointment in Germany, Draper advanced through the professorial ranks until he was promoted to professor. He became the director of education media and taught courses in the instructional use of media. At this time, major new educational media centered on the creation and use of filmstrips. Draper also was extensively involved in University-wide activities during these years. He served on several committees including tenure and promotion, research, curriculum, as well as the typical department committees. Draper’s main contribution to research was his editorship of Creative Child and Adult Quarterly; it also remains his proudest career accomplishment. The body of his publications was in this journal. While no longer published by the National Association for Creative Children and Adults, this quarterly publication was and remains an important international journal covering the creative instruction of children and adults. In addition, he edited a curriculum textbook that he updated annually for a number of years, Resource Guide for Secondary Students. This textbook was used at Ball State in all the teaching methods courses. While at Ball State, he joined other organizations, such as Phi Delta Kappa, but remained very involved with Kappa Delta Pi.

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In 1988, the state of Indiana launched a state school: The Indiana Academy for Science, Mathematics and Humanities. Located on the Ball State University campus in Muncie, Indiana, the school is a residential institution that serves some 300 gifted and talented upper-level high school students from the entire state. In addition, the Academy provides outreach programs for other students and teachers in the state. Draper was designated the first principal for this academy and laid the groundwork for the academy to become a nationally recognized institution for educating gifted and talented students (The Indiana Academy 2010). Finally, after twenty-nine years of service at Ball State University, Draper retired in 1999 and left a profession in which he had spent a lifetime encouraging students and teachers. Part of his major service to the educational world was his involvement with and leadership of Kappa Delta Pi, both on his own campus and with the international society. Draper joined the Society in 1970 as an undergraduate student at Southern Illinois University. Upon taking a faculty position at Ball State University, other faculty members recognized his membership in the group and they encouraged him to become counselor of the local chapter which at the time was dormant. Draper accepted the counselorship, the chapter was reinstated, and these steps led to the lengthening of his twenty-nine year association with Kappa Delta Pi. During the Society’s 40th biennium, 1994-1996, Draper served as president. His presidential message to Kadelpians at the 40th Biennial Convocation reported about five initiatives introduced under his leadership: increased membership, chartering new chapters, service to communities and schools thru the Our Reading Is Fun program, creation and awarding of the first Achieving Chapter Excellence (ACE) awards, and providing assistance to local chapters by hiring four new field services staff members (Convocation Program 1995). Other changes during these two years included constitution changes that increased the number of vice-presidents to two. Regional conferences were once again held. As president, Draper chaired Executive Council meetings, assisted in chartering new chapters, visited chapters during initiations, and served as keynote speaker at cluster meetings and regional conferences. Committees on which he served included the Publication, Constitution and bylaws and Budget and Field services committees. New chapters chartered during his tenure include those at Wilkes University, Waynesburg College, Monmouth College, University of North Carolina-Greensboro, Gannon University, Indiana Wesleyan University and Gwynedd-Mercy College. He was the keynote speaker at cluster meetings and regional conferences at Columbia University, Glenville State College, McMurry University, University of Memphis, Fitchburg State University, and Lock Haven University. His also participated in chapter initiations at University of Tulsa,

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Purdue University, University of Nevada-Las Vegas, University of Hull (UK), Northeastern State University, and Ball State University (Report of President 1994-95). The Convocation theme during Draper’s presidency was Educators Make a Difference. In the years leading up to and including his presidential term (1994-1996), strong and often hostile criticism of education, including teacher education, continued in public forums, at universities, and in legislatures. Tenure for professors was strongly criticized and these strident voices offered a general criticism of public education. In response to this climate, the 40th Convocation emphasized all that educators do in the context of people’s lives: Educators generate enthusiasm for learning, create curiosity about knowledge, provoke thought, explain clearly for comprehension, demonstrate caring, and provide the conditions for success in learning. Educators who have exhibited these characteristics have made a difference to our Society. (Educators Make the Difference 1994-96)

The Convocation theme was emphasized throughout Draper’s presidency. Not only did the Society add a number of new chapters, its program sought to attract a more diverse membership given that, at this time, a large percentage of the Kappa Delta Pi membership were females and whites. This effort stressed the importance of enrollment of more males and many more minority ethnicities (Executive Council Minutes 1994). Draper remembers that he took great pride in several programs, particularly in the Kappa Delta Pi European student tours. Draper’s dedication to the Society was demonstrated by his continuing service as chapter counselor at Ball State University following his presidency and until he retired. His commitment to the field of education endures. Although he has retired professionally, he still remains a member of some KDP committees. Another point of immense pride for Draper is the fact that he has only missed only one Convocation from 1970 to the present time. He missed the 2009 Convocation in Orlando, FL, when he inadvertently scheduled a six-week trip to Mexico at the time of the conference dates. Since his retirement from university teaching, Draper continues to be very active. He and his wife Nancy celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary last year with their two sons and five grandchildren. One son holds a PhD degree and continues the family teaching legacy at a community college. Draper’s other son has a Master’s degree and works as a missionary in the Middle East where he teaches underprivileged children. While maintaining his residence in Muncie, IN, Draper travels extensively. He has visited Egypt, New Zealand, and Mexico twelve times and has visited all of the European capitals. When not traveling and at home, he is very active in church work such as helping to direct the Senior Saints, a group

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of 70-95 year olds. Sports continue to be a passion for Draper. He attends the NFL Indianapolis Colts football games whenever he can and enjoys particularly the athletic events at Ball State University. Although a fan of all of the University sports, he always finds time for some women’s volleyball games and men’s basketball games, as well as attending baseball games, his favorite sport from childhood. Ever the scholar, Draper still loves to read when he can find the time. Having provided guidance through a period of growth and adaptation to change, Draper experienced what can be called a successful presidency of Kappa Delta Pi. Creation of the Achieving Chapter Excellence (ACE) awards and the addition of four field service positions to the Headquarters staff are two of his most satisfying presidential accomplishments. Those having the privilege to have known Draper during his tenure know that he has lived his Convocation theme: Educators Make the Difference.

REFERENCES University of Phoenix. 2010. http://www.phoenix.edu /about_us/about_university_of_phoenix.html. Kappa Delta Pi. 2010. http://kdp.org/aboutkdp/ourhistory.php The amazing Appleknockers: Cobden’s history and attractions. 2010. http:// www.amazingappleknockers.com/cobdenhistory.html Educators make the difference. 1996. 40th Kappa Delta Pi Biennium program. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). The Federal Role in Education. 2010. http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/fed/ role.html The Indiana Academy. 2010. http://www.bsu.edu/academy Convocation program. 1995. President’s address, November 2-4. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Report of the President. 1995. Annual Report 1994-1995. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Executive Council Minutes. 1994. Executive Council Meeting, Chicago, Illinois June 24-25. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL).

CHAPTER 25

MORGAN SIMPSON (1996-1998) Hope and Opportunity Jamin Carson

Morgan Simpson 1996-1998 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 279–286 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Morgan Simpson was born in Birmingham, Alabama on October 11, 1943 to Fred and Blanch Simpson. His father’s side of the family lived on a farm in Daviston, Alabama and his mother’s side lived in Piedmont, Alabama. Four generations before his birth members of his family migrated from Belfast, North Ireland to the United States. They came ashore in South Carolina before finally settling in Alabama (Simpson, pers. comm.). Simpson was the middle child of three boys. He grew up in a suburb of Birmingham, Alabama. His school was located in his neighborhood, which Simpson said, “had the effect of creating community” (Simpson, pers. comm.). The boys and girls played outside in the neighborhood, swimming and riding their bicycles. He was also involved in Boy Scouts. He remembers having trouble recognizing and naming ten trees, which was part of the requirement for moving up from Tenderfoot to First Class rank. The test was taken during winter and all he had to go by was the tree bark. He attained the rank of First Class before leaving scouting for other activities. Simpson was also part of the school safety patrol and was given a very busy intersection to assist the kids across the street. These were the days before adults were assigned to work with the street crossing guards. He played football and made the all-star team for his weight class. He was captain of the all-star team as an offensive lineman and defensive linebacker, but his football playing ended in the tenth grade when he began high school and had to play against the older boys. His father was an automobile mechanic and was “extremely handy with his hands,” but he was also adamant that his children not become auto mechanics (Simpson, pers. comm.). He wanted them to go to college because he had not such an opportunity to go. Although Simpson enjoyed school, he did not remember much about it during his early years. In high school, on the other hand, he began to take a serious interest in a career in education. He graduated from Shades Valley High School in Birmingham, Jefferson County, Alabama. Simpson was born toward the end of World War II and near the beginning of the Cold War. These historical events would play an important part in guiding Simpson’s career. By the time Simpson was 14 (1957), the Soviet Union successfully launched the first Earth-orbiting satellite into space, Sputnik 1. The press interpreted this event in part as a knock against American education, which they argued had failed to educate its students in the knowledge needed to be successful in a technologically advanced society (Ravitch 2000). Consequently, the schools and congressional legislation responded by encouraging enrollments in math, science, and foreign languages. While in high school, Simpson and his fellow students took interest inventories to discover the types of careers for which they were best suited. The guidance counselor called him in to

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his office to inform him of his survey results and said he appeared to be interested in becoming a mathematics teacher. Simpson agreed not only because he was a good math student and the country needed good math teachers but because he personally enjoyed the subject. As it turned out, the science and technology race with the Soviets would continue and, thus, fuel education’s emphasis on math and science. Simpson graduated in 1961, two months after the Soviet cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, became the first human in outer space. That same year, the new President John F. Kennedy initiated the Apollo Program to put a person on the moon before the end of the decade. That same year Simpson enrolled in Auburn University and studied mathematics education. He earned a BS in education in 1965. After graduation he began teaching mathematics at Opelika Junior High School, in Opelika, Alabama, a neighboring community of Auburn. While teaching junior high school he continued his studies in mathematics education at Auburn University. At the time, his motivation for a higher degree was purely for the love of teaching mathematics and a desire to do it better. However, he was also interested in earning a doctorate and becoming a university professor some day. While teaching junior high school and earning his masters degree, Simpson met his wife Kitty during the summer quarter in 1965. She was an undergraduate student at Auburn at the time. She graduated that same quarter with majors in biology and English. After her graduation, she took a job in Birmingham at the Southern Research Institute doing laboratory research. They were married in the summer of 1966 and have two girls and a boy. While the Cold War was impacting education and, by necessity, the teachers in the profession, another historical event was taking place that would also impact Simpson’s life. In 1954, when Simpson was 11 years old, the landmark Supreme Court case of Brown v. Board of Education ruled that racially segregated schools were unconstitutional. For the next 15 years schools would be desegregated. However, progress was slower in the South were Simpson lived and worked. In 1967, Opelika City Schools hired Simpson to be the mathematics supervisor for grades one through twelve (there were no public kindergartens in Alabama in 1967). At this time, much of Alabama was still segregated, so Simpson was the supervisor of three black schools: two elementary schools, serving grades one through six, and one high school serving grades seven through twelve. A large part of his role as supervisor was directing Title I funds to these schools, which suffered from long-term funding deficiencies. After two years as supervisor, he was asked to be the principal at Opelika’s high school for black students, Darden High School. He replaced the black principal at Darden High School, who was retiring. The super-

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intendent wanted to combine the all-white and the all-black high schools into one or two integrated schools. Morgan would serve as interim principal through the job. The Darden student body at the time Morgan began working was 100 percent black. Four, including Morgan, of 22 teachers were white. Serving as a principal during the transition from segregation to integration in the South was a challenge, to say the least, but Morgan never reported any regrets. He relished the opportunity to help and is grateful for the experience (Simpson, pers. comm.). During his two-year tenure as principal, he continued his work to direct federal funds to the school’s financial needs. In the way of curriculum reform he worked on individualizing instruction, which was popular at the time. His administrative staff purchased programmed learning materials for all the mathematics classes. They also began efforts to adjust the teaching and learning environment to enable students to exercise the freedom to learn at their own pace. Simpson also individualized the social science and science classes with learning activity packages and some commercially prepared materials. English courses adopted a “mini” course curriculum in which students selected from a range of nine-week mini courses. These were high interest yet demanding courses that covered the topics normally taught. As a result, they had many students taking extra English mini course as their electives. While his experience as principal was formative he never intended to be an administrator. He had decided to get his doctorate so he could teach mathematics education at the university, thus ending a stage in his life and beginning another, his transition into his research and university teaching. He attended Memphis State University (now known as the University of Memphis) for a variety of reasons. MSU was in another state. The financial package was the most attractive of the several institutions to which he applied. He also knew and respected many of the faculty there and they were able to tailor his academic program to suit his desires, i.e., enable him to take twice the number of graduate mathematics courses that most programs required. Finally, the university’s mathematics department was outstanding. Like most doctoral students, Simpson’s first real experience with research came during his dissertation, which focused on individualized instruction. His dissertation was a study in which teachers tutored mathematics students using an audio tutorial lab. It incorporated the use of a visual book in front of the students as they listened to an audiotape. His study compared the students that received the treatment to the ones that did not. While he was at Memphis State University he became involved in Kappa Delta Pi’s, Lambda Gamma chapter, which had been turned over to the graduate students. The president of Lambda Gamma approached

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him and said he wanted to get him involved in the leadership with the local chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. He was initiated and began working immediately with them. He was initially vice president. The following spring he was a delegate at the Kappa Delta Pi Convocation in Phoenix, Arizona. After that meeting he became president of the local chapter. Simpson graduated from Memphis State University in 1974 with an EdD MSU did have a PhD available until after he graduated. He regarded the three years he spent at the MSU as “truly rewarding and enriching” (Simpson, pers. comm.). After graduating in 1974, he was offered an assistant professorship in mathematics education at Auburn University Montgomery at which he officially began his career as a professor of education that resulted in more than 60 publications, presentations, and grants. At Auburn University Montgomery he served as the Director of Certification for ten years. He was responsible for all field laboratory experiences and he worked with various state departments of education to obtain certification for his students. He served as Acting Dean for the School of Education for two years while the school sought a new dean. He held leadership in the faculty governance of AUM, served as President of the Faculty Council, and chaired several key committees. Toward the end of his career at AUM he co-chaired the school’s Southern Association of Schools and Colleges reaccreditation efforts, which resulted in reaffirmation in December 2008. This was a four-year project involving all departments and branches of the university. He taught mathematics education courses as well as foundations and secondary education courses. In this group of courses were Introduction to Education, Educational Research, and Secondary Curriculum and Methods. He was also active in a number of educational associations: the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, American Educational Research Association, the Association of Teacher Educations, and the National Field Directors Forum. In addition to Kappa Delta Pi, he holds membership in Phi Kappa Phi and Omicron Delta Kappa. Simpson’s research spanned several different areas. A number of articles emerged from his dissertation, but his research interests also included concept formation, cognitive and learning styles, and mathematics for special education students. He published frequently in the Journal of Instructional Psychology, Teaching Math and Science to Students with Disabilities, and the Alabama Journal of Mathematics. While at the AUM, he was appointed to the Kappa Delta Pi nominating committee, his first experience with a Society-wide committee. After that he and others founded a chapter at the university in 1983. At this time his involvement increased significantly. He was the counselor of Pi Pi chapter from its founding in 1983 until his retirement in 2008.

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One of the more defining moments in Simpson’s progression as a Kappa Delta Pi member was as chair of the Society’s constitution and bylaws committee. Convocation has historically been a place at which proposed changes in the constitutional bylaws were debated but not necessarily resolved. But Simpson and those with whom he worked were able to overcome this obstacle. For example, officers were always elected at Convocation. This method meant only voting members were voting for officers. Simpson, however, wanted to open up the voting to all members of the society and due to his and others influence he was able to accomplish that goal. Another difficult challenge he faced was increasing dues. Dues were increased at Convocation by a vote of delegates attending the meeting. However, since the majority of those voting were students the leaders perceived that students would not vote for a dues increase. But dues needed to be raised to keep Kappa Delta Pi functioning at a high level. Simpson and others led moves to change the constitution and bylaws in order to permit officers to set the dues, an action, which eliminated the requirement for Convocation approval. This action gave more power to the budget committee. After getting that approved, subsequently Simpson served on the budget committee, which would recommend to society officers if membership dues needed to be increased. Then, the executive committee would approve it instead of depending on an unlikely vote. This change was proposed and approved by the 1990-1992 Constitution and Bylaws Committee. Simpson served on the 1994-1996 Budget Committee, which recommended a modest dues increase to the Executive Council. The next stage of his involvement with Kappa Delta Pi was his bid to become its president. Previously, presidents had served as vice president before serving as president, but Simpson travelled a different route. Bypassing the vice presidency, he immediately ran for president-elect. To him this plan seemed the best way. The first time he ran for office, however, he was defeated. He lost to Wally Draper. A long-time friend, Frank Marsh, a former president, pulled him aside and said, “Morgan, I want you to know. I did the same thing. I want you to run again in two years” (Simpson, pers. comm.). Before Marsh’s encouragement he considered not running again, but on the advice of Marsh he ran again and this time won. Incidentally, Simpson was the last person elected president-elect of the Society by a vote of Convocation delegates. All succeeding officers have been elected by mail balloting by individual members. Then this change was approved at the 1994 Orlando Convocation. Once he became president, he faced challenges that were significant in the evolution of Kappa Delta Pi. The headquarters of Kappa Delta Pi at the time he became president was in West Lafayette, Indiana, on the campus of Purdue University. The Society’s building and its location pre-

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sented several problems. It had limited access to the first floor of the building. The executive secretary and his staff were increasingly concerned about having a building that was not handicapped accessible. The building was also a potential risk because it was difficult to evacuate the staff from the first floor in case of an emergency. Additionally, the extensive cost of maintaining its heating and cooling system made relocation sensible. Traveling to the headquarters presented only two realistic options: an individual could fly to Chicago or to Indianapolis and then take a small commuter aircraft or a commuter van to West Lafayette. Several cities were considered, Orlando being one. In the end, the Executive Council voted to move the headquarters to Indianapolis. Another important contribution to the society was gaining more control over the publications, The Educational Forum and Kappa Delta Pi Record. Prior to his presidency the Society would employ an editor from a university faculty and he or she would edit publications. During Simpson’s biennium as president, the Executive Council employed a Director of Publications and changed the nature of editorial responsibilities. These moves gave the Society’s Executive Council and headquarter staff greater control over the finances as well as the content of the journals. Moving the control of the journals to KDP Headquarters did more than allow better management of the finances and content. Once production of the journals was moved to Headquarters, issues of both were produced on time and within budget. Simpson acknowledges that opinions differ about whether the quality of the journals suffered once control was moved to Headquarters. He notes that readers believe that survey the quality of the journals did not suffer and they appreciated the timely production of the journals as a result of the changes made. In his opinion, these changes contributed significant forward steps by the Society even though some very strong personalities opposed these change and he respects their reasons, e.g., to remain under the chief control of two powerful editors (Simpson, pers. comm.). All organizations typical must confront a variety of financial issues. However, during the 1990s the finances of the Society were excellent probably due to the thriving economy at the time. The budget at this time ran a surplus and we were able to accumulate a reserve fund of over a million dollars. Simpson believes that the financial challenges faced today are different than what he and the Executive Council faced during the 90’s. Today, the finances are probably one of the Society’s major problems. Following his term on the Executive Council Simpson had served important committees. One was the Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation Board, which he chaired from 2004 to 2008. Another was the search committee for a new Executive Director. When Mike Wolfe retired in 2006

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he chaired the committee to locate a new Executive Director. Simpson says of Wolfe, “Mike was a visionary, motivator, and intellectual. Working with Mike for the betterment of Kappa Delta Pi was a joy and rewarding. We cannot underestimate how important he and his staff were to the overall success of Kappa Delta Pi” (Simpson, pers. comm.).This experience taught him what a unique person the Society requires to be the chief executive. According to Simpson: We need someone with academic experiences. They need to understand the issues in the teacher education enterprise. We need someone with P-12 school experience. They need to understand the issues faced by the majority of our members. Finally, they need to understand how associations work. We are an association and there are unique skills needed to lead a 50,000 plus membership organization. There are very few people with these qualifications who are willing to live or relocate in the Indianapolis area. This experience taught me that we are very fortunate to have talented people working for us at Headquarters and thanks to their working with the leadership and the membership we have a strong organization. (Simpson, pers. comm.)

Simpson describes his experiences with Kappa Delta Pi with honor and humility. He claims that he got more out of the experience as president than he actually contributed to the organization, especially the relationships with members, staff, and officers (Simpson, pers. comm.). The central mission of Kappa Delta Pi has stayed the same, but he notes that the Society pays more attention to its members than ever before, which he regards as the proper mission of the society. He retired from Auburn University Montgomery as Professor Emeritus in 2008.

REFERENCES Ravitch, Diane. 2000. Left back: A century of battles over school reform. New York: Simon & Schuster.

CHAPTER 26

BARBARA D. DAY (1998-2000) To Serve and To Lead Sherry L. Field and Michelle Bauml

Barbara D. Day 1998-2000 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 287–299 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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The Kappa Delta Pi’s initiation ritual calls attention to four ideals: fidelity to humanity, science, service, and toil. The ideal of service is described as such: “This ideal is the very essence of education which seeks advancement, not merely for self, but for society as well. The incentive of the great educators of the world has been their desire to serve humanity. Service in education implies living so that others are strengthened and inspired, and striving for the achievement of justice, peace, and a better way of life for all” (Kappa Delta Pi 2010). Barbara Day was initiated into a life of service by her parents, Jennings M. Davenport, Sr. and Mayme Woodley Davenport. They taught her at a young age that service was to be at the center of life in a democracy. Day observed her parents’ commitment to service as they served their local community of Creswell, the state of North Carolina, and the church. Additionally, she learned that in her close family, service began early. Unsurprisingly, in her career as a teacher educator, Day took up the banner of service to community, profession, and church, and waved it enthusiastically. Balancing her professional life and family commitments, she sought to provide service to her profession in leadership roles in three major international professional organizations by serving as President of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development in 1980-1981, President of Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society from 1998-2000, and President of the Delta Kappa Gamma Society International for Key Women Educators from 2006-2008. Although many educators have the opportunity to serve one or perhaps two professional organizations well, it is remarkable that Day reached the pinnacle of service and leadership as president of three of the most prestigious groups in American education. At the same time, she remained keenly focused on her academic specialties: curriculum and instruction, leadership, research methodology, early childhood education, and teaching and learning. In spring 2011, Day announced her retirement as Professor and Chair of the Department of Curriculum and Instruction in the School of Education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a position that she held for over 25 years. As President of Kappa Delta Pi, Day proved herself as a leader of the Society and made major contributions by shepherding a new era of celebrating teachers and mentoring them as leaders in the field. During her presidency, the Society entered the new millennium and experienced a biennium of innovation, recognition, progress and change.

EARLY LIFE AND INFLUENCES Barbara Davenport Day grew up in the small community of Creswell in eastern North Carolina, near the coast and 50 miles from Nags Head and

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the Outer Banks, where, she says, “everyone knew me—and my parents and siblings—and we knew them. It was a wonderful place to be” (Day, pers. comm.). North Carolinians treasure their proximity to the coast, and the Outer Banks remain an unspoiled area for vacation, relaxation, and nature study. Day’s mother was a teacher who taught her in first grade. Her father and her mother were both county commissioners in Washington County. Her mother was the first woman to be elected as the chairperson of the county commissioners. Her parents also served on state committees appointed by the governors of North Carolina. Thus, her parents were public servants throughout Day’s formative years. Additionally, her sister later became county commissioner in the same county and her brother served in the military, retiring recently as a Colonel in the United States Marine Corps. All of the siblings observed their parents in their daily work and lives, out in the community, hearing from constituents, and responding to their needs. Day credits her parents with imbuing in her the strong values of education, religion, and community. Religious service was of particular importance to the Davenport family. “We attended church every Sunday—there was never any question about that. And we valued service to others in our community” (Day, pers. comm.). For example, Day became her church’s pianist, and later, its organist, on Sundays when she was a teenager, mirroring the service she saw her parents provide. Her mother chaired the Altar Guild for more than 50 years and her father was church treasurer for over 40 years. Day’s roots for serving others through the church and education continued to grow during her childhood. Day was intensely interested in learning, and noted that her parents “helped me to become an independent thinker and learner. They trusted me to make good decisions” (Day, pers. comm.). She remembered having a passion for reading, and English was her favorite subject in school. Recently, Day spoke at a meeting at which her favorite high school teacher, Mrs. Evans, was in attendance. Day had the opportunity to tell Mrs. Evans how much she had meant to her and asked her to stand and be recognized by all in attendance. “My background in English was so broad; it was an incredible foundation for my college English courses, thanks to Ms. Evans” (Day, pers. comm.). Day recalled making good grades in school in all subjects, and noted that her parents “would have allowed nothing less” (Day, pers. comm.). Additionally, Day said, “If I earned a grade of 98, my mother would lovingly say, ‘What happened, Barbara? You didn’t make a 100!’ ”(Day, pers. comm.). As did many children growing up in small communities, Day had an opportunity to take a job when she was 13 years old. She became a salesperson in a local department store, after school and on Saturdays. She reflected that she learned three valuable lessons in this job. Not only did

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she learn how to work with the public, she learned about both economics and fashion. Day remembered being grateful for having been taught the value of a strong work ethic and for having been given many opportunities to work with a variety of people at a young age. Leadership opportunities abounded for her in this small community and, in school, she was president of the Honor Society, head cheerleader, and voted “Most Likely to Succeed.”

BECOMING A TEACHER AND ADMINISTRATOR Day graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Education degree from East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina, at which she was honored with an Outstanding Senior Award, and at which she received the 1989 Outstanding Alumni Award. Day accepted a position as an elementary school teacher in the Raleigh City Schools in Raleigh, North Carolina. She described her job interview in this way, “I drove to Raleigh and met with Mr. Sanderson, the district’s superintendent, at the district’s administrative office. I said, ‘Mr. Sanderson, I would like to teach for you and I will be a good teacher,’ to which he replied ‘I would like for you to do that. I have a place for you at Longview Gardens School, and you will work with Ms. Wall’” (Day, pers. comm.). Day set about to do just that. She got to know her students and their parents. Prior to the opening of school, she visited the homes of her children. She experimented with the curriculum, trying different strategies to meet the needs of her learners. She gained confidence as a teacher. She realized how warmly she had been accepted into the community when school ended for winter holidays, as she returned to her car and found it filled with presents. Soon after her first teaching experiences, Day was accepted to the Graduate School at the University of North Carolina. She earned her Master of Arts degree in Education (summa cum laude) and a PhD in Educational Leadership. Also during this time, she married Doug Day, an insurance executive. Their move to Chapel Hill was a permanent one, as they have lived all of their married lives in this community in the Research Triangle of North Carolina. This area includes the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, Duke University in Durham, and North Carolina State University in Raleigh, all located within a 30 mile radius of one another. Day became a school principal in Orange County Schools, Hillsborough, North Carolina, after one year of teaching. She stressed that she was a “teaching principal,” which meant that she taught alongside the teachers and worked collaboratively with them to plan for the administration of the school. Prior to completion of her doctoral degree, Day had an opportunity to practice school leadership at the highest level, by serving

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first as a principal and then as an assistant superintendent of schools in the Chapel Hill City School District, Chapel Hill, North Carolina. She was recruited to administer a large federal grant at the University of North Carolina as she began writing her dissertation. The grant’s focus was to prepare leaders in early childhood education and for the development and implementation of kindergarten education throughout the southeastern United States. Upon completion of her PhD, she was offered a tenure-track position at the University of North Carolina. Thus, the foundation was laid for her academic life, which focused on curriculum and instruction, leadership, research methodology, early childhood education, and teaching and learning. When asked what advice she would give to teachers and educators, Day responded: Start by recognizing that teaching is the most wonderful profession you can have. Enjoy your students and let them know that you appreciate them. Celebrate diversity by becoming as informed as possible, traveling as much as possible, and meeting as many people around the world as possible. Join professional organizations, attend conferences, get an advanced degree, and be a lifelong learner. Above all, find joy in your career and love what you do. (Day, pers. comm.)

LIFE AS AN ACADEMIC AND LEADER Day gained valuable professional experience as a teacher, principal, and assistant superintendent of schools. In 1970, in recognition for this work, she received the North Carolina Outstanding Young Woman of the Year Award. She served as the Chair of Early Childhood Education, Elementary Education, and Teaching and Learning and Director of the Teaching Fellows Program, and, for the past 25 years, Chair of the Doctoral Programs in Curriculum and Instruction at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, her academic home for 45 years. During this time, she chaired 65 doctoral committees. Day noted “all of her doctoral advisees completed their degrees and served the educational community throughout the world” (Day, pers. comm.). Throughout her years as a university professor, Day was very active in her academic community. Appointed by the Chancellor to serve on Town and Gown committees, as well as Capital Campaign Committees, she also was a Carolina Speaker, a faculty member chosen to be an ambassador for the University. As a Speaker, she focused on two vital topics: Reform in Education: What Have We Learned from a Decade of the North Carolina Teaching Fellows Program, and Listening to Teachers: What Do They Say They Want and Need to Be Successful. Day’s research focused on curriculum and instruction, leadership, early childhood education, leadership, and identifying perceptions of teachers

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and other educators related to their wants and needs in order to be successful. Most recently, she utilized interview and survey data from National Board Certified teachers and those who are not Board certified across a variety of subject areas. This research was published in Kappa Delta Pi Record (2005), Delta Kappa Gamma News (2006), and Delta Kappa Gamma International Journal for Professional Education (2010). She has written extensively about developmentally appropriate curriculum and instruction for young children. Her textbooks are used at major universities and are translated into several foreign languages. Among her many publications, she authored Open Learning in Early Childhood Education; Early Childhood Education: Creative Learning (2nd edition); Early Childhood Education: Creative Learning (3rd edition); Early Childhood Education: Developmental/Experiential Teaching & Learning (4th edition); and, with S. H. Leeper and R. L. Witherspoon, Good Schools for Young Children (5th edition), published by Macmillan Publishing Company. Day served as editor of Education in the 21st Century: Leadership, Literacy, Legislation, and Learning, published by the Delta Kappa Gamma Society International. In addition, she is the author with K. Drake of Early Childhood Education: Curriculum Organization and Classroom Management, published by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD). She served as the national Early Childhood expert on ASCD’s 1991 video staff development program, a 40-minute videotape program and facilitator’s manual that won the CINE Golden Eagle Award. As a researcher in early childhood education, Day focused on developmentally appropriate pedagogy and practice for young children. She says, “In a developmentally appropriate learning environment, where caring teachers systematically plan and organize individualized learning experiences, each child can be creative and discover the many joys that learning has to offer” (1994, viii). Further, Day expressed, Three characteristics of developmentally appropriate learning environments—active involvement, experience-based learning, and individualization—are essential for effective learning. Children learn by doing, and therefore, the curriculum is structured to promote their active participation. Learning centers provide a variety of experiences through which children can actively seek and discover knowledge about themselves, build on previous learning, and stimulate new learning and experiences. Teachers structure and guide the learning process based on their knowledge of the abilities and background of each child. Because children have unique developmental needs, learning styles, and interests, teachers tailor the learning processes to fit each child. In a developmentally appropriate learning environment, where caring teachers systematically plan and organize individualized learning experiences, each child can be creative and discover the many joys that learning has to offer. (1994, vii)

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Day is an international lecturer and traveler. She has studied and lectured in many parts of the world, including the United Kingdom, the Scandinavian countries, Germany, Switzerland, Russia, China, Korea, Singapore, Japan, South Africa, Estonia, Canada, El Salvador, Panama, and Costa Rica. Travel abroad is yet another way in which she continued to mentor students and provide leadership. Much of her travel included study tours in which she led administrators, teachers, and teacher educators in further inquiry into the curriculum and instruction utilized. Her philosophy regarding learning about the world is to “celebrate and understand diversity, and to get to know as many people around the world as possible” (Day, pers. comm.). Many of the textbooks she has authored have been translated into foreign languages. Her international work, often related to her leadership in national and international organizations, is a part of her career about which she is extremely proud. As previously noted, Day has served at the national and international highest levels for several professional organizations and societies. She has won leadership awards from Kappa Delta Pi, Phi Delta Kappa, and ASCD. In 2006, she was elected President of the Delta Kappa Gamma Society International and served during the 2006-2008 Biennium. In 2009, Delta Kappa Gamma Society International presented her with the Society’s highest and most prestigious award, the International Achievement Award at its Oslo, Norway meeting. The citation given included the following statement: “The individual is a scholar, a leader, a communicator, and an advocate for women. She has traveled to more than 40 states (and many foreign countries) as a speaker. Our recipient is a visionary and has promoted The Society in new arenas. Her vision is reflected in the installation of two new state organizations, Denmark and Estonia. She is gracious, positive, encouraging, and empowers women educators (Delta Kappa Gamma 2009). Day was invited to become a member of the National Association of State Boards of Education’s Early Childhood Education Task Force, which led to the publication, Right from the Start, a blueprint for the improvement of early childhood education throughout the United States. As President of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, she chaired an Early Childhood Education Commission composed of members of 13 school districts from across the United States whose primary mission was the improvement of early childhood education programs. She also served as Factotum of the Professors of Curriculum. In addition, Day has served as the keynote speaker for a variety of education related organizations throughout the United States and abroad. Giving lifelong service to the church, Day has served on the Altar Guild, is a lay reader, a lay Eucharist minister, a graduate of the Education for Ministry Program offered through the University of the South,

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Suwanee, and a Stephen Minister and Stephen Minister Leader at the Chapel of the Cross Episcopal Church, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Bringing her early service learning full circle into her adult life, Day also sought continued education in the ministry, and her advanced studies are impressive. In May, 2002, she received a Master’s degree in divinity, summa cum laude, from Duke University and a post-graduate diploma in Anglican Studies from Virginia Theological Seminary in May, 2004. She currently is a candidate for a doctoral degree in Ministry from Virginia Theological Seminary. Day is also a graduate of the Leadership/Management Program, Harvard University. She has served as President of the Altrusa Club and currently manages a Kiwanis service program, “Read Around the World,” for children at the University of North Carolina Memorial Hospital.

LEADING KAPPA DELTA PI LOCALLY, NATIONALLY, AND INTERNATIONALLY In the midst of an academic career hallmarked by service, Kappa Delta Pi was a beneficiary of Day’s leadership at the local, national, and international levels. Day was inducted into Kappa Delta Pi and was the founder of the Pi Theta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi at the University of North Carolina, where she served the society as Chapter Counselor throughout her academic life. The University’s website provided many reports of recent initiations and activities of the chapter. At the national and international level, Day served as Chair of the Kappa Delta Pi Publication Advisory Committee, and in 1992 she was invited to be the guest editor of Kappa Delta Pi’s publication, Kappa Delta Pi Record, vol. 28, no. 3 with the theme: “Early Childhood Education: A Developmental Perspective.” Barbara Day served as Vice President of Kappa Delta Pi from 19941996, President-Elect from 1996-1998, President from 1998-2000, and Past President from 2000-2002, thus enjoying eight years on the Executive Council. During her Presidency, she consistently drew attention to issues of leadership, learning, and long-term growth of Kappa Delta Pi. She profoundly influenced its path by shepherding a timely and organized system to conduct the business meetings of the Society at Convocation, advocating for Leadership Conferences to be offered across the country, seeing to continued growth internationally, and contributing to the publications of Kappa Delta Pi. Also, Day’s Presidency oversaw key societal events from impressive publications to a physical move of the society headquarters. For example, a scholarly edition of John Dewey’s 1938 lecture, Experience and Education was published with margin notes, a new introduction, and accompanying

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essays by four Dewey scholars and educational historians who reflected on the meaning of Dewey’s work for contemporary educators. Also under Day’s Presidency, the Celebration of Teaching program was launched by the Society. With Educational Foundational support, dozens of teachers have received grants from this program, designed to provide seed funding for projects, materials, and supplies through a competitively-selected process. Additionally, Day helped pave the way for Leadership Forums to be offered in thirteen geographic areas. The Forums provided opportunities for chapter counselors, chapter officers, and chapter members to gain valuable knowledge about organizing for effective chapter governance, and growing into important leadership roles. Finally, KDP relocated from West Lafayette to its current headquarters building at 3707 Woodview Trace, Indianapolis, Indiana, allowing for growth at KDP Headquarters and expansion in the future. Donations from Society officers, members, and staff funded necessary remodeling and development in the new building. Along with initiatives for renewal and growth, the Society also received awards for its publications. Kappa Delta Pi Record received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Association of Educational Publisher organization and the New Teacher Advocate received recognition from the American Society of Association Executives. For initiatives in Leadership Programming and for the Chapter Resource Guide, in the year 2000, Kappa Delta Pi received the prestigious Pyramid Award from the American Society of Association Executives. Among her significant contributions as President of Kappa Delta Pi was Day’s edited publication, Teaching and Learning in the New Millennium, published by KDP in 1999. The book was provided to all members of Kappa Delta Pi who attended the 1999 Convocation in Baltimore. She noted in its introductory chapter: To bring focus and understanding on these issues and to examine the next century of education, Kappa Delta Pi commissioned Teaching and Learning in the New Millennium to enlighten and provoke all readers—members as well as nonmembers, educators as well as non-educators. We asked outstanding educators to share their insights about our profession and the students who benefit from it, including our successes, failures, and new directions. All of the authors have contributed significantly to the field of education in a variety of ways, and all are recognized leaders in their areas of expertise. (1999, ix)

Authors included Michael Fullan, Bettye Caldwell, Charles R. Coble, James Banks, R. Freeman Butts, Tracie Hargrove, William S. Palmer and David K. Pugalee, David Elkind, Hunter Ballew, Xue Lan Rong, David Moursund, and Barbara Day. Each author looked forward to the new millennium to

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propose new programs and purposes for education. Regarding a renewed commitment to the purposes of education, Day wrote: We must return to the early motivations for a public education system; to prepare and educate children to become functional adult citizens to protect the ideals upon which the nation was founded; and to ensure that young people are prepared to participate fully in our democracy. Citizens of other nations must make similar demands of themselves and their schools. To approach these challenges effectively, improved teacher education and preparation are vital. The respect accorded the teaching profession 50 years ago has declined in the face of decreasing teacher salaries and increasing opportunities in other domains for intelligent youth. We must bring about reinvigorated respect—both symbolic and financial—to the teaching profession to attract these individuals. Furthermore, we need greater teacher education and preparation to maintain the skills of existing educators in the onslaught of technological innovations. Many educators believe that educational partnerships are crucial to maintaining and improving the core skills of teachers. (1999, ix)

In the President’s Message to Kappa Delta Pi members who were 1999 Convocation attendees, Day reflected, “You are part of a great legacy dating back to 1911. Now you will be a part of charting the future course of Kappa Delta Pi’s business and strategic planning for the future. This is your opportunity for reflection and renewal as we focus on the challenges and the joys that we face at the dawn of a new millennium” (Introductory pages, Conference Program 1999). When Day’s Presidency ended in 2000, she looked back upon a term of office that was active and that brought about significant changes to the Society. She was to be honored by Kappa Delta Pi in the years following her Presidency. At the 2005 Convocation of the International Honor Society, initial funding was made to establish a new scholarship in her honor, the “Dr. Barbara Day Scholarship for Doctoral Students in Curriculum and Instruction.” Following full endowment of this scholarship in 2010, the scholarship is now known as the “Barbara Day Laureate Doctoral Scholarship in Curriculum and Instruction.” On July 7, 2006, Day was initiated into membership to the prestigious Laureate Chapter of the Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society. The Laureate Chapter is an organization of sixty of the most prominent living educators and researchers in the world. A competitive selection process occurs each time a new member may be elected. Past members of the Laureate Chapter include such luminaries as John Dewey, Margaret Mead, Albert Einstein, and Eleanor Roosevelt. Current members of the chapter include Tom Sergiovanni, Gloria Ladson-Billings, Marilyn Cochran-Smith, O. L. Davis, Jr., and Larry Cuban.

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As previously noted, Day continues to serve Kappa Delta Pi in various ways. Through spring 2011, she was Chapter Counselor of the Pi Theta Chapter at the University North Carolina. She has several recent articles in Kappa Delta Pi publications, including Kappa Delta Pi Record, the New Teacher Advocate, and The Educational Forum. Day asserted that through these publications, which were co-authored (two were co-authored with students), she had additional opportunities to put into practice her ideal of mentoring the next generation of teachers and scholars. The accomplishments of Kappa Delta Pi during the Presidency of Barbara Day continue to enhance the Society today. As she noted, the work of the group, combined with a steady vision and plan of action contributed to the successes during her term and the future work of Kappa Delta Pi. Day continues to be a tireless educator who advances the quality of education through her research, teaching, and service. She finds joy in her daily work and in being a mentor to many colleagues. She also finds joy in her family, which includes her husband, Douglas Day; daughter Susan Douglas Day-Brooks; son-in-law William Leonhard Brooks, Jr., an engineer; grandsons William L. Brooks III and Henry Douglas Day-Brooks, nine Godchildren, and many God-grandchildren. Perhaps not surprisingly, Day’s daughter Susan left the business world to become a teacher and is currently a National Board Certified, Master’s degreed kindergarten teacher in North Carolina. Susan loves the classroom and is currently planning her doctoral study.

NEXT STEPS Barbara Day’s career portrays a nuanced balance between life in academia, leadership to the profession, service to professional societies, service to the church and community, and family. She leaves a strong legacy. In the last 20 years, she led three major international scholarly organizations as President, taught numerous classes and mentored dozens of doctoral students in curriculum and instruction at the University of North Carolina. Her lasting legacy of 45 years of service to the University of North Carolina and mentoring of 65 doctoral students to completion of their dissertations and degrees is remarkable. Barbara Day’s retirement will likely mean simply a redirection of her energies, not a reduction of activity. While not prone to think of being retired, Day says she will remain active in her scholarship. She intends to devote the first year of her retirement to the completion and successful defense of her dissertation for her doctoral degree in Ministry from Virginia Theological Seminary. She will remain a traveler, with trips planned for 2011 to Canada, El Salvador, Geneva, and Baden-Baden. She will also travel more with her

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husband, Doug, who in October 2011 will become Governor-Elect of the Carolinas District of the Kiwanis Club. Thus, routes in both North and South Carolina will be well-traveled by the Days. Her service and leadership to Kappa Delta Pi will continue through her membership in the Laureate Chapter. She leaves a lasting legacy in her scholarly writing, with important messages about curriculum, instruction, and leadership for members of Kappa Delta Pi to remember. She exhorted, As members of Kappa Delta Pi, we teach young and old all around the world. Through successful methodology balanced with innovative techniques, we create windows of hope and foster learning at all levels. For the first grader whose school experience will provide a lifelong foundation of learning, we must continue to nurture wonder and enthusiasm. Likewise, for the first-year teacher, we offer support and guidance….We must continue to foster the professional growth of novice teachers so they can fully realize their present success and envision future possibilities. (Day 1997, p. 75)

Perhaps Day’s thoughts about the core mission of Kappa Delta Pi are best to conclude this chapter, as they remind us of the interconnectedness of constituents in successful educational endeavors. She stated, Success tomorrow requires teamwork today. We must encourage teamwork among educators, administrators, parents, students, policy makers, corporate leaders, and elected officials…. We need the entire community working together for our children and our future. We must remember the words from the Kappa Delta Pi motto: “So to teach that our words inspire a will to learn; so to serve that each day may enhance the growth of exploring minds; so to live that we may guide young and old to know the truth and love the right.” The motto is our call to arms in working for the best education possible for our children. In the midst of our work, we must remember to live humanely and take part in artistic endeavors, and enjoy the diversity of a richly multicultural world. As we strive to help our students learn, they may benefit most from our example. (Day 1999, p. 156)

REFERENCES Day, Barbara D. 1975. Open learning in early childhood. New York: Macmillan. Day, Barbara D. 1983. Early childhood education: Creative learning activities (2nd edition). New York: Macmillan. Day, Barbara D. (Ed.). 1985. Education for the 21st century: Key issues, leadership, literacy, legislation and learning. Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company. The Delta Kappa Gamma Society International. Day, Barbara D. 1988. Early childhood education: Creative learning activities (3rd edition). New York: Macmillan.

Barbara D. Day (1998-2000) 299 Day, Barbara D. (Ed.). 1992. Early Childhood Education: A Developmental Perspective. [Guest Editor]. Kappa Delta Pi Record, 28(3). Day, Barbara D. 1994. Early childhood education: Developmental/experiential teaching and learning (4th edition). New York: Merrill. Day, Barbara D. 1997. Creating Windows, Kappa Delta Pi Record 33(2), 75. Day, Barbara D. (Ed.). 1999. Teaching and learning in the new millennium Indianapolis, Indiana: Kappa Delta Pi. Day, Barbara D. 2000. Teachers for a new century: Two premiere programs. Kappa Delta Pi Record 36 (3), 124-127. Day, Barbara D., Dagenhart, Diana, O’Connor, Katherine A. and Petty, Teresa M. 2005. Giving teachers a voice. Kappa Delta Pi Record 41(3), 108-111. Day, Barbara D., and Drake, Kay. 1983. Early childhood education: Curriculum organization and classroom management. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Day, Barbara D. and Smith, N. (2011, in press). The research is clear: Time and choice are key with middle school students. The Educational Forum. Delta Kappa Gamma Society International for Key Women Educators. 2009. International Achievement Award citation presented to Dr. Barbara Day. Kappa Delta Pi. 2010. Initiation guidebook. http://www.kdp.org/chapters/pdf/ notebook/init_guidebook.pdf Leeper, Sarah Hammond, and Witherspoon, Ralph L., and Day, Barbara D. 1984. Good schools for young children: A guide for working with three-, four-, and five-yearold children (5th edition). New York: Macmillan. Lujan, Nan and Day, B. (2010). Professional learning communities: Overcoming the roadblocks. Delta Kappa Gamma International Journal for Professional Education 76(2), 10-17.

CHAPTER 27

JANETTE STATON ROGERS (2000-2002) Excellence In and Beyond the Classroom Robin Robinson Kapavik

Janette Staton Rogers 2000-2002 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 301–310 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Like many other teachers, Janette Staton Rogers was a child of teachers, a circumstance that provided a lineage of service to the education profession and one exemplified by service to students and community. She was the second-born daughter of Lawrence and Edith Staton. Her birth on February 6, 1947, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, completed her family which also included an older sister, Joanne Staton (Bartel). The family spent her childhood years in Oklahoma, with the exception of one year of kindergarten, during which the family lived in Brookport, Illinois. The Staton family was a family of educators. Lawrence Staton, a graduate of both Northeastern State University and Tulsa University, served rural Oklahoma as a secondary educator at East Central High School in Tulsa and the principal of Carlile Elementary near Gore, Oklahoma. In addition to his work as an educator, Lawrence also supported his family as a licensed pipe fitter, an occupation which provided income for the Staton family during summers. When reflecting upon her father’s life, Janette recalled the influence of his work ethic which kept him always on task with opportunities to support the family (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). Edith Staton originally worked as an administrative secretary for several oil companies in Tulsa, Oklahoma. This expertise impacted her life once she decided to enroll in Northeastern State University in Tahlequah at which she majored in business and minored in education, enabling her to become a business teacher at Gore High School in Gore, Oklahoma. Janette’s sister, Joanne, followed her parents’ career path by becoming a 1st grade teacher in Meade, Kansas, at which she remained for more than thirty years before retirement. These family members paved the way for Janette’s career in education. In fact, she fondly recalled her 7th and 8th grade school years at Carlile, at which her father was also her classroom teacher. It was a rural school with one teacher who taught all subjects to pupils who were at different grade levels (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). Because Carlile did not have a high school, many students, including Janette, attended grades 9-12 at Vian (OK) High School. It is interesting to note, as well as a direct reflection of the quality of her Carlile preparation, the Valedictorian (Janette) and the two Salutatorians of the 1965 VHS graduating class had attended the Carlile rural school. Upon her high school graduation, Staton enrolled at Harding University (Searcy, AR) at which she majored in elementary education and graduated with a BA in 1969. Likely because she is a much focused individual, she completed her program of graduate studies and received a MSE degree from the University of Central Arkansas at Conway the following year. Janette was hired as an Assistant Head Start Teacher at Carlile School in 1969, and then as a 1st grade teacher at Lynn Lane Elementary and a Reading Specialist for the Junior High Corrective Reading Program, both in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

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Her studies at the University of Central Arkansas were supported with a Fellowship in Teacher Education which also served as an impetus to Janette to pursue her doctoral studies at Oklahoma State University (OSU) in Stillwater, Oklahoma. She received her EdD degree in elementary education with a concentration in reading in 1974. She self-described herself as an over-achiever with a drive to do well, an attribute which has continued to serve her as an educator, professor, KDP counselor, and president of Kappa Delta Pi (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). Upon graduation from OSU, Janette accepted a position as an Assistant Professor of Elementary Education at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas. During the 1974-1975 school year, she taught Reading Methods courses and researched reading practices in open education settings (Rogers 1976). After marrying James V. “Jim” Rogers on June 6, 1975, she returned to her native state where she served in several different positions including, 1st and 2nd grade teacher (1975-1977) in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and a Reading Specialist (1978-1982) in Muskogee, Oklahoma. While teaching in the public school system, Janette was offered a position to teach night courses at Northeastern State University (NSU) in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. In 1982, she became a full-time Assistant Professor at NSU. During her first year at NSU, Rogers accepted the invitation of a colleague, Dr. James “Jim” Jones, to assist him as a co-counselor of NSU’s Kappa Rho chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. At that time, the chapter included only a small number of students, but Rogers believed that it could be stronger, and she wanted more for her students. “I decided to upgrade the local chapter and became highly involved in recruiting and working with student officers, planning meetings, and fundraising. As I increased my involvement, I grew personally and professionally through networking with students, faculty, and area educators” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). As a professor, Rogers held high expectations for her students, primarily for officers and members of Kappa Rho chapter. In 1986, Rogers attended her first KDP Convocation in Denver, an event which signaled a career-long commitment to KDP and its activities. In addition to her commitment to KDP, Rogers also became a leader within the Association of Childhood Education International (ACEI) in Oklahoma. She served on the State of Oklahoma Executive Board from 1985-1993, during which time she was elected as Organizational Development Chair, Vice-President, and State President (Area 1990). In addition, she was the cofounder and co-sponsor of the Eastern Oklahoma ACEI branch at NSU, as well as a member of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE), the International Reading Association (IRA), the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), and Phi Delta Kappa

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(PDK). Her dedication to student organizations on campus was evident as she encouraged students to take leadership positions within these organizations, as well as to attend state and national conferences. Rogers motivated students and promoted all education organizations, which eventually led to her next appointment within NSU. In 1985, she became the Elementary Education Program chair, a post which she held for fifteen years. During these years, Rogers gave significant leadership to the Kappa Rho chapter which she described as very “undergraduate focused” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). This focus enabled her to work with students as they embarked on the earliest years of their careers in the teaching profession. And, as NSU grew to include satellite campuses, the Kappa Rho Chapter grew to include “satellite” chapters, as well. Rogers described the challenges involved with multiple KDP Initiation Ceremonies which took place on multiple campuses, including the NSU campus and the Broken Arrow campus, nearly sixty miles in distance from the main campus (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). This arrangement posed logistical issues, but the challenges were met with solutions as Rogers continued to support the chapter. Rogers’ leadership style enabled students to take key leadership roles within the chapter. The Kappa Rho chapter increased in size as students sought to belong to an organization that made a difference in the local university community. The chapter increasingly began to serve as a provider of information and services for the university and greater communities. For example, the chapter hosted novice teacher panels, participated in the Celebration of Teaching Grant, hosted many professional developments, including “How to Market Yourself as a Teacher” and “Legal Aspects of the Profession.” In addition, Rogers encouraged undergraduate and graduate students to submit program proposals to Convocation planners in order to insure that students would be included in the program and, thereby, to understand the full effects of membership and participation in the organization. Due to these efforts and achievements, the chapter received the ACE (Achieving Chapter Excellence) Award during multiple years (1995, 1997, 1999). Rogers reflected upon the many outstanding alumni of the Kappa Rho chapter of Northeastern State University, many of whom performed a number of service projects to support the College of Education at various levels, including local, statewide, national, and international projects (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). Community service projects conducted under Rogers’ counselorship include book collections for children in the Cherokee Nation and Africa, canned food drives, and local blood drives (NSU 1999). Through its efforts to provide professional support and community service, the chapter supported many students who left

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NSU and continued on as leaders within the profession. In fact, many of Rogers’ former students, KDP members, and Kappa Rho chapter officers are now teacher leaders, principals, education professors, Teachers of the Year at various levels, and Nationally Board Certified Teachers. Rogers recalled that the largest lesson learned during these years was the art of promoting the chapter. She learned how to get media attention for the students’ many academic accomplishments and community service functions (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). This attention fostered two purposes, chapter recognition and increased participation. In fact, Rogers became a master at involving students in the work of the chapter, all the while documenting achievements and key moments through photography. Kappa Rho’s history has been meticulously documented in multiple scrapbooks donated by Janette and Jim Rogers, who both share a passion for photography (Rogers, Jim, pers. comm.). Although Rogers attended her first Convocation in only 1986, she quickly became an active member at levels beyond the Kappa Rho chapter. By the early 1990s, she served as an Area Representative (1991-1997) for the Oklahoma chapters, which introduced her to the Regional Counselor Coordinators. In addition, Rogers became very active on National KDP Committees, including the Field Services Committee, which she chaired from 1992-1994. In her work on this committee, she assisted with the development of the following new services and programs: Chapter Membership Kit; High Impact Chapter Activities Notebook; Chapter Leadership Training Sessions at Regional Conferences; Counselor Recognition Programs; Area Representative Guidelines; Chapter Resource Notebook; Job Listing System; Reading is Fun/KDP Joint Project. Rogers also served on the Constitution and Bylaws Committee from 1996-1998, on the Editorial Advisory Panel from 1993-1997, and as a Reviewer for several KDP scholarships (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). During this time, Rogers had the opportunity to bring large numbers of students to regional conferences and Convocations, a fact noticed by Michael P. Wolfe, then Executive Director of KDP. She described Wolfe as inspirational in his ability to draw people towards KDP and its efforts to provide support for educators and pre-service educators. Rogers believes that Wolfe recognized her work with KDP students from NSU, as well as the surrounding Oklahoma community, and encouraged her to continue to work with KDP at the Society level. Rogers reflected that she knew how to be a local counselor, but through Wolfe’s mentorship, she was able to utilize those skills on a larger, national level. She fondly remembered working with Wolfe and Faye Snodgrass during jam packed Executive Council meetings, followed by lively social events hosted by Polly and Michael Wolfe (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.).

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After an unsuccessful bid for membership on the Executive Council in 1992, Rogers was elected Vice-President of the Society for the 1994-1996 biennium. However, when she had to make the decision of whether or not to pursue the position of President-Elect, she worried about her many obligations at NSU (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). After all, Rogers was a professor at a teaching university, at which she maintained a full teaching and advising load, served as NSU’s elementary education program coordinator, participated in many other professional organizations, served as the Kappa Rho chapter counselor, and dedicated her life, along with her husband, to serving the community in diabetes awareness. Rogers knew that she was capable of serving in the position; however, she questioned if she had the time to fully support KDP as is required of a President-Elect. In addition, Rogers reflected about the group of Vice-Presidents with whom she served during the 1994-1996 years (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). Rogers had full faith in the work and service of Dr. Barbara D. Day (President, 1998-2000), and strongly believed that she would make an excellent president of the Society. Rogers, therefore, decided to step away from the Executive Council during the next biennium. However, that decision did not curb her commitment to KDP and, with encouragement and support from many people including her husband, Jim Rogers, she was elected President-Elect (1998-2000) and served through the leadership cycle as President (2000-2002) and Past President (2002-2004) (Rogers, Jim, pers. comm.). She acknowledged the influence of those Society Presidents who served with her on various Executive Councils, including George L. Mehaffy, Wallace D. Draper, F. Morgan Simpson, Barbara D. Day, and Blossom Nissman. Concerning these former Society presidents, she stated, “All of these individuals were professionals with extensive credentials who were passionate about KDP and its Ideals. So we spent a lot of time together, worked on teams with our councils, and had a lot of fun in the process. The wonderful friendships I have made with individuals like these are one of the greatest treasures of my association with Kappa Delta Pi, and for that I am very grateful!” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). When Rogers’ presidential biennium began in 2000, KDP Headquarters had just completed its move from West Lafayette to Indianapolis, but the building still was being redesigned to better fit KDP’s needs. As such, a Capital Campaign continued to raise funds for building expenses, additional scholarships, and academic projects for the Society. Rogers remembered that her Executive Council was unique in that two members had life-changing personal events during the Biennium. Mary Margaret Harrington gave birth to a baby during the term and student member, Denise Matty, became engaged and was married during the term. Rogers com-

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mented, “I had served on a number of Executive Councils before, but nothing exciting like these events had happened on the other Councils” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). In her work on the Executive Council, Rogers most fondly remembers the unique opportunities afforded to her as president of the Society. One such opportunity included the privilege of meeting and introducing the 2001 National Teacher of the Year whom she found to be inspirational and motivating. In addition, she participated in numerous chapter installations including the Tulane University Alumni chapter, the re-chartering of Gamma chapter at the University of Oklahoma, and several new campus chapters. Another highlight for Rogers was meeting the distinguished educator and KDP Laureate, Dr. John Goodlad. “One of the reasons that I was so attracted to KDP was the fact that KDP members could actually interact with the Laureates and meet them … it was a thrill to listen to these ‘giants’ and to meet them as I served in different capacities with KDP” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). Of all her opportunities, however, she ranks the highlight of her biennium as the Global Initiative trip to Beijing during the summer of 2000. During that trip, Rogers, along with former Society President, Dr. F. Morgan Simpson, and KDP Society Laureate James Banks, served as delegates from the United States as representatives of Kappa Delta Pi at the fourth China—U.S. Conference on Education. As a delegate, Rogers was able to meet with educational counterparts from China and discuss teacher preparation in the United States and China. The hosts provided many opportunities for the delegation to visit historic sites within the city and countryside, but one of the most memorable aspects of the trip was a visit to a demonstration primary school in Beijing at which an orchestra composed of approximately 150 elementary school children performed folk music (Rogers 2000). Other notable KDP achievements that took place during this time period included the establishment and presentation of the Millennium Counselor Award, the creation of Regional Chapter Resource Consultants, and the creation of the National Day of Service. Rogers remarked that “to emphasize and support new teachers is one of the best projects KDP ever adopted” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). With that regard, Rogers also appreciates that KDP Headquarters annually sends a letter to university presidents in acknowledgement of the work of chapter counselors. For Rogers, Kappa Delta Pi is one of the few remaining organizations that still have a “human edge.” For example, when a telephone call is made to Headquarters, a person still answers the phone to assist the caller/KDP member. This is different from the computer generated telephone response systems now used by most organizations, and, in Rogers’

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opinion, something that keeps KDP above the rest (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). With regards to concerns or problems that arose during Rogers’ tenure as President of the Society, a national tragedy stands out—September 11, 2001. Although this day changed millions of lives, as well as the course of the nation, it also prompted worry about the 2001 Convocation attendance in Orlando since many people became uneasy about air travel. Rogers recalled many meetings and “behind the scenes” conversations with Michael Wolfe, all focused upon the challenge to promote Convocation in the wake of the national tragedy (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). In fact, many personal letters and phone calls were made in a short period of time to encourage members and counselors to attend the event, which was to take place just two short months after the tragedy. As a result, attendance was decent, although the Society did lose some money because it had originally planned for larger numbers. However, the good news was that no keynote speakers backed out of the biennial meeting. In addition, Rogers credited the state of Florida, who really came through in attendance numbers. During the meeting, she took extra time to thank people for attending. The theme of the 2001 Convocation was “Opening Gates to the Future” and for Rogers, two stand out moments from the conference included participation by two women who had literally ‘opened gates to the future.’ These women were Barbara Morgan and Dr. Deborah Wolfe. Rogers introduced the keynote speaker, Barbara Morgan, NASA’s first Educator Astronaut, who completed her first space flight in 2007 after a 22 year journey with NASA. Her career with NASA began in 1985 when she was selected as the back-up candidate for the NASA Teacher in Space Program, where she trained with Christa McAuliffe and the Challenger crew at Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. Rogers recalled how she, with the assistance of Morgan Simpson, Barbara Day, and Michael Wolfe, inducted Morgan into the Society after her speech, an inspirational event. The other awe-inspiring moment occurred when KDP Laureate Deborah Cannon Partridge Wolfe, led the closing banquet prayer. One reason that Rogers thought that the prayer was memorable was the eloquence of Wolfe’s oratorical skills and presence (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). When asked about major challenges for KDP, Rogers acknowledged an issue that was a challenge both during her years on the Executive Council as well as currently. She remarked that KDP must continue to be find ways to meet the needs of all KDP members, which includes a very diverse group of educators. When members’ needs are met, members continue to retain membership in the organization and see KDP as a valuable asset to their professional career. The encouragement of students to remain active

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members after graduation is a key component to a strong Society. In addition, Rogers believes there is a need for increased support to chapter counselors in order to heighten awareness among university and school administrators about the valuable contributions KDP makes to the profession at international, national, state, and local levels (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). Concerning a major qualification for becoming president of the Society, Rogers remarked that “one must have a passion for service and a passion for KDP.” In fact, Rogers credits KDP’s Ideal of Service as being the most impactful in her own life. This Ideal impacts Rogers’ life on a daily basis as she abides by the verse, “People don’t care how much you know unless you show them how much you care” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). This sensitive attitude has resulted in numerous awards from entities other than KDP. Rogers has achieved many accolades, including the Outstanding Young Women in America Award (1977); Outstanding School of Education Alumnus Award from Harding University (1986); Who’s Who in American Education (1989-1995); Outstanding Volunteer Award for the Oklahoma branch of the American Diabetes Association (1991); and Phi Delta Kappa’s President’s Award (1996). Rogers’ commitment as counselor to NSU’s Kappa Rho chapter, in fact, postponed her retirement for two years (Rogers, Jim, pers. comm.).Of all the positions she has held within KDP, that of chapter counselor has been the longest. Therefore, she wanted to leave the chapter in capable hands, with someone who would continue its legacy on campus and tend to its growth. Rogers found that person in Dr. Debbie Landry. Just as Dr. James Jones who recruited Rogers to oversee the chapter in 1982, Rogers recruited Landry 25 years later as she decided to retire from Northeastern State University in 2007. At present, Rogers continues to work with Resident Teachers as well as her husband’s real estate business as an associate broker. Rogers’ favorite activities include photography, travel, and interacting with the college aged students who live in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. Of all the chapter’s accomplishments during Rogers’ tenure as chapter counselor, she is most proud of the achievements with the Celebration of Teaching Grants, which were originally established by the Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). The Kappa Rho chapter competed for and was awarded this grant which supported the establishment of a signature program for the College of Education. The Kappa Rho chapter, in collaboration with NSU, the Minority Teacher Development Program, and the College of Education developed one-day conferences designed to entice middle and high school students to consider entering the teaching profession. Although the Celebration of Teaching Grants are no longer funded through the Society, Northeastern

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State University continues to sponsor the program and its efforts to support young people in the decision to enter the education profession. The Celebration of Teaching Program currently showcases and honors both the National Teacher of the Year and the Oklahoma Teacher of the Year, in addition to area teachers of the year and recently named Nationally Board Certified Teachers, many of whom are alumni of NSU. Because of this emphasis, Rogers described the Celebration of Teaching as Kappa Delta Pi’s most significant legacy to Northeastern State University (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.). When asked about her greatest accomplishments, Rogers described each endeavor. As an educator, she is most proud of the connections she made with students by showing them that she cared. As a member of Kappa Delta Pi, she is most proud of her accomplishments as a counselor. As president of the Society, she is most proud of the friendships that were created and continue to the present day. Rogers added that Kappa Delta Pi “should be about the ‘meat’ of education, that is, scholarship and excellence in education” (Rogers, Janette, pers. comm.).

REFERENCES Area ACEI branch established on NSU campus. 1990. Tahlequah Daily Press (Tahlequah, OK), March 20. NSU chapter takes part in meeting. 1999. Tahlequah Daily Press (Tahlequah, OK), December 12. Rogers, Janette S. 1976. Reading practices in open education. The Reading Teacher 29: 548-54. Rogers serves as delegate in China. 2000. Tahlequah Daily Press (Tahlequah, OK), August 18.

CHAPTER 28

BLOSSOM SNOYER NISSMAN (2002-2004) “Labels are for Jelly Jars, Not for Children” Dana Haraway and Barbara Slater Stern  

Blossom Snoyer Nissman 2002-2004 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 311–320 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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Dr. Blossom Snoyer Nissman, Kappa Delta Pi (KDP) International President from 2002-2004, remains actively involved and concerned about the status of education in today’s society. She is dedicated to celebrating the accomplishments of effective teachers and administrators, while focusing on their positive impact on children. This chapter outlines Dr. Nissman’s background, her career contributions to the field of education, her service to Kappa Delta Pi and, even in retirement, her continued contributions to professional development through her publications and public speaking across the United States.  Dr. Nissman was the youngest of four children born in New York in 1928. Her parents, Arthur and Rose Snoyer, moved from New York to Philadelphia, Pa. shortly after the Great Depression of 1929 and remained in Pennsylvania for 21 years during which Dr. Nissman attended public school and moved on to Temple University where she received her Bachelor of Science degree in 1951. She began her teaching career in Pennsylvania in Elkins Park and Pennsbury, PA, suburban school districts of Philadelphia. After her marriage to Albert Nissman, the couple lived in Philadelphia before moving to Willingboro, NJ to join the Willingboro School District. Dr. Nissman was a member of the school staff as a teacher in grades 1-3 and guidance counselor for the elementary schools for 10 years. Her husband, Dr.  Albert Nissman, was a teacher in the secondary school for 6 years; and, after receiving his doctorate in secondary education from Penn State University, was a Professor of Education until his death in 1998. Clearly the product of a close and loving family, Dr. Nissman describes their two children, Debbi (1957) and David (1959), as being their most wonderful achievement (Nissman, pers. comm.). Dr. Nissman pursued her M.A. degree at Trenton State College (now the College of New Jersey) in the field of Guidance and Counseling graduating with honors in 1969. She entered Rutgers, The State University, NJ, to pursue her Doctorate in Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education Degree completing the program in 1976. Her dissertation, A Study of Performance Contracting and its Application to Education, explored the rational, results driven approach to education and concluded that while aspects of performance contracting have a place in the bottom line of student achievement, overall performance contracting ignores “aspects of personal growth” and the “moral, aesthetic, cultural conditions of teaching and learning” (204). This important theme is evident in subsequent works and remains quite salient in today’s educational environment. Dr. Nissman holds a permanent certificate in Elementary and Special Education from the state of Pennsylvania. Her permanent certificates from New Jersey include Elementary Education, Student Personnel

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Services, School Principal, Supervisor, Superintendent of Schools, and Elementary School Counselor. Her varied professional experiences include a multiplicity of educational roles across the field including: Nursery School Director in Bensalem, PA; Elementary Guidance Counselor, Willingboro, NJ; and Learning Disabilities Consultant and Curriculum Specialist in Willingboro, NJ and Mount Holly, NJ respectively. Her positions in administration include: Executive Director of the Central Burlington County Region—a consortium of 10 school districts; and Principal, Assistant Superintendent, and then, Acting Superintendent of the Long Beach Island School District, NJ until 1989. During the summers, when Dr. Nissman was not under a 12 month administrative position, she was the Camp Director of Camp Council, a camp for underprivileged girls in Phoenixville, PA for 4 years, and a Red Cross Water Safety Instructor (volunteer) for 20+ years. She also worked as a swimming instructor at the YWCA in Philadelphia and as a Red Cross Life Guard Instructor in boating and water safety as Dr. Nissman recounted, “… believe me, that is hard to do in a swimming pool!” (Nissman, pers. comm.). After her retirement from 32 years in public education, Dr. Nissman accepted a position on the faculty of Georgian Court University in the Department of Education (1989) where she remained for eleven years retiring in 2000 as a full professor in the undergraduate school. During her 43 year career, Dr. Nissman also served as an adjunct professor in the Graduate Schools of the University of Pennsylvania, Rider University, The College of New Jersey, and Temple University. This range of educational experiences and career positions testifies to an active, lifelong learner with a thirst for new and ever increasing challenges and responsibilities. Dr. Nissman’s travels in her leadership role of educational organizations has resulted in her recognition as an international and national motivational speaker. She reflected that her life models the fact that women or men can find their place of leadership in the educational community if they truly believe in what they are doing and have faith in their own abilities. “It is said that it takes twice as much effort for women to prove their worth as compared to men but that can be easy for those that truly become “a possiblist” and believe in themselves” (Nissman, pers. comm.). She continued: “it takes guts and preparation to get things done. How you do it is the point” (Nissman, pers. comm.). While she believes that women can be great leaders, she shared that she hates to see good teachers leave the classroom and suggested that they be rewarded for excellence. In her view, good teachers should be paid more so they don’t feel they have to go into administration and other roles to “climb the ladder” (Nissman, pers.comm.). Dr. Nissman acknowledges that merit pay is

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very difficult to implement without bias and favoritism but insists that good teachers should be acknowledged and rewarded. During the course of her educational pursuits that clearly demonstrate her passion for education, hard work and commitment, Dr. Nissman accumulated several noteworthy awards. At Temple University, she was inducted into the Magnet and Chimes Honor Societies, and was the recipient of the Outstanding Senior Award and the Emma Johnston Senior Scholarship Tuition Award. After working at Sears Roebuck for two years in order to earn tuition monies, she was awarded a first year scholarship.  In recognition of her completion of her years of service on the Executive Board and as State and Chapter President of Delta Kappa Gamma Society (DKG), an international honor society of women educators, she was able to complete her doctoral studies at Rutgers the State University when she received a generous scholarship awarded by the society. In 1980, Dr. Nissman was selected as one of only six recipients worldwide to receive leadership training at the University of Texas sponsored by scholarships from DKG. Dr. Nissman indicated that this group still meets together at DKG conventions. Recognition of Dr. Nissman’s contributions continued with the prestigious New York Times Book Award given for her first textbook, coauthored with Dr. Martin Stamm, entitled New Dimensions in Elementary Guidance (1971). At the time, this book was recognized for its “innovation in elementary school [education] and the Child Study Team” (Nissman, pers. comm.). Dr. Nissman also received the Teachers of English Book Award, the Central New Jersey Council for Special Education Service Award,  the Red Cross Service Award, The Hugh O’Brian Youth Foundation Award,  Woman of the Year Award from American ORT (an international, non-government organization dedicated to education and training), a Willingboro County Chapter Award, the Chapel of Four Chaplains’ Outstanding Education Award (in coordination with Temple University),  the Council for Exceptional Children Award, an Outstanding Senior Award from Temple University and the New Jersey School Administrator’s Award. Dr Nissman has been prolific in her publications throughout her career. She has published in excess of 40 articles in both educational journals and in other general publications, e.g. Women’s Day. Her educational journal publications are primarily focused on special education, educational administration and general education and appear in journals such as The School Counselor, Administrator’s Quarterly, the Journal of Learning Disabilities, and Kappa Delta Pi Record. Dr. Nissman has co-authored several books in addition to the one previously mentioned including Improving Middle School Guidance which focuses on practical strategies for teachers, counselors and administrators. Dr. Nissman responded to questions from

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residents in the Trenton area regarding school concerns in weekly, local newspaper columns entitled “Ask the Counselor” and later “Ask the Principal”. Subsidized by grant funds for the State of New Jersey, Dr. Nissman completed a series of teacher instruction booklets for the New Jersey State Department of Education published by Guidance Awareness Publication. Her most recent book, What Every Teacher should Know About Teacher-tested Classroom Management Strategies (2009), published by Prentice Hall, is currently in its third edition. Dr. Nissman is currently drafting a new book, Laughing Through Life as an Educator.  In addition to serving as International President of KDP from 20022004, Dr Nissman has been, and remains, actively involved in several organizations committed to youth. She served as President of the New Jersey State KDP Chapter as well as President of the New Jersey Organization for Learning Disabilities. She has been actively involved in Delta Kappa Gamma as well having been elected and serving as both Vice President and President. Dr. Nissman is involved in community service and was Executive Director and served on the Board of Directors for Camp Council, a camp for underprivileged girls from Philadelphia. She served on the Board of Directors for the Girl Scouts and has remained actively involved since 2004 as a Trustee on the Executive Board for Mashpee, MA, her current town of residence. Invited to KDP membership upon receipt of her doctorate at Rutgers (1976), Dr. Nissman accelerated her involvement in 1989 when she began working at Georgian Court University (GCU) and started their KDP chapter. She related that, “we usually had 100 to 150 members inducted every year and Georgian Court continues to be a very active chapter today.” She still retains her KDP membership at GCU and attends some of their events. Dr. Nissman recounts, “Actually, Georgian Court University provided a special installation event for me and my fellow officers when I became International President” (Nissman, pers.comm.). Dr. Nissman served KDP as President Elect, Vice President, Program Chair, and member of the Editorial Board providing her expertise to the research and the publication committees. Dr. Nissman proudly states that she has been an “active participant and made presentations at every Convocation from 1989 to present as well as providing leadership training for newly inducted chapters” (Nissman, pers. comm.). One of the few KDP officers willing to undertake large amounts of travel, Dr. Nissman recalled presentations to chapters in: Maine; New Hampshire; Rhode Island; several in Massachusetts; Vermont; Connecticut; Delaware; Potsdam, NY; Goldsboro, NC; Raleigh, NC; Cumberland Community College; Jacksonville, FL (at an ATE meeting), and many more. Naturally, there was some duplication in these presentations but Dr. Nissman’s enthusiasm and positivism marked the occasions of installation of new chapters, recognition

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of new members, or presentations about Kappa Delta Pi to other organizations. She recounts “they sure kept me on the run, but I enjoyed every minute of it!” (Nissman, pers. comm.). Dr. Nissman encourages new members to “take advantage of the scholarship, the publications, the Convocations, the website, and the scholarships made available to them through membership in KDP” (Nissman, pers. comm.). She highlights the importance of KDP as “more than a line enhancing a resume” and prompts members to go the extra mile for their students saying “encourage your students to open doors never before explored” (Nissman, pers. comm.). In her presentations, Dr. Nissman employs an invigorating and inspirational tone reminding the new members that the “students you will be teaching are on a journey, not a race, and great moments aren’t judged by how long they last, but how long they are remembered” (Nissman, pers. comm.). In recalling her experiences, two that stand out are “the thrill of the visitations to Temple University and to Rutgers University installations as both were alma maters in days long gone by” (Nissman, per. comm.). Being greeted by past fellow students and professors who had been informed that she was to be on campus was a very special moment for her, as well as receipt of the Outstanding Educator’s Award from Rutgers University. This award is not necessarily given annually and the presentation included the attendance of her daughter, her daughter’s two children and several faculty members from Georgian Court, her then place of employment.   As she reflects on the many places she traveled when she was an officer of KDP, Dr Nissman recounts: I remember most the warmth of the welcome of both staff and students— seeing these same students at their first Convocation, listening to the excitement in their voices of their pride in becoming a member of KDP and talking to their parents who shared their pride…. I had the opportunity to meet amazingly talented and dedicated young men and women who exhibited energy and enthusiasm for their work with youngsters of all ages. When I asked: ‘What made you decide to become a teacher?’ they often shared with me that they were encouraged by outstanding teachers who taught them to love learning and respect their colleagues. (Nissman, pers. comm.)

As an example, Dr. Nissman provided a copy of a presentation from Convocation, November 5, 2005, in which she incorporated techniques and examples from her aforementioned book, Teacher Tested Classroom Management Strategies. Although the world is very different now from the one she grew up in, Dr. Nissman’s educational philosophy and current educational concerns remain salient. She states:

Blossom Snoyer Nissman (2002-2004) 317 Primarily the technology of today has given youngsters a front row seat to observe terrorism, war, human suffering because of natural disasters, and pressure for achievement that easily can overwhelm all of us. That is why it is vitally important that we as teachers … must be personally well grounded in our own positive self concepts and understanding of our role in the classroom. (Nissman, pers. comm.)

Dr. Nissman continues with the importance of a positive understanding of how to change negative behavior to positive action. She discusses relatively simple steps to assist with the change and provided an example of when bulletin boards that reflected classroom activity and student success were being taken or torn by students in the hallways. Dr. Nissman describes the solution as following a process. “The first challenge was to determine who was damaging the displays? Was this intentional or accidental?” (Nissman, pers. comm.). When the determination was made that the student in question was known for hostile and negative behavior, Dr. Nissman called him to her office, appointed him Bulletin Board Monitor, made him a pin with his title, and put him in charge of finding out who was ruining the bulletin boards so that that person would “know that this is inappropriate and mean behavior.” The student accepted the challenge, told everyone about his new job and the problem of the negative behavior was changed to positive action. She is a proponent of catching kids doing things right instead of constantly harping on what they do that is wrong. It is, she stated, logical that we all want to feel good about ourselves. She closed her presentation telling her audience that “Life is good! It truly is. And as teachers and administrators you have the opportunity to make a significant difference in the lives of those you touch.” She had prevailed upon her publisher to supply a copy of her book to every member of the audience and told them to “Enjoy and keep up the good work making a difference in your classrooms and schools” (Nissman, pers. comm.).    In reviewing the minutes of the Executive Board for the period that Dr. Nissman served in the leadership of the organization, the most pressing concerns centered on issues typical of similar organizations and included membership growth, chapter support, attendance at Convocation and the usual financial issues attendant with maintaining the organization. Dr. Nissman shared that additional issues that arose included the need for beginning teacher support, the selection and identification of outstanding educators to serve as models for the membership during Convocation, the review of by-laws and basic philosophies “that are the heart and breadth of KDP”, and ways to share the vision and mission with the membership. The Executive Council worked with Dr. Michael Wolfe, KDP Director and his staff to establish appropriate goals and plans for the Executive Council’s biennial. As a result the priorities for the Executive Council

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“were to search out the weaknesses of KDP—the areas that seemed to be most needed for the membership” (Nissman, pers.comm.). The Council responded by [promoting] closer relationships with chapters through representatives hired to visit chapters and respond personally to questions. In addition, student representatives were sensitive to exploring chapter needs and bringing these thoughts to the Council. The Council worked closely with the Foundation’s Board.  In addition the committee members submitted reports that were reviewed by the Council and the Council was always welcome to send a representative to the meeting to clarify concerns, update materials, and answer questions. (Nissman, per. comm.)

These efforts were rewarded as evidenced by “good membership response, increase in enrollment and an outstanding Convocation” (Nissman, pers. comm.).  Dr. Nissman still has suggestions for KDP. She feels that KDP should keep an honors record of members who have done outstanding work— people aren’t acknowledged enough. She is concerned that there is a cadre of talented retired members and that KDP “shouldn’t forget us.” This group of individuals still has much to contribute. Overall, her assessment of Kappa Delta Pi is that it is an outstanding professional, as opposed to purely social, organization that provides support for pre-service, beginning and in-service teachers. She hopes that KDP continues to reach out and offer service to its chapters and members while simultaneously maintaining the quality of its excellent publications. “The fact that contact with KDP staff can be achieved with a telephone call is a miracle in this day and age … demonstrated by the warmth and friendship of the staff and members to one another in this computerized society...” She sincerely feels the need for personal contact is so important in helping young (and older) people become valued contributors to society because personal contact makes each of us feel we are needed and are listened to.  Throughout our discussions with Dr. Nissman the same themes continually repeated themselves—positive personal regard coupled with an enthusiasm for life and for learning. She is, by her own admission, a real people person. There is also a recurring theme of feminism; she recounted working at Georgian Court, a Catholic women’s university. She stated that “when women are not distracted by coed relationships in the classroom they do much better academically and they have much to contribute.” She was an early advocate for looping (keeping the same students together as a class over several grades with the same teacher). She took a risk, tried this out and had a class where nobody failed and every-

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body flourished at the end of the three year period (Nissman, pers. comm.). In response to a question about her greatest professional challenges, Dr. Nissman mentioned that at presentations people open up with their most personal revelations, their innermost problems, and want you to help them—she was concerned about how to respond. She also talked about the caliber of new teachers who she believes are less committed than earlier generations of teachers. She believes that “technology contaminates our education system. Social networking is damaging; kids are not thinking for themselves” (Nissman, pers. comm.). She disapproves of virtual or online education. She describes it as a dangerous area as “you don’t know who is taking the tests and who is doing the work, there is no way to check.” She believes that logically, you have to meet the complete person—you can have good academics online but bad teaching—it is not good for students” (Nissman, pers. comm.). Dr. Nissman’s introduction at the beginning of this chapter is followed by a statement she often mentioned in her presentations “labels are for jelly jars, not children!” She adds that personal contact, looking at the whole child and helping him or her find self worth can solve so many problems because it gives each person value and purpose.  Perhaps we all should think about that and look for the good in each individual instead of identifying the “bad”. To quote Dr. Nissman “Teaching is a part of life.  It continues as we interact with people with positive reinforcement, with our search for what is right instead of picking on what you feel is wrong and by thinking of oneself as a person who cares and enjoys seeing the happiness in others because you have recognized something good in them. Dr. Nissman states, “KDP supports this belief and as a true member it is your obligation to uphold it.” Upon her election to International President of Kappa Delta Pi, Dr Nissman moved to Cape Cod, MA to be nearer to her daughter’s family living in Wellesley, MA. The overwhelming love and pride she has in her family was evident as she discussed the accomplishments of her son, her daughter, her four grandchildren, and her four great grandchildren as well as her two adorable and friendly cockapoos who keep her actively on the move. In a telephone conversation she mentioned that she was “rabbit sitting” for her youngest grandchild while the family was on vacation on their sail boat. She enjoys her walks on the beaches near her home, as well as having the option for more time to travel throughout the United States to fulfill the requirements of this exciting position of leadership over a membership exceeding 60,000 members in the U.S. and overseas. It is hard to imagine Dr. Nissman ever fully retiring and losing

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interest in the plight of people in general and students, their teachers and the field of education specifically.

REFERENCES Fostering professional growth of women educators for 75 years—and counting! 2009. Delta Kappa Gamma Bulletin 76(1):6-6. Nissman, Blossom S. 2009. Priceless gifts. Kappa Delta Pi Record 45(3):144. Nissman, Blossom S. 2009. Teacher-tested classroom management strategies. 3rd ed. Boston: Pearson. Nissman, Blossom S. 1980. Mainstreaming: Who? why? when? how? Trenton: Central Burlington County Region for Special Education. Nissman, Blossom S., and Georgian Court College. 1996-1998. So you want to be a teacher. Lakewood, N.J.: Georgian Court College. Nissman, Blossom S. 1976. A study of performance contracting and its application to education. Unpublished thesis. Rutgers University. Nissman, Blossom. 1970. Ask the counselor. Trenton, N.J: Chandler-Davis. Stamm, Martin L., and Nissman, Blossom. 1970. Alphabet land. West Trenton, N.J: Chandler-Davis,. Stamm, Martin L., Nissman, Blossom S. 1979. Improving middle school guidance: practical procedures for counselors, teachers, and administrators. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. Stamm, Martin L., Nissman, Blossom S. 1973. Your child and drugs: A preventive approach. Rancocas, N.J: Guidance Awareness Publications. Stamm, Martin L., Nissman, Blossom S. 1971. New dimensions in elementary guidance; practical procedures for teachers, counselors, and administrators. 1st ed. New York: Rosen Press.

CHAPTER 29

JOHN DOUGLAS LIGHT (2004-2006) A Lifetime Educator Janet Hammer and Patricia Wiese

John Douglas Light 2004-2006 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 321–329 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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On December 17, 1937, Ralph and Stelle Light welcomed their third son, John Douglas Light, into the family. At the time, the family called Chicago, Illinois, home, but when Light was five years old, his father moved the family to Champaign, home of the University of Illinois. With this change in location and close proximity to a large university, the elder Light felt confident that his three sons would earn college degrees. After growing up in a working class neighborhood and attending local public schools, Light graduated from a community high school in 1955 at the age of seventeen and left his parents’ home in Champaign, Illinois, to attend Wabash College, an all male liberal arts college in Crawfordsville, Indiana. However, at the end of football season and much to the disappointment of his family, Light dropped out of college and returned home. What might have surprised his family in 1955 is that he would eventually return to college, earn three degrees, and devote much of his adult life to the field of education. After returning home from his first college experience, Light enlisted in the U.S. Navy. Because he was only seventeen at the time, his enlistment required a parental signature. During his naval service, Light was a member of a flight crew that regularly flew from Midway to the Aleutian Islands. During this era of the Cold War, the crew’s job was to monitor sea and air for Russian contacts. Although the crew was based in Hawaii, Light also spent time in Midway. When his near three-year tour of duty ended, Light once again returned home to Champaign, and, this time, he enrolled in the University of Illinois. After attending the University of Illinois for a year and a half, Light transferred to Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana. While attending Butler, Light was motivated by his uncle, J. Everett Light, a lifelong educator who had begun his career as a vocational teacher and later became Superintendent of Schools for Metropolitan School District of Washington Township in Indianapolis. Throughout his uncle’s career, he was dedicated to the vision of a school that would prepare students for college and work after high school, and his passion for education inspired his nephew. Although his uncle’s talent for motivating and inspiring young people did not stop with Light, as was later evidenced by the establishment of the J. Everett Light Career Center in Indianapolis, Light attributes his decision to pursue a career in education to his uncle’s influence and example. While attending college in Indianapolis, Light helped to support himself by working in construction jobs; however, he also found time to work with the YMCA. His affiliation with the YMCA had begun when he was a child in Champaign. Later, while in the U.S. Navy, he helped with the gym club, swim club, and the summer day camp for dependent children living on the Naval base. The years spent affiliated

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with the YMCA confirmed Light’s interest in pursuing a career working with children. While attending Butler University, Light’s Aunt Louise arranged for him to meet a young lady named Beverly Foust at a church function and, in 1963, during his senior year, he and Beverly were married. Following his graduation in May 1964, Light gained his first teaching position as a sixth grade teacher at Morehead Elementary in Metropolitan School District of Warren Township, Indianapolis, Indiana. With a $300 stipend for intramurals, he was earning $4,600 a year. Light knew that his goals included graduate school. Therefore, during the summer following his first year of teaching, he enrolled in Ball State University with the goal of earning a master’s degree in school administration. Upon completion of this degree in 1968, Light became assistant principal at Morehead Elementary, the same school at which he began his teaching career. In 1971, he broadened his administrative experience within the Warren Township Schools when he was named to become the principal of another township school, Lakeside Elementary. During Light’s tenure in Warren Township schools, he and Beverly expanded their family to include a daughter, Lezlie, and two sons, Douglas and Bradley. As a father, Light emphasized education to his children, not only by expecting them to earn good grades but by stressing the importance of their “gaining an understanding and appreciation of a wide range of subjects” (Douglas Light, pers. comm.). All of the children were encouraged to pursue their interests, whether they be academics, sports, Boy Scouts, or other activities, and Light was always there to offer support, encouragement, and when necessary, a lesson in perseverance (Douglas Light, pers. comm.) Light had not yet reached his goal of completing a doctorate, so in 1972, when the U.S. Congress began discussing the possibility of ending the GI Bill, he realized that he might not have the opportunity to use the tuition assistance provided by his GI Bill if he further delayed graduate school at the doctoral level. Therefore, he applied to the doctoral program at Ball State University and was accepted. After only two years as principal at Lakeside Elementary and to his superintendent’s surprise, Light took a two year leave of absence to return to school in pursuit of a doctorate in educational administration with the goal of eventually becoming a superintendent of schools. Though Light’s area of research was the development of evaluations for in-service programs using observations, surveys, and personal interviews, and his interest was curriculum and instruction, he quickly realized that a superintendent needed to understand the politics of education, a realization that would serve him well in the years ahead.

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While attending Ball State University, Light was invited to join Kappa Delta Pi (KDP) and did so in 1975, the same year he earned an Ed. D. degree in educational administration. Following graduation, Dr. John Light accepted the position of Assistant Superintendent for Elementary Schools in Michigan City (IN) Area Schools. This system was suffering from its efforts to work through desegregation issues. It had a sizable population of minority and low socio-economic students who needed increased attention and additional funds, but the more affluent schools within the district were reluctant to “turn loose” of their own benefits (John Light, pers. comm.). In response to this reluctance and in an effort to equalize the district’s supply of instructional materials, the administrative office became more responsible for the equalization of instructional budgets and distribution of items such as textbooks. Light earned a new title and played a key role in meeting this challenge. In 1976, Light began his second year in Michigan Area City Schools as Assistant Superintendent of Instruction and worked with administrators and teachers from elementary to high school. The district’s focus had shifted to attendance-based budgeting, and Light was assigned the task of helping to educate principals and school board members on this new way of budgeting. He was also tasked with implementing a system of teacher observations. Using the evaluation research he had developed during his doctoral program, he trained principals effectively to observe teachers. These observations mostly concerned attention to established standards and corresponding teacher behavior, but the implementation of this observation model required collective bargaining because the teachers of the district were unionized. Light was able to rely on his doctoral focus--as well as his understanding of the political implications of education--to help him address instructional goals while handling associated union negotiations. Light continued to have the goal of becoming a superintendent of schools. In an effort to keep Light, the superintendent of Michigan Area City Schools attempted to secure him a multi-year contract but was unsuccessful. Following the completion of his single year contract, Light moved to Connersville, Indiana, to become Superintendent of Fayette County School Corporation. Here he helped to transform an educational environment that included seven hundred full and part-time employees from a culture of dissonance and distrust into an educational culture that valued professionalism and put the education of children in the forefront (Kappa Delta Pi Election Booklet, 2002). This district was much smaller than Michigan City Area Schools and comprised a substantial rural population (approximately 40%) and a large manufacturing population (approximately 60%). A number of parents were employed in union manufacturing jobs, while a large portion of the district’s economy benefitted

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from a very successful agricultural grain and animal production base. Although the population of Connersville was approximately twelve thousand, it maintained five independent banking institutions. The teachers too were unionized, affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers. The community had experienced a previous teacher work stoppage, and school board members, principally management and independent farmers, were reluctant to yield to the teachers demands. The knowledge Light had learned in his doctoral program, coupled with the skills gained through experience relative to education, and politics were soon put to the test again. Similar to the teacher observations John had implemented in Michigan City Area Schools, he began the process of educating administrators effectively to observe and assess teachers. His goal with this program was to merge teachers’ observations and staff development into a package in which certified personnel would be treated as professionals, including having a vested interest in the development of the criteria and outcomes and actually being involved in the critiquing of the model once it was in place (John Light, pers. comm.). Once again, this move involved collective bargaining. Although the elementary and junior high school principals were receptive to change, the high school principal was resistant and had to be convinced of the opportunities this model provided. In January of Light’s fourth year as superintendent, the district’s teachers struck. Increased salaries were one motive for their strike, but teachers were also encouraged by an earlier, almost successful first attempt at striking. While Light worked with the union to end the strike, he continued to stress to everyone in the community that the students’ best interests should remain the focus. Union working parents hesitated to cross teachers’ picket lines, but after sixteen days, the strike was resolved, and teachers and students returned to the classrooms. Light considers the times following the settlement of this strike as his most creative (John Light, pers. comm.) and his leadership abilities quickly became apparent. His first task as superintendent was to heal the administrators who felt betrayed by teachers with whom they had worked for years. During his first month or so of the spring semester, with the experienced staff and more mature principals taking leadership roles, the administrators spent time developing personal and interpersonal relationships with each other. Light’s goals were to enable the administrators to vent their frustrations among themselves and then to forgive and more forward. Light’s second goal following the strike was to build a strong curriculum and to involve teachers in leadership roles. During the summer following the strike, for the first time on record, Fayette County teachers were paid $50 per day to develop a kindergarten through eighth grade

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curriculum. Originally the project’s timeline was budgeted to be two weeks, but the work extended much longer, with some teachers working as many as nine weeks. Light remained as superintendent of Fayette County School Corporation for two years following the strike, but in 1984, he and his family returned to Metropolitan School District of Warren Township. With this return home, Light was no longer a teacher or principal but now was the superintendent of Metropolitan Schools District of Warren Township. After two difficult years as superintendent, Light and his wife, Beverly, decided that this appointment would not be their final destination. “You can never go home again” summed up his reason for leaving. People continued to view him as he had been in the past and could not grasp that his role within the community had changed (John Light, pers. comm.). Therefore, Light left Warren Township schools for a second time and became a special consultant for Lily Endowment, a large nonprofit organization in Indianapolis. During the hiring process, Light was questioned as to his ability to serve Warren Township because he had not left on totally positive terms. He assured them he wouldn’t have a problem putting the task first and proved this during his ten month tenure as a consultant. As a special consultant, he was charged with developing Project ISTAR (Indiana Students Taught Awareness and Resistance), a substance abuse prevention program targeting pre-adolescents. The resulting program’s success was apparent when it gained national recognition within three years. In 1987, after ten months with the Lily Endowment, Light earned the title as Executive Director of Project I-Star. The board with whom he worked was constituted of thirteen superintendents of schools, and he had a staff of twelve people. He and his staff started the program with the eleven public school districts and the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, Marion County. They trained teachers, counselors, principals, and parents on the issues of substance abuse prevention and resistance. They used a curriculum that had been researched and developed at the University of Southern California. The staff not only trained people in use of the curriculum but also evaluated its success. One aspect of the evaluation and data collection included the use of a breathalyzer that tested pre-adolescents for tobacco use. At the end of three years, the program had achieved its goal of gaining national recognition and was honored for its productivity and performance with the 1990 American Medical Association’s Youth Congress Award for Excellence for Adolescent Programming and the 1990 Secretary of Human and Health Services’ Award for Community Programming for Adolescent Substance Abuse. In 1991, Light became ill and chose this time as an exit point. He took a year off to rest and recover.

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After a year, Light was ready to return to work but this time in higher education. From 1991 to 1992, he served as an adjunct assistant professor at the University of Indianapolis, where he taught educational foundation courses and supervised student teachers. This work was a natural culmination of his earlier administrative work, especially in the area of curriculum and instruction because he was able to blend his academic studies with his extensive experience “in the trenches” (John Light, pers. comm.). Realizing that he enjoyed working at the university level, Light applied for a more permanent position at the University of North Alabama in Florence, Alabama, and, in 1992, he was appointed to teach courses in educational administration and curriculum. For eleven of the twelve years spent at the University of North Alabama, he served as Associate-Counselor and then Counselor of the Epsilon Psi Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. In 1995, during Light’s tenure at the University of North Alabama, Kappa Delta Pi held its Convocation in Birmingham, Alabama, and, during this Convocation, he had an opportunity to meet former and present leaders of KDP who would become influential mentors to him. One of these individuals was Frank Marsh who had served as president of KDP from 1972 to 1974. Marsh and his wife co-chaired the Birmingham Convocation. Light also met Morgan Simpson, who served as president of the Society from 1996 to 1998 and he, too, became a valued mentor. A third person was Michael Wolfe, KDP Executive Secretary, who asked Light to serve on the Society budget committee, which he did from 1998 to 2002. Light went on to work with additional special committees, including the Convocation planning committee, 1996-1998, and the capital campaign committee beginning in 1999. In 2001, he was a presenter at the Orlando Convocation. Throughout these years, Light was able to attend special meetings of the Society, when permitted, and to thereby learn more about the inner workings of the Society; his various leadership roles included an initial candidacy for Society president-elect. Light remained at the University of North Alabama as an associate professor of educational administration until 2004, at which time he and Beverly decided to retire from education. In 2004, the University awarded him the title of Professor Emeritus. In 2004, during his first year of retirement, Light received a telephone call from a friend at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee. The friend explained that Union had a campus in Memphis and asked him if he might be interested in teaching in the University’s doctoral program in educational administration. An incentive for returning to teaching at the university level and moving to Tennessee included the opportunity to live near their daughter’s family, Lezlie and Scott Shelton, and granddaughters. So, once again, Light returned to work, this time as a professor of educational leadership at Union University. During this time, he chose to

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stand again for Society president elect and won. With the support of Union University, he served in the dual capacities as president of Kappa Delta Pi and professor of educational leadership from 2004 to 2006. Reflecting on his years of teaching at the university level, Light continues to display great pride in the field of education and its future. He believes that his students at the University of North Alabama and at Union University displayed strength in character and were genuine advocates of children. He is encouraged by his belief that their contributions to the field of education will exceed their expectations. In 2007, after having failed at his first attempt at retirement, Light once again retired from the field of education but not from his active involvement with KDP. Today, he remains involved with KDP as a member of the Educational Foundation board. The Foundation Board works to ensure the Society’s reputation and role in the educational community, including service and membership support (John Light, pers. comm.). When recalling his experience with KDP, Light speaks warmly of the heart of the Society and has fond memories of the people with whom he worked and grew to respect. One such person was Dr. Deborah Wolfe, whom he met during his first year as president. Wolfe, with an Ed.D. from Teachers College (TC), Columbia University, had been a professor at Tuskegee University and was then an emeritus professor at Queens College, NYC, and also a social activist and an ordained Baptist minister. As a graduate student at TC, Columbia University, she had been initiated into KDP by Dr. William C. Bagley, founder of the Society. Light remembers her and other Society Laureates with respect and admiration and recognizes how they were instrumental in helping him to frame his relationship with KDP. As Light had exemplified during his school district leadership, when he had invited teachers’ input, he wanted to include the voices of those with whom he worked. Therefore, during the August, 2004, KDP Executive Council meeting, he appointed a Vision Design Team. This team’s charge was to develop a vision statement for the Society. During this same meeting, he reminded the leadership team that, “A goal without action is a dream,” and as a result he requested that the newly formed team share their work during the leadership team’s March, 2005 meeting (Minutes from KDP Executive Council Meeting, August 7, 2004). Pamela Kramer Ertel and Karen Nicholson served with Light and later became presidents of KDP. Both remember him as a caring person who displayed integrity and ethics, essential qualities for a leader of an honor society. They recall how he treated everyone with respect and made each person feel appreciated for his or her service. They also remember the pride he had for the field of education and for Kappa Delta Pi. When a decision had to be made, he reviewed all aspects and then based his deci-

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sion upon what would best serve the Society in the present and future. He was detail oriented and committed to ensuring that policies were accurate and up to date. His extensive knowledge of budget and finance served the Society well (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.; Nicholson, pers. comm.). After retiring for the second time in 2007, Light chose to remain in Tennessee where he volunteers at his granddaughter’s elementary school, serves on working committees in his community, plays golf, and is learning to make stained glass. He and Beverly go camping whenever time allows. Family now replaces work commitments on his calendar, and he finally has time to read and work with the outreach program at his church, both activities he enjoys. During the 2009 Convocation, Light and his wife, Beverly, established the J. Everett Light and Louise Light Scholarship in support of an undergraduate or graduate student majoring in special education. Light chose to name the scholarship for the uncle who greatly contributed to his career in education and his wife, Louise, who earlier had introduced him to Beverly (Richardson, pers. comm.; Light, pers. comm.). Henry Adams’ quotation, “Teachers affect eternity, no one can tell where their influence stops.” easily describes Light. Through his years in education, Light held positions of leadership that required a strong academic background as well as sound judgment and foresight. Dr. Light clearly is someone who has taught and led both by what he is and what he does … and his influence continues.

REFERENCES J. Everett Light Career Center, http://www.stateuniversity.com/universities/IN/ J_Everett_Light_Career_Center.html Kappa Delta Pi Election Booklet. 2002 Kappa Delta Pi Record (Spring): 3-4. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Kappa Delta Pi Executive Council Minutes, 2004-2006, Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL).

CHAPTER 30

KAREN NICHOLSON (2006-2008) Angela Eckhoff

Karen Nicholson 2006-2008 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 331–337 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION

Dr. Karen Nicholson, Kappa Delta Pi President from 2006-2008, was born in McDowell County, West Virginia. McDowell County is the southernmost county in the state and was home to the state’s prominent coal mining industry; McDowell County has produced more coal than any other county in West Virginia (West Virginia Office of Miners’ Health, Safety and Training 2010). As the daughter of a coal miner, circumstances dictated that Nicholson’s family move frequently during her early school years. Nicholson attended several different elementary schools but spent 1st and 6th grade at Coalwood Elementary in Coalwood, West Virginia as well as junior high at Coalwood Junior High School. Nicholson graduated from Big Creek High School in War, West Virginia in 1967. The Appalachian community of McDowell County had an enduring influence on Nicholson. As she describes, “Being from a small coal mining town, the teachers always seemed to be the individuals with the most knowledge and stature in the community…” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). Undoubtedly, the community’s esteem and strong support of educators influenced Nicholson’s views on education. Nicholson’s Kindergarten through 12th grade experiences taught her that the way to make a difference in life is through education. In particular, Nicholson credits her teachers for motivating and encouraging her during those years. She describes the lasting impact of her teachers as, “… [T]hey showed me that it was important to know your students and that education is about students and not just about conveying content” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). In particular, Nicolson recounts the influence of two of her high school teachers that she viewed as mentors. One of her mentors encouraged her to major in journalism at university while the other encouraged her to explore education as a major. The lasting impact of her school experiences and relationships with mentor teachers can be seen in the choices and direction of Nicholson’s university experiences in the years that followed. Following her graduation from Big Creek High School, Nicholson initially applied for and was accepted into the Journalism program at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia. In the late summer before beginning at Marshall, Nicholson decided to change her major to Education. This decision and her involvement with Upward Bound “… had the most profound impact on my life and career” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). Prior to beginning her freshman year at Marshall, Nicholson participated in the federally funded, Upward Bound college preparation program offered at nearby West Virginia State College (WVSC), founded in 1891. West Virginia State College, now known as West Virginia State University,

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was one of seventeen-land grant institutions founded under provisions in the Second Morrill Act of 1890 to provide for the education of the African American citizenry and is one of the United State’s 105 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (Thorn 2010). The 1954 United States Supreme Court ruling to outlaw segregation in the nation’s schools rapidly transformed the student population of WVSC from a majority African American population to a predominately Caucasian, commuter student population (Thorn 2010) by the time of Nicholson’s arrival. However, Nicholson recalls that her time at the Upward Bound program at WVSC “… exposed me to a level of diversity that I had not experienced before. The schools I attended and the town I lived in were separated by race. My high school was not desegregated until my senior year” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). After her participation in the Upward Bound program at WVSC, Dr. Nicholson withdrew from Marshall University’s Journalism program and applied to the Elementary Education program at West Virginia State College. Her familiarity with the WVSC campus and faculty along with the practicalities of the WVSC Education degree being a four year program versus the Marshall University five year Education program influenced her decision to change universities. While the Caucasian commuter student population was on the rise at WVSC, Nicholson recounts that during her years of study the female resident population at WVSC was predominantly African American. During this time WVSC assigned roommates for on-campus resident students according to race and Nicholson recounts that she was one of the first students to challenge the validity of racebased criteria for roommate assignments (Nicholson, pers. comm.). As Nicholson states, “By being a residential student, I was in an environment where I was the minority from Friday afternoon until Monday morning. I developed a sensitivity to equity issues that I don’t think I could have understood otherwise” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). In 1972, she graduated with a B.S. in Elementary Education with a concentration in Language Arts. Dr. Nicholson then enrolled in the West Virginia College of Graduate Studies Institute where she received her M.A. in Elementary Education with a concentration in Psychology in 1975. She received her Ph.D. from The Ohio State University in 1982 with a concentration in Early and Middle Childhood Education. During her doctoral studies at The Ohio State University, Dr. Nicholson specialized her studies in the areas of Language Acquisition and Use, Cognition and the Learning Process, Analysis of Teaching, and Research Design. Dr. Nicholson’s course of study as an undergraduate and graduate student provided her with the knowledge and skill base to encourage future generations of educators.

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ACADEMIA AND KAPPA DELTA PI: A COMMITMENT TO EDUCATION Dr. Nicholson began her more than 20 year involvement with Kappa Delta Pi as a faculty member at Pennsylvania State University-Harrisburg. In 1989 Dr. Nicholson was serving as a new Assistant Professor of Education where students from the School of Education initiated the search for a professional educational organization for the Harrisburg campus. Along with the interested students, Dr. Nicholson helped to identify possible professional organizations in education that would match the needs of the student body in the education program. Kappa Delta Pi was identified and subsequently chosen because of the Society’s historical commitment to undergraduate education and because of the strong role that women had played in the organization from its inception (Nicholson, pers. comm.). The campus chapter, Sigma Alpha, was formally installed on May 1, 1990 and Dr. Nicholson began serving as Chapter Counselor. She remained in that position until she left the University in 1994 for a faculty position at Manhattan College in Riverdale, New York. In 1994 Dr. Nicholson joined the faculty of the School of Education at Manhattan College and took on the role of Counselor for the Society’s campus chapter, Mu Sigma. Manhattan College is founded upon the ideals of the LaSallian tradition—respect for individual dignity, teaching excellence, and a commitment to social justice—inspired by John Baptist de La Salle (Brothers of the Christian Schools). It was during her tenure at Manhattan College that Dr. Nicholson began to expand her service to the Society from Chapter counselor to service at the national level. Dr. Nicholson describes her initial involvement at the national level as an unintentional but professionally rewarding. “Holding a national position was not a deliberate or intentional experience. I was counselor to my chapter, attended regional meetings and convocations but really viewed it as something I did with and for my students” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). In 1998, Nicholson was invited to serve on the Society’s Budget committee. She accepted the invitation and served on this committee for two biennia. During those years the budget committee met quite regularly and the Society purchased the current Headquarters building in Indianapolis, Indiana. This experience, coupled with her expanded engagement with the committee, opened the possibilities for additional service at the Society level. Her expanding Society roles included a term as a Vice-President (20022004) and she served on the Executive Council. Subsequently, she was elected President-Elect (2004-2006). In the presidential capacity, she chaired the Ad Hoc Vision Committee which was responsible for exploring and ensuring the direction of the Society. In addition, Dr. Nicholson took

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a role in the organization’s response to a critical topic facing educators during that time; The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. As a member of the Planning Committee, Dr. Nicholson and fellow committee members, including Dr. Nell Noddings, President of the National Academy of Education and Laureate Counselor of KDP, developed a series of No Child Left Behind Forums. The series of 10 events was jointly sponsored by Kappa Delta Pi, the National Society for the Study of Education, and the prestigious National Academy of Education. These forums were held mainly on university campuses and hosted, in large part, by the local Society chapters. In 2006, Dr. Nicholson began her term as Society President serving the organization at its highest level. In the following year, Dr. Michael Wolfe resigned from his 15 year tenure as the Society’s Executive Director. Nicholson was instrumental in the transition of Headquarters leadership to Faye Snodgress who was formally appointed during the August 2007 Executive Council meeting in Louisville, Kentucky. The 46th Biennial Convocation was held in November 2007 in Louisville, Kentucky. The theme of the Convocation was Educators Matter: Committed. Connected. Competent. Dr. Nicholson relayed her personal connection to the Convocation theme in her Presidential address: The theme is very important to me because I truly feel that professionally prepared educators do matter and are, in fact, central to the success of education. Our theme is about honoring the role teachers and other educators must have in the education process. Since Kappa Delta Pi is committed to the best and the brightest in education it follows that we have a special responsibility to convince others that educators do matter. (Nicholson 2007)

Immediately following the 2007 Convocation, an ad-hoc committee convened at Headquarters in late November 2007 to explore the mission, vision and future directions of Kappa Delta Pi (Nicholson 2008). Dr. Nicholson describes her presidential agenda as “evolving” early in her presidency. Following the important, initial events of her presidency, Dr. Nicholson’s agenda was “… to maintain the core identify of the organization while ensuring its relevance to contemporary educators” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). The effects of Dr. Nicholson’s presidential agenda can be seen in two programs established in 2007 and 2008 that aim to honor members at all Society levels. The first, The Teacher of Honor program is a recognition program that honors the commitment of practicing teachers to professional growth and integrity in the classroom. The second program, O. L. Davis Counselor of Distinction award, was introduced at the 2007 Convocation and formally presented at the 2009 Convocation in Orlando, Florida. The award is the Society’s official recognition of outstanding counselors who demonstrate exceptional commitment to service, scholarship, chapter leadership, and student mentoring.

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During the 2006-2008 biennium, there was a surge of new Kappa Delta Pi chapters in colleges and universities across the United States. As President, Dr. Nicholson oversaw the installation of 38 new Kappa Delta Pi chapters; 14 chapters in 2006, 13 chapters in 2007, and 11 chapters in the final year of her presidency in 2008. While serving as Society President, Dr. Nicholson personally installed two chapters during 2007-2008. She writes of the experiences in her Presidential Report. I was able to install two new chapters this year. One at Coppin State University in Baltimore, MD and the other at Miles College in Birmingham, AL…. These two chapters were especially important to me since they are both at institutions in the tradition of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities, as is my undergraduate alma mater. Both schools were so welcoming and I felt connected at a personal and professional level. (Nicholson 2008)

POST PRESIDENCY: ENDURING PASSION TO LEAD AND INSPIRE In her role as Past-President serving from 2008 to 2010, Nicholson continued shaping the future of Kappa Delta Pi through her involvement in the international education community. In 2008, she traveled to Taiwan in the official capacity of Past-President and ambassador of the Society. The week-long trip included the delivery of a series of workshop lectures to faculty, graduate students, administrators, and classroom educators from five colleges and universities across Taiwan. The lectures were focused around the themes of multicultural issues and highlighted educational organizations in the United States. The principal event of the trip was Nicholson’s participation in signing the Memorandum of Understanding with the Taipei Municipal University of Education on behalf of Kappa Delta Pi on August 5, 2008 (KDP Record 2009). The memorandum served to formalize a partnership between the two organizations as a part of the KDP Liaison Program which provides membership opportunities to qualified undergraduate and graduate students at institutions without chartered chapters. The signing of the Memorandum led Kappa Delta Pi to install a new international chapter at Taipei Municipal University of Education in September 2010. Additionally, in her capacity as Past-President, Dr. Nicholson assisted then president, Mr. Andrew Brolsma, of the Rho Theta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi at Castleton State College in Vermont in a 2008-2009 international community service project. Inspired by current events in Afghanistan, the Rho Theta Chapter project collected enough school supplies to fill two cargo planes. The supplies were delivered to schools in Afghanistan in January 2009 on behalf of the Rho Theta chapter and Kappa Delta Pi (Brolsma 2010).

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Dr. Nicholson’s enduring commitment to Kappa Delta Pi and the education field is echoed in her thoughts about role that Kappa Delta Pi could play in the many of the challenges facing 21st century educational systems and educators. In her words: I’m actually a great supporter of accreditation in teacher education. I think it gives us support internally for what we’re doing, but I also think it’s an accountability issue for the public; if we have standards that are acceptable and we address those standards in meaningful ways, then I think it gives the public more confidence in education…. My time as president didn’t change the way I think about teacher education but it opened my eyes to the role that Kappa Delta Pi could play in big issues like teacher retention. (Nicholson, pers. comm.)

During her term as Past-President, Dr. Nicholson was recognized as the Distinguished LaSallian Educator New York District for 2008-09. This award served as regional recognition of Dr. Nicholson’s continued commitment to the ideals of John Baptist de La Salle. When asked to describe herself as an educator, Dr. Nicholson stated: “The word that I think of is passionate. I’ve been in education since the 1960s and I do think that I’m as passionate today about the preparation of teachers and providing education for everyone as I was then” (Nicholson, pers. comm.). Perhaps the marriage of passion and Dr. Nicholson’s suggestions for ensuring a place for Kappa Delta Pi at the center of 21st educational issues and agendas will ensure a strong legacy for the Society into the future.

REFERENCES Brolsma, Andrew. 2010. KDP, the national guard, and two planes. Kappa Delta Pi Record (Winter): 94-95. Kappa Delta Pi. 2009. Kappa Delta Pi and Taiwanese partners: An international initiative. Kappa Delta Pi Record 46(2): 92-93. Nicholson, Karen. 2007. Presidential Address. Presidential address at the 2007 convocation of Kappa Delta Pi, Louisville, KY. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Nicholson, Karen. 2008. Presidential Report. Kappa Delta Pi Presidential Report. Kappa Delta Pi Archives, University of Illinois Archives Student Life and Culture Archival Program (Urbana, IL). Thorn, Arline, R. 2010. Our history. West Virginia State University. http://www .wvstateu.edu/about-wvsu/history West Virginia Office of Miners’ Health, Safety and Training. 2010. West Virginia coal facts. http://www.wvminesafety.org/wvcoalfacts.htm

CHAPTER 31

PAMELA KRAMER ERTEL (2008-2010) A Quiet Leader Kelley M. King and Vivien Geneser

Pamela Kramer Ertel 2008-2010 A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 339–352 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania is located on a leafy campus near the easternmost edge of the state. Bounded by Worthington National Forest in the heart of the Pocono Mountains, and located within walking distance to the Delaware River, the university features state of the art laboratories and facilities, and takes pride in the service and achievements of its outstanding faculty members (East Stroudsburg University). Within this campus lies an additional source of pride, the College of Education. Known for its excellent teacher preparation program, the College of Education is led by former Kappa Delta Pi (KDP) president, Pamela Kramer Ertel. Kramer Ertel has devoted her career to making quiet inroads to achieve her goal of improving the general quality of classroom teachers and engendering support for the profession. Beginning with her experiences as a neighborhood babysitter, and through her years as, first a classroom teacher, and then, as a teacher educator and educational researcher, Kramer Ertel has dedicated her life to the education of young children and the support of those who teach them. Through the years, she has been a source of guidance and inspiration to her colleagues and students and their respect and appreciation have manifested in the form of awards such as the Outstanding Professor in Teacher Education (1992), and in her elections to positions of leadership in the KDP (2004-2012). As KDP president (2008-2010), she helped the organization to define its mission and steady its course as it prepared to celebrate 100 years of honoring excellence in teachers. In her current position as Dean of the College of Education, Kramer Ertel continues to serve as a leader in the field of education by serving as an effective mentor to her faculty and students and by supporting programs that provide services to classroom teachers.

“A GREAT INTEREST IN BECOMING A TEACHER”: THE WELL-NURTURED CHILD

“I had people that were caring and nurturing and influenced me in a very positive way” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.) Educational improvement has been the hallmark of Kramer Ertel’s distinguished life and career. Born Pamela Gialanella in New Jersey in 1956 to Henry and Angela Gialanella, Kramer Ertel grew up in the suburbs of northern New Jersey, in the cities of Boonton and Parsippany. She is the younger of two siblings; her brother, Henry, now a pharmacist in Andover,

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New Jersey, is two years older. The Gialanellas were a family that greatly valued both education and community service. Throughout Pamela’s childhood, her parents were active in their church and served as community volunteers. Henry, a data analyst, volunteered as a police man, and Angela, who worked as a teacher’s aide and in retail, served as Girl Scout leader. A traditional girlhood occupied with babysitting, Girl Scouts, volunteer work in her church and community, and ample experience caring for children reinforced young Pamela’s love of working with young children. The teaching profession appealed to her from very early on. As a child, she dreamed of having her own classroom, even setting up her own little school in her neighborhood. As a young woman, after briefly considering a career in the medical field, she determined that indeed her skills and strengths were best suited for a career in education (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Seeking to explore new regions of the country, Kramer Ertel looked away from the East Coast for college, and chose for her undergraduate education a Catholic institution in the Midwest. Visiting Marian College (now Marian University) in Indianapolis, Indiana, as a high school junior she was struck by the friendliness of the people of the Midwest and believed she had found a good fit with the college. Her choice was fortunate. Marian’s teacher education program provided strong preparation for beginning teachers, both in terms of mentoring and in classroom and field experiences. Kramer Ertel remembers that the faculty at Marian provided students with a lot of individual attention, and she is still impressed with the quality of the teaching that took place there. Sister Claire Whalen, her advisor, was one of her memorable faculty members and, thirty years later, Kramer Ertel remains in contact with her. Kramer Ertel also remembers her advisor as “a master teacher” who “knew how to make content come alive,” “forced you to make sure you understood things conceptually” and “was able to make you construct your own understanding” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). While at Marian, Kramer Ertel expressed an interest in Early Childhood Education. With the help of Sister Claire Whalen, she was granted permission to design her own honors course in early childhood as an independent study. By doing so, she was able to graduate with a major in Elementary Education and a minor in Early Childhood Education, which was not an academic option at Marian that point in time. As a result of Kramer Ertel’s interest, Claire Whalen worked to make more early childhood education courses available to other students as well. Kramer Ertel remembers, “I did an independent study and an honors project related to early childhood, so she was helping to differentiate learning a long time ago before that was the in thing to do” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.).

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Thus, she established herself as an innovator from an early point in her career as she pursued her avid interest in Early Childhood Education. In addition to nurturing and supporting her goals and interests, Marian College offered Kramer Ertel a variety of student teaching field experiences. “We were in public schools; we were in private schools in an urban community. I had experiences in different types of settings, like child care centers as well as elementary schools,” Kramer Ertel remembers. “They really did an outstanding job preparing us for the profession” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Kramer Ertel made excellent use of the opportunities afforded her at Marian and graduated Magna Cum Laude in May, 1978 with a BA in Elementary Education and a minor in Early Childhood Education. She was well prepared to begin her classroom teaching career.

PREAPRED TO TEACH, CONTINUING TO LEARN: THE CLASSROOM TEACHER

“I was willing to go above and beyond minimal expectations to do whatever it took to help students be successful” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). After graduation, Kramer Ertel returned to her home state of New Jersey to begin what would become a long and distinguished career in the field of education. Beginning in the fall, 1978, she served as a classroom teacher for three years in grades 1 and 4 at St. Peter the Apostle School in Parsippany, New Jersey, a school that she herself attended for grades 5 through 8. Kramer Ertel was fortunate to have class sizes of 25 students or fewer and an exciting, supportive work environment. She remembers these years fondly, and she praises her colleagues for their selfless efforts and commitment to education. Kramer Ertel recalls that, although the teachers started at about $5,000.00 per year, they gave 120 percent of their time to the students and collaborated well with each other. She says that they were all willing to go above and beyond the call of duty for their students. She was inspired by her colleagues’ work ethic, as well as their passion for teaching. “It was exciting,” she said, “to be in that environment where people really were passionate about doing what was best for students” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). From St. Peter the Apostle, Kramer Ertel moved to the Franklin Township School in Quakertown, New Jersey, where she taught in grades 2 and 3 from 1981 to 1987. Continuing in the tradition of her family’s strong work ethic, Kramer Ertel had begun working towards her

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master’s degree during her second year of teaching. She attended classes at Kean College of New Jersey, where she was able to pursue her passion for young children in earnest, and she completed an MA in Early Childhood Education in 1982. Then, although she was still employed as a successful classroom teacher during the day, she began a second career as an adjunct instructor of education at Centenary College in Hackettstown, New Jersey, in 1986. While still a young teacher, Kramer Ertel met and married fellow teacher, Barry S. Kramer, at that time taking the name “Kramer,” which she would use personally and professionally for the next two decades. Following the birth of her daughter, Elizabeth, in 1987, Kramer Ertel resigned her position as a classroom teacher. By doing so, she was able to devote more of her energy to Liz during her crucial early childhood years. However, she retained her position as an instructor at Centenary College, and thus was able to sustain her career in higher education by teaching education classes for the college on a part-time basis (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.).

TEACHING TEACHERS: THE PROFESSOR OF EDUCATION

“I’m really trying to be the cheerleader for the College of Ed and to help our faculty to be more respected and valued” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). In 1990, several years after leaving her elementary teaching position, Kramer Ertel was recruited to join the faculty at East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania as an instructor in the College of Education. She was a popular instructor and in 1991, after only a year with the university, she was promoted to the rank of assistant professor (tenure track) despite the fact that she had not completed her doctoral degree. She continued to excel and, at the end of her first year as an assistant professor, she was voted Outstanding Professor in Teacher Education for 1992. Through the years, Kramer Ertel devoted her research studies to the plight of novice teachers. Although instructors in the college of education are primarily focused on preparing preservice teachers for the classroom experience, she was interested in following up with her students as they began their careers. She perceived a need to support them through their crucial first year. Enrolling for doctoral studies at Lehigh University, she continued to teach full time at East Stroudsburg University. Kramer Ertel’s research

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efforts culminated in the successful completion in 1994 of her dissertation, The Role of the University in Helping First Year Teachers. In her dissertation research, she found that first year teachers appreciated several types of support, including teacher hotlines and support groups with other new teachers. She also documented considerable variation in the level and types of support offered by school districts. Some districts “had really taken the lead in providing services,” while others provided none at all (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.; Kramer 1995). As an active member of the faculty at ESU, Dr. Ertel has maintained a busy schedule of teaching and scholarship. Especially, she focused on writing books and articles that would assist practicing teachers. In 1993, she co-authored AIDS: Instructional Guide for Teachers: Grades K-5 for the New Jersey Department of Education (Kramer 1991). This work was followed by several articles and presentations that focused on the use of children’s literature to teach academic subject areas and to help children deal with life changes. Having divorced in 1993, Kramer Ertel recognized the need for classroom teachers to be prepared to help children in such situations. Two of her articles from this time period focus on bibliotherapy to help children adjust to family changes, particularly divorce (Kramer 1996, 1998). In 1996, Kramer Ertel was promoted to the rank of associate professor. In the years that followed, she continued her service to the university, community, and to Kappa Delta Pi. In 1997, eager to work more closely with students, she volunteered to serve as Chapter Counselor for the Gamma Xi Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi, a position she continues to hold on the ESU campus. She was also committed to retaining and improving her teaching skills with children, so she volunteered her services as a Sunday School teacher at her church and continues to do that to this day. She also continues to serve as the faculty advisor to the ESU Christian Fellowship, a club on the ESU campus. She has served in that role for the past 18 years. Concurrently, she has been an active member in numerous other state and national teaching associations, including the Association for Teacher Educators (ATE), The Pennsylvania Association of Colleges and Teacher Educators (PAC-TE), the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) and the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). In the year 2000, the book Life Cycle of the Career Teacher was published by Kappa Delta Pi. To this highly acclaimed publication on the progressive phases of the classroom teaching experience, Kramer Ertel contributed to a chapter on “Expert Teachers.” Along with co-authors Jane S. Bray and Denise LePage, she used the case study of a teacher, “Emily” to represent the defining characteristics of a teacher in the expert phase of her career. Using

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examples such as the teacher’s willingness to accept students that were considered to be discipline problems, as well as vignettes that portray Emily’s commitment to student achievement, she designates Emily as an expert teacher. In this chapter of the book which is deemed “an action plan for teachers” the authors specify that experts serve as visionaries, leaders, and mentors who use what they have learned to help novice teachers and to improve the education profession (Bray, Kramer, and LePage, 2000). Kappa Delta Pi, the publisher, found the book to be very important for those in the field seeking to support teachers throughout the several phases of their careers. In fact, the organization would use the concepts laid out in the book to structure some of the new services it was developing for practicing teachers (Snodgress, pers. comm.). In 2001, Kramer Ertel earned another promotion. Because of her contributions to the profession, to the university, and to the community, she was awarded the rank of Professor at East Stroudsburg University. She would continue in her success as a faculty member and education administrator over the next few years, serving as Professional Development School (PDS) Coordinator from 2001 to 2003 and PDS Cohort Point Person from Fall 2002 to the present date. Higher administrative roles would follow. She served as interim and then assistant department chair from 2003 to 2007, and became interim dean in 2007. That same year, she married her second husband, Daniel Ertel, an industrial engineer, becoming stepmother to his two grown daughters, Ashley (who is studying social work) and Jessica (a physician’s assistant). Finally, in 2008, the same year she became president of KDP, she assumed the deanship of the College of Education at East Stroudsburg University (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Despite a busy schedule that entails numerous administrative responsibilities, Dr. Kramer Ertel continues to pursue scholarship with publications that are relevant to practitioners in the education profession. In her most recent article, in the Winter 2009 issue of the New Teacher Advocate, a Kappa Delta Pi publication, she elaborated on the techniques for collaborating with parents in an article titled “The Dean’s Dozen: Tips for Developing Family-School-Community Partnerships” (Kramer 2009). In this article, Kramer Ertel sustains her proactive stance by suggesting that both parents and teachers prepare thoroughly for the parent-teacher conference experience. She recommends that they progress gently from general inquiries that serve to establish the parent-teacher partnership such as “How can we work together to meet the needs of the child?” to more specific questions that will provide insight into the individual child’s experience such as “How often does my child raise her hand in class?”

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In addition to having published numerous articles, Kramer Ertel has also completed a book; The ABCs of Classroom Management (Kramer 2005). Chief among her concerns is the attrition rate in the education profession. For many years, teachers have had the highest rate of attrition of any position that requires a college degree (Abdallah 2010), and Kramer Ertel has devoted her efforts to alleviating the turnover issues by authoring publications and initiating programs that reach out to teachers in the field. Advocating for a strong emphasis on proactive measures, Kramer Ertel has continually highlighted the benefits of advance preparation as a way to prevent many behavioral issues that frequently surface in the classroom. For example, in The ABCs of Classroom Management, almost every letter of the alphabet contains a suggestion that refers to a preventative technique. The entry that is labeled “Anticipate” pertains to essential preparations for unexpected occurrences that are, in Kramer Ertel’s experience, actually bound to happen. In “Assume nothing,” Kramer Ertel spells out the need for openness and acceptance of student behaviors that reflect their culture, yet also encourages teachers to hold their ground as learning leaders by instructing them to communicate clear expectations for student behaviors. She epitomizes the adage “iron hand in a velvet glove” with alphabetic entries that promote kindness such as “Be human” and “Cooperative learning” that portray her belief in a firm, yet benevolent teaching style. As evidenced by the aforementioned examples, Kramer Ertel has consistently promoted preparation and planning as the key to success for classroom teachers. Furthermore, Kramer Ertel has sustained a lifelong belief that effective teachers know how to bring out the best in their students and are capable of helping them to reach their potential. However, Kramer Ertel retains her practical awareness of the challenges that teachers face in the classroom. Her sense of realism was revealed in a recent statement about her approach to the classroom environment that she posted to the blog of Anthony Mullen. To Mullen, the National Teacher of the Year who spoke at the 2009 KDP Convocation, she said, “While we can’t fix all things in the lives of our students, we can have some control over the atmosphere and environment that is created in our own classrooms. We can help make our classrooms environments where everyone is treated with respect and dignity” (One is the Loneliest Number). Kramer Ertel’s enthusiasm and commitment to education has been passed on to her own daughter, who is studying International Education as a graduate student at the NYU Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.).

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CHARTING KDP’S FUTURE: A GRACIOUS LEADER

“I went to the KDP Convocation and I was just blown away by the passion and the excitement and the enthusiasm of everyone there” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Developing the book, Lifecycle of the Career Teacher brought Kramer into a working relationship with KDP’s executive director Michael Wolfe. He saw in Kramer Ertel a potential leader, and strongly encouraged her to run for executive office of the Society. Looking back, Kramer remembers, “I was right at that point in my life where I was looking for what’s next, what do I do next, and then at Convocation, I realized that I wanted to be more involved in KDP because I really believed in the mission and what KDP was all about” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). In 2004, while also serving as interim chair of her department at ESU, Kramer successfully ran for vicepresident of KDP. Her platform, as she explained it in her application essay, expressed her long-term concern for teacher retention and sought ways in which Kappa Delta Pi could support beginning teachers. “I believe it is essential to continue to promote the excellent support services currently available, but we also must continue to keep the best and brightest in this profession,” she wrote in the KDP Record (Kappa Delta Pi 2004). Kramer also recognized the pressures that education reform efforts at the national level had created for the profession. To counter an “obsess[ion]” with testing and an emphasis on “practices that are not in the best interest of America’s children,” Kramer Ertel proposed that KDP should use its “wealth of expertise … to help determine better ways to ensure accountability, professionalism, and appropriate teaching practices” (Kappa Delta Pi 2004). Her vision for the future of KDP won her the position out of a field of eight candidates, including accomplished school administrators and teacher educators from across the country. Kramer Ertel did not run for executive office of KDP with the intention of eventually to seeking the presidency. As vice-president of KDP, she served in the administration of John Light, who was succeeding Blossom Nissman as president. Karen Nicholson, who had served as vice-president under Nissman, had been elected to the presidency and would serve the next two years as president-elect and become a close colleague of Kramer Ertel. Only while serving her term as vice-president did Kramer Ertel realize that she had much to offer the organization as president. “The more involved I became,” she notes, “the more I believed in the organization and found that I did have a role to be leader there so that was the

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next step that I took and I really felt that that point I was ready to take that on...”(Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Subsequently, she was elected President-Elect. By continuing to serve on the executive council as president elect, president, and, finally, past president, Kramer Ertel would help to shape the vision of the organization and to be able to see the ideas and initiatives generated by the executive council over time, come to fruition. The continuity of her leadership would help define and steady the course of the Society during challenging times. In 2004, as vice-president Kramer Ertel joined an executive council that would almost immediately face serious management challenges. In 2005, Wolfe, who had served as executive director of the Society for 15 years, announced his retirement. This action forced the Executive Council to conduct a search for a new executive director. Wolfe’s resignation after a long term as a key figure in the organization left a large gap to fill, and finding a suitable replacement required the Society to carefully consider what was required of the new leader. Identifying a new leader would require the Society to consider its identity as an organization (Snodgress, pers. comm.). Kramer Ertel noted that during her vice-presidency, the Executive Council was “really trying to define who we are and who we want to be and we started looking at what should really be the priorities in terms of how we use our funding and resources” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). The council struggled to find the appropriate executive to lead KDP, ending one search unsuccessfully, and then hiring a director who would be forced by the serious illness of a family member to resign after just nine months in the position (Snodgress, pers. comm.). Additionally, record keeping had become a problem and, as of the executive board meeting of April 2007, accurate financial statements for the previous year were unavailable. The most recent audit conducted in 2006 indicated that, unknown to the Executive Council, the Society had been running in the red and tapping reserve funds. At the April 2007 board meeting, the board determined that producing accurate financial statements and developing a budget would be top priorities. The executive council would take much care over the next few years to ensure that the Society defined its mission and hired staff that would allow it to move forward effectively (Kappa Delta Pi Meeting Minutes, April 20, 2007). In 2007 Faye Snodgress, originally hired initially by Wolfe as a marketing coordinator at KDP Headquarters and then Associate Executive Director, was employed as the Executive Director, a position she continues to hold (Snodgress, pers. comm.). By the time Kramer Ertel succeeded to the presidency in 2008, a number of personnel changes had been made at KDP Headquarters and the

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management issues were being addressed. Still, Kramer Ertel was aware of the key challenges that would face her as president of KDP. Among these were the related issues of membership and finances. Such were the financial challenges from 2008 to 2010 that Kramer Ertel joked that her greatest accomplishment was “keeping us alive” during the time of financial crisis (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Whereas KDP had, in the past, been able to cover budget overruns with interest earned from investments, the severe economic downturn now made that impossible. KDP’s resources would be depleted if such strategy continued. To compound the crisis, membership was in decline and had been falling for the past 17 years (Kappa Delta Pi Executive Council Meeting Minutes, July 30-31, 2007). Kramer Ertel realized that KDP was not alone in facing a crisis of participation. As public policy expert Robert D. Putnam notes in his survey of American voluntary organizations, organizations that relied on active member participation, KDP among them, saw declining participation over the last decades of the twentieth century (Putnam 2000). The economic crisis of 2008 exacerbated the problem for KDP as interest earnings fell and economically strapped members declined to renew their memberships. Kramer Ertel noted that part of the problem was that KDP was seen as focusing primarily on college student members even though a “huge proportion of our membership is people who are beyond college years (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Because members did not consistently renew their memberships past college, even with the number of initiates up, overall membership continued to decline. To address this problem, Kramer Ertel’s administration would strive to ensure that the needs of all members, not just undergraduate students, were being met, and would monitor membership very carefully. To better serve members at all stages of their careers, Kramer Ertel and the KDP administration determined to “look at the practicing teachers, professors and administrators and to look at who we can provide services and recognize excellence in those areas also” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). The administration looked at ways to reach out and determined to undertake initiatives aimed at a broader swath of the education community, and to use new technologies to reach out to large numbers in ways that were convenient and cost-effective. At the same time, the Society would move away from its reliance on member dues for financial support. Marketing professional development initiatives to “individuals, schools, and districts” was proposed as a means to contribute broadly to the profession and to raise necessary funds. The focus would be on areas that impact teacher retention: “classroom management, differentiated instruction and assessment, mentoring, and the need for and use of collaborative communities” (Kappa Delta Pi Executive Council meeting minutes, March 14-15,

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2008). Among the new initiatives fostered by the executive council under the leadership of Snodgress and Kramer Ertel are I-Lead: leadership conferences for teachers, and KDP Connect, a program with which Kramer Ertel has been highly involved. KDP Connect is designed to be a support for school districts “in mentoring and inducting new teachers and [to] provide all kinds of support” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). As Kramer Ertel notes, this concern relates to her dissertation work on the needs of new teachers, and, in fact, Kramer Ertel herself helped to develop the materials to be used. Originally it was piloted as a face-toface, workbook based program offered by KDP to school districts. However, that experience demonstrated that moving online would be more efficient. The online version is being piloted and is expected to launch fully as a subscription service in 2011. Kramer Ertel has also sought to empower the KDP Executive Council, insisting on leadership training and implementing the first board selfassessment. To ensure a more efficient organization, the executive council also oversaw the redefinition of KDP’s relationship with its roughly 550 chapters, and implemented a three-tier plan that classified chapters by their activity level. Less active chapters would need and receive less attention from Headquarters, while more active chapters would be given guidance to continue to develop. Under Kramer Ertel’s leadership, the executive council also continued international outreach programs begun by previous administrations, most notably attempts to form partnerships in China with the Chinese Association for Educational Administration and in Taiwan and to achieve Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) status with the United Nations Kappa Delta Pi (Executive Council conference call minutes, March 20, 2009; Snodgress, pers. comm.). Initiating new programs in a time of financial constraints is a bold move, but Kramer Ertel, Snodgress, and the KDP leadership realized that cutting back on services could cause a downward spiral from which it might never recover. Without changes, the organization may not have survived beyond five to six years into the future (Kappa Delta Pi Executive Council meeting minutes, March 14-15, 2008). The new initiatives have been designed to help KDP become a self-sustaining organization, less reliant on membership dues and investment returns. So far, the results of Kramer Ertel’s leadership have been positive. KDP has moved from operating in the red to having shown a small profit for the last several years, and membership numbers are up (Snodgress, pers. comm.; Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Kramer Ertel adamantly acknowledges that much of this success is due to the extraordinary leadership and commitment of KDP’s Executive Director, Faye Snodgress and her staff.

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A CAREER SPENT “KEEPING TEACHERS GROWING” Through her work supporting teachers Pamela Kramer Ertel has gained a reputation as “one of those quiet leaders” (Snodgress, pers. comm.). She is known as a committed professional whose leadership style is gracious and collegial. A dedicated teacher, she did not immediately envision herself in leadership roles, but accepted and grew into them as needed. Of her KDP presidency, she notes, “It was an honor and a privilege to serve in that role” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Her service to KDP, especially at the executive level, allowed her to develop the leadership skills and confidence she would employ as dean. Despite her gracious and understated leadership style, however, she has proven to be a leader capable of bold decisions in difficult times. Asked what she believed to be the most critical issue facing the profession today, Kramer Ertel noted the necessity of promoting best teaching practices in an era that emphasizes student performance on tests above all else. In the face of pressure to reduce education to test preparation, educators must advocate for authentic assessment and quality teaching. Similarly, as Dean of the College of Education, she finds herself promoting her students and faculty within a culture that lends them little respect. “I am really trying to change that [lack of respect] and help our campus as well as our community understand the value of teacher educators and the important role they play and the great work they do” (Kramer Ertel, pers. comm.). Despite these challenges, in reflecting on her career, Kramer Ertel declares that her passion for teaching has not subsided through the years and, in fact, she feels as devoted as ever to the profession. She credits much of her devotion to her career to her continued and active participation in Kappa Delta Pi. At the installation of a new KDP chapter at Marian University in Wisconsin in the Fall of 2007, Kramer Ertel proclaimed her commitment to a profession that is characterized by “energy and enthusiasm” and was excited to witness the “zeal and commitment for the education profession” among the KDP members (Kramer 2007). Undoubtedly, Kramer Ertel will herself continue to inspire zeal and commitment as she works at many levels within the field to nurture and support classroom teachers.

REFERENCES Abdallah, Jameela. 2009. Lowering teacher attrition rates through collegiality. Academic Leadership Live: The Online Journal, November 30. http://www.academicleadership.org/ article/lowering-teacher-attrition-rates-through-collegiality Bray, Jane S., Pamela A. Kramer, and Denise LePage. 2000. The expert teacher. In life cycle of the career teacher, ed. Betty E. Steffy, Michael, P. Wolfe, Suzanne H.

352 K. M. KING and V. GENESER Pasch, and Billie J. Enz, 75-84. Thousand Oaks, CA: Kappa Delta Pi and Corwin Press East Stroudsburg University. 2010. About ESU. http://www4.esu.edu/aboutesu/ index.cfm Kappa Delta Pi. 2004. Executive Council Election Information 2004-2006: Pamela Kramer. Kappa Delta Pi Record 40 (3): 4 of insert. Kramer, Pamela A. 2007. Installation remarks of Dr. Pamela Kramer-Ertel, Kappa Delta Pi president-elect. Marian University. http://cw.marianuniversity.edu/ kdp/Features.htm Kramer, Pamela A. 1996. Preparing teachers to help children and families of dDivorce. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Associaton for Colleges of Teacher Education, Chicago, IL: ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED 393 836. Kramer, Pamela A. 1995. The role of the university in meeting the needs of first-year teachers. Ph.D. diss., Lehigh University. Kramer, Pamela A., and G. G. Smith. 1998. Easing the pain of divorce through literature. Early Childhood Education Journal 26 (2): 89-94. Kramer, Pamela. 2005. The ABCs of Classroom Management. Indianapolis, IN: Kappa Delta Pi.

CHAPTER 32

NATHAN BOND (2010-PRESENT) Journey Towards the Centennial Celebration Sarah Mathews and Denisha Jones

Nathan Bond 2010-Present A Century of Leadership: Biographies of Kappa Delta Pi Presidents, pp. 353–364 Copyright © 2012 by Information Age Publishing All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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“I’m always reminded of that Robert Frost Poem, The Road Not Taken. I ask myself, what would my life have been like if I had stayed on the ranch and worked with my parents?” (Bond, pers.comm.)

TWO ROADS DIVERGED— THE MAKING OF AN EDUCATOR

Born September 11, 1963, to a family with a long history in the cattle industry, Nathan Bond grew up on a ranch located fifty miles northeast of Amarillo in the Texas Panhandle. During his youth he learned the values of commitment and responsibility while tending to the cattle. “Their needs had to come before your own” (Bond, pers. comm.). Yet his parents emphasized and valued a sense of education and expected that he and his brother would attend college. In his own words, Bond describes this devotion to academics saying, Growing up there was always a great value placed on education. We were always expected to go and earn our degrees. I guess that worked against my parents because once we realized what was out there in the big, bad world, we decided that we really did not want to stay and punch cows for the rest of our lives. (Bond, pers. comm.)

The question was not “Are you going to college?” Instead, “Which college are you going to attend?” (Bond, pers. comm.). When Bond first enrolled at Baylor University in Texas he enrolled in the pre-medical program. Even though he finished all of his pre-med courses, Bond reached a point at which he recognized that he was always doing things that others asked of him. Reflecting back on his childhood he realized that he always had a passion for studying languages, especially Spanish and Russian. He tells the following story: When I was in fourth grade, the school district that I attended made all children choose if they wanted to take band, choir or Spanish the following year in the fifth grade. I chose choir because I wanted to sing. I enjoyed choir, and I used to sing loudly with all my heart. One day as the choir was rehearsing a song, the choir teacher made a comment, “Someone is singing off key.” She walked around the room while everyone was singing. Then, she came up to me, listened, pointed her finger at me, and said, “Nathan, it’s you. You’re singing off key.” Of course, I was very embarrassed and humili-

Nathan Bond (2010-Present) 355 ated in front of my fellow choir members. So, I quit choir and transferred to the Spanish language class. (Bond, pers. comm.)

At the time, this was a very upsetting event yet in retrospect he realized it was a pivotal experience. “It’s the event that really changed the course of my life. As a result, I built a career studying and teaching foreign languages” (Bond, pers. comm.). In 1984, Bond travelled to the Soviet Union with his advisor, Dr. Frauke Harvey. They visited Moscow and rode the Trans-Siberian Railroad across country. This event was life-changing for Bond. It inspired an interest in the Russian language. When he returned to the United States, Bond completed a Bachelor’s degree in biology and a Master’s degree in Russian literature. Nevertheless, he still wondered how these majors would match up with a career. People always joked that because he spoke Russian and his last name was Bond he should become a spy. He rejected this idea for employment saying, “Instead I reflected over the events of my life and decided that I enjoyed learning the most. It was logical for me to become a teacher” (Bond, pers. comm.). He completed his certification at the University of Texas at Austin. As a life-long educator, Bond incorporates his life experiences into the lessons he passes onto his students. “I always tell my students to be sure to share all of your interests in an interview because the principal might envision you actually developing a class around these interests” (Bond, pers. comm.). He learned this lesson while applying for his first job. Bond was initially hired as a science teacher, although he later learned that the principal hired him after noticing he had a background in the Russian language. The principal at Bowie High School in Austin, TX, was a visionary, hoping to establish a language program at the school; so he hired Bond to teach Russian language classes in addition to science courses (Bond, pers. comm.). In 1992, Russian was one of those critical languages that only high-achieving schools offered and this principal wanted his school to be one of the best. Bond established a Russian club that first year and thirty students signed up to study the language. After one year as a science teacher, he established a Russian language program, teaching courses for the next 8 years at Bowie High School and Bailey Middle School, the middle school that fed into it. When he left the schools in 1997, he had 150 students studying Russian. He collaborated with the two other high school teachers of Russian in the Austin Independent School District to establish a sisterschool partnership with a city in Russia. Through this three-week cultural immersion and student-exchange experience, students from Russia and Austin traveled to the other’s country, attended each other’s school, and lived with host-families.

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FACING A FORK IN THE ROAD— BECOMING A TEACHER EDUCATOR While he was employed as a high school Russian teacher, Bond also attended late afternoon and evening courses at The University of Texas at Austin and worked toward a PhD, degree in Foreign Language Education which he finished in 1999. During this time he was initiated into Kappa Delta Pi by UT Austin’s Delta chapter. After completing his doctoral degree, this graduate realized he was at the cross-roads. “Do I continue as a Russian teacher, teaching at the high school, which is what I love to do? Or do I take the chance and try to get a position teaching at a university?” (Bond, pers. comm.) He put himself on the job market and accepted an invitation to join the faculty of Texas State University, an institution located 30 miles south of Austin. Texas State University, which originated as Southwest Texas State Normal School, is a university that continues to focus on teacher education (Texas State University 2010). The University boasts more than 30,000 students with almost 100 undergraduate degrees. It is the sixth largest university in Texas. By 2011, Bond had been employed at that university for 12 years within the Curriculum and Instruction Department of the College of Education. This department enrolls about 3,000 to 4,000 students and certifies approximately 500 student-teachers each semester. Excluding alternative certification programs, Texas State certifies more pre-service teachers than any other university-based teacher education program in the state of Texas. Through his involvement in teacher education at this university Bond has taught undergraduate and graduate education classes to pre-service and in-service teachers. In 1995, Texas State University adopted a professional development school model, a characteristic that sets TSU apart from most other teacher education programs in the state. The faculty strongly believes that the best way to prepare new teachers is working side-by-side with practicing teachers in local public schools. This model requires students to spend two full days each week in a local school. On any given day in the professional development school, preservice teachers receive four hours of instruction from professors and spend the remaining four hours teaching in a cooperating teacher’s classroom. The model has its strengths. Preservice teachers are able to experience extended periods of time in real classrooms with real teachers and real students. University professors also benefit. They stay abreast of the latest happenings in schools. (Bond, pers. comm.)

He believes it is the best model for teacher education and he challenges all teacher educators to engage in similar practices.

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Former teachers have served as an inspiration and a blueprint for Bond’s foray into teacher education. From high school teachers to foreign language instructors at the university, these teachers taught him that teaching is a great profession and modeled that seeing one’s students succeed is one of the greatest joys in education. Just as he was mentored by exemplary teachers, Bond strives to instill that same dedication in all of his students. In his own words he explains, “My goal as a professor is for each student to become the ‘teacher of the year’ on their future campus. I do not want my students to just survive, I want them to succeed” (Bond, pers. comm.). As a professor Bond strives to equip all of his students with the knowledge and skills they will need to become master teachers. This dedication to teacher education is also evident through his professional writing (Bond and Fite 2007; Bond, Beesley, and Dehr 2009). In a 2007 article, for example, Bond outlined twelve strategies for helping teachers deal with potential management issues that take place during classroom question and answer sessions. According to Bond, these classroom management issues occur during two different conditions: 1) students are bored or unattached to the material being engaged or 2) they do not know expectations about the appropriate ways in which to respond to students during these discussions (Bond 2007). In addition to offering appropriate amounts of wait time and assigning different students to answer different questions, Bond challenges teacher candidates to be purposeful in terms of how they cue students to answer specific and intentional questions. This article also indicates how important it is for teachers to both communicate and model their expectations for appropriate participation during each questioning period.

CONTINUING ALONG THE PATH TOWARDS KDP— COUNSELLING THE ETA ZETA CHAPTER Bond began working with Kappa Delta Pi’s Eta Zeta chapter at Texas State University in the fall of 2000 as a co-counselor. Although he was a new faculty member, he agreed to serve as the counselor the following semester when Dr. Tom Mandeville, his co-counselor retired. Counselors are in a unique position of developing strong successful chapters while at the same time encouraging capable students to lead the chapter. At times, a counselor may find the job to be simpler to take on more of the chapter leadership if he or she takes on more of the chapter leadership in an effort to insure successful chapter programming. However, Dr. Mandeville advised Bond against this approach when he said, “We know you can do this. You can run the entire chapter, but we want to guide the students to do it” (Bond, pers. comm.). Bond followed much of his predecessor’s

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advice about the guidance of the chapter in terms of helping develop student members to become chapter officers. He came to understand that a counselor likely finds the role more rewarding if the students are allowed to take on more of the chapter leadership. During the Spring semester, 2001, Texas State’s Eta Zeta chapter observed its’ fiftieth anniversary. In keeping with tradition, the Society’s Executive Director, Michael Wolfe, attended the celebratory initiation, an act prompting the president of the university to attend the session because he was a personal friend of Dr. Wolfe. This example recognizes the cyclical relationship that can be established between pre-service teachers, the larger university, and the Kappa Delta Pi Society. The induction ceremony launched Bond’s leadership in the Society, a leadership built around maintaining consistency amongst the Eta Zeta Chapter and inspiring pre-service teachers to be future teacher leaders. A firm believer that teachers should strive for the highest level of success, Bond brought this belief with him as he assumed the role of counselor. “I work closely with my chapter officers and emphasize leadership because I want them to become future teacher leaders” (Bond, pers. comm.). If students are to become leaders, they need opportunities to serve their chapter, school, and community. KDP chapters provide these opportunities through chapter meetings, service projects in the community, and presentations at KDP’s national Convocation. Bond drew on these opportunities as a space to enable chapter members to have opportunities to demonstrate their leadership through chapter meetings. Thus, he utilized suggestions of his previous co-counselor Mandeville to foster leadership for pre-service teachers. A couple of weeks ago, our chapter held its monthly meeting and each officer clearly understood their role and carried it out with great confidence and style. In fact the dean of my college was impressed that all of the speaking roles of our last initiation were conducted by the students themselves, and not by me. (Bond, pers. comm.)

In addition to chapter officers conducting successful meetings, they also offer tours to local elementary schools and plan for the initiation ceremony for new members. The Biennial Convocation offers additional opportunities for KDP members to become leaders. Bond has accompanied his chapter officers to the past five Convocations and he has been able to guide them to develop and present at the national level. At Convocation, some chapters are recognized with the Achieving Chapter Excellence (ACE) Award. The Eta Zeta Chapter has won two ACE Awards in consecutive biennia in 2007 and 2009 and at the time of press was told they would receive their third at the 2011 Convocation.

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Chapter programming is the heart of all KDP chapters. Through service, professional development, and fundraising, chapters implement programs to meet the goals of KDP. Chapter counselors provide guidance and support for chapter officers to implement a variety of chapter activities. Under Bond’s guidance the Eta Zeta chapter has sponsored annual book drives for local elementary schools and its members have served as pen-pals for local English Language Learning (ELL) students. Successful chapter events, like these, usually require the dedication of chapter members and the support and guidance of the chapter counselor. One of the chapter’s 2010-2011 presidents referred to working with Bond using the following sentiment, “Dr. Bond’s strength to me is humbleness. He never takes credit for our chapter’s success, yet always gives the officers spotlight, when in reality none of it would be possible without his behind the scenes effort” (Baker, pers. comm.). According to Bond, one the many challenges facing Kappa Delta Pi as it prepares to celebrate its centenary, is to find ways to stay relevant as an organization dedicated to teachers’ excellence. Competition from other organizations and online communities that arise through social networking make imperative that KDP continue to serve teachers not only as an academic honor society but also as a dynamic professional organization. With these goals in mind, Bond asked the Executive Committee to think logically about opportunities for KDP chapters to be relevant and do more for their school, community, and the world. Bond took the idea of making students ambassadors of their university, of the Kappa Delta Pi, and of the teaching profession, and used it to make the Eta Zeta chapter more relevant to the needs of students at Texas State University. As the university strived to develop stronger connections with alumni, Bond saw an opportunity for the Eta Zeta chapter not only to do more but to support the long term goals of the university as well. “My goal is to expand the role of Kappa Delta Pi on my campus. It’s not just an honor society and professional development organization. I want KDP members to become ambassadors for my university” (Bond, pers. comm.). As ambassadors, KDP members provide orientation for new students and reach out to prospective students through campus tours. Not only can these projects provide much needed services to the university, they also introduce more students to the Society. Bond believes that having KDP members serve as ambassadors will strengthen not only their leadership skills but their relationship to the college and commitment as future alumni. He stated, “By asking my KDP members to taken on this dignitary role, they will hopefully feel a stronger allegiance and loyalty to the university” (Bond, pers. comm.). At the local level, the Eta Zeta chapter members work hard to promote KDP as an organization for outstanding teachers. Bond envisioned an

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expansion of the role of KDP on his campus noting that the “function of KDP is to recognize and honor teachers” (Bond, pers. comm.). This task was partially accomplished by utilizing a fall initiation ceremony to honor local teachers and to recognize partnerships with professional development schools that partnered with Texas State. During the 2009-2010 academic year 195 new members were inducted into the Society in the fall and another 157 new members were inducted in the spring. At this occasion, school-wide scholarship winners also were recognized. Forging connections between KDP members, K-12 teachers, alumni, and future alumni are just a few of the steps Bond has stimulated in order to make the Eta Zeta Chapter more relevant on the Texas State campus. To foster a notion of continual participation, members are required to plan at least 3 professional development meetings, one service project and one initiation ceremony at minimum each semester. His chapter also partners with the Round Rock campus. This dual approach allows students to have a variety of opportunities for involvement in KDP activities. Bond recognizes, however, that KDP members are often overly ambitious individuals. His leadership style is one to caution them that while at the beginning of the semester these ideas often seem exciting, once one faces the reality of academic responsibilities, it is often a struggle to maintain momentum. “As a leader, Bond always takes everyone’s ideas into account and knows how to incorporate everyone’s ideas into a final product” (Brabant, pers. comm.). Although he reminded them that less is more, this highly motivated group of students has continued to engage in many additional service projects throughout the years.

FOOTSTEPS TOWARDS HIGHER SERVICE— MEMBERSHIP ON THE EXECUTIVE COUNCIL Bond served as a Society Vice President in 2006-2008 and he believes himself fortunate to have served when Faye Snodgress was transitioned to become Executive Director. “She is such an asset to the organization and really keeps initiatives moving forward. From Faye, I have learned a lot about being a leader” (Bond, pers. comm.). He also credits the distributed leadership of the members of the Executive Council (EC), a leadership model that has evolved through time, as the foundation that supports his role as president. The president works closely with the Executive Council, the Executive Director and the Headquarters staff to develop the strategic plan. The president and the Executive Council are responsible for thinking strategically for the organization. Once the plan has been created, these leaders priori-

Nathan Bond (2010-Present) 361 tize the initiatives and provide the vision and energy to bring them to fruition. The leadership approach for KDP is very collaborative. There are at least eight committees that are working on the details of the various initiatives. (Bond personal comm.)

With a 100 year anniversary around the corner, these Society officers chose to focus on defining what KDP would look like in the future. This experience led to the development of a professional development resource for K-12 teachers known as “KDP Connect”. This Executive Council identified KDP Connect as an initiative that it wanted to advance because they felt that is would help the Society to become more relevant to the members (Bond pers. comm.). For about five years, the Executive Council has engaged in a strategic discussion toward increasing involvement of members in the organization. For example, an increase in competition is evident amongst a variety of organizations in terms of recruiting students whom might not have the time to devote to multiple groups. Additionally, many universities have increased pressure for faculty to spend more time on research and publications than engaging in service, a pressure that impacts the numbers of individuals willing to serve as chapter counselors. Thus much of this work on the Executive Council during Bond’s presidency has been the involvement of a variety of committees that examined different approaches to increasing membership and participation in the Society. As Kappa Delta Pi, most people associate the Greek name with higher education. Yet, Bond has wanted to make KDP more relevant to the K-12 setting, again exemplifying his commitment to pre-service and in-service teachers. Under his leadership, the Executive Council has continued to rebrand KDP as a professional development organization for all teachers as well as an honor society. The Executive Council, working with Bond, focused efforts on individuals just entering teaching. Although the goal of this project was established during Bond’s service as Vice-President in the organization, in the spring of 2011, Kappa Delta Pi launched KDP Connect. This effort is a multimedia web-based, professional development tool to connect educators to lesson plans, current research on practice, and tips for the classroom. Through this on-line site, pre-service teachers can access tips for setting up their classroom, school administrators and in-service teachers can download and participate in professional development modules, and KDP members can share ideas about their practice (Kappa Delta Pi 2011a). Throughout the remainder of his presidency Bond will have the unique opportunity to oversee this endeavor and assess the impact it has on KDP members. In 2008, Americans saw a massive bank-bailout, a housing market that bottomed-out and the start of large increases in unemployment. As the

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economy continued to take a turn for the worse, the number of Society initiates dropped at the very time that it was committed to develop forwardlooking projects. The EC confronted the task of reexamining the Society’s budget to find ways to expand the organization and, at the same time, to bolster its financial sustainability. The commitment to these goals appears to have been beneficial thus far and worth the effort,“… the very deliberate and committed effort to analyzing the budget has put us into a strong, healthy position as an organization” (Snodgress, pers. comm.). Its work models Bond’s perception that his presidential role is to serve as a steward of the Society’s past traditions while supporting present initiatives. During his presidency Bond oversaw several other committees including the newly formed Public Policy Committee designed to address opportunities for KDP to advocate for members. One project branching from the public policy work is the Advocacy Committee, one with which Bond served as the EC liaison. In response to the economic recession, many school districts across the nation sought to balance local budgets by terminating faculty employment. Some members have approached Kappa Delta Pi with this issue, wondering if the Society could support teachers whom have lost their positions. Within his presidency, Bond believed that Kappa Delta Pi had the opportunity to support and to serve as an advocate for practicing teachers who face such problems. Because it is a non-profit organization, KDP cannot lobby for or against political issues. However, it can help raise awareness from multiple perspectives about multiple areas of concern. This awareness, he believes, can take several forms including provisions of articles and statistics to arm educators with research and significant opinion when they need to address issues of budget cuts within their own school districts. A special example of advocacy during Bond’s presidency was the revitalization and relocation of the KDP archives. Bond served on a committee with Dr. Peggy Moch and Faye Snodgress to identify several universities with the capability to house KDP records We contacted eight universities across the United States and asked them a series of questions to help us select the best possible fit for KDP. As we explored each site, we used 12 criteria, such as prestige, quality of service, cost, location and accessibility, to evaluate the various possible sites. Once we finished our investigation, we presented our findings to the Executive Council. It was decided that the archives at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was the best fit for Kappa Delta Pi. (Bond, pers. com)

The goal is to continue this work by collecting additional manuscripts, oral histories, and ephemera. Finally, because Kappa Delta Pi is an international honors society, Bond believes that expansion of chapters internationally should be a

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strong focus. The first international KDP chapter, Omicron Omicron, was established in 1951 at the University of Calgary in Canada (Kappa Delta Pi 2011b). In the late 2000’s, Kappa Delta Pi signed a memorandum of understanding with an international group in China, CAEA (Chinese Educational Administrators Association). A representative of this group attended the 2009 Convocation and invited President Bond to Shanghai in the Fall, 2010, to meet with members of this organization. While in the Far East, he also traveled to Taipei, Taiwan, and established the Taiwan chapter at Taipei Municipal University of Education. The council has supported Bond’s work to strengthen the Society’s international initiatives. Bond utilizes a similar leadership style with the Executive Council as he does with the Eta Zeta Chapter. Those who work with him agree that he is not only humble but eager to enable others to play an important role in the decision making an execution of tasks. One Eta Zeta chapter president’s describes his leadership style by writing, I would consider Dr. Bond a leader with end goals that are achievable yet raise the bar for other chapters to meet. He not only puts in many hours to help our chapter, he teaches good leadership skills to us as college students to imitate and one day instill in every organization we take part in, especially the schools we work in as practicing teachers. (Baker, pers. comm.)

Faye Snodgress, the Executive Director, agrees that Bond is adept at being in charge while also encouraging others to weigh in on particular topics and issues (Snodgress, pers. comm.).

THE ROADS THAT LIE AHEAD—THE JOURNEY CONTINUES On Saturday, March 5, 2011, Kappa Delta Pi celebrated Founder’s Day at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, an event marking the 100 year anniversary of the Society’s establishment on that campus. Especially for this celebration, KDP Headquarters staff produced a webinar thereby permitting Bond and others close to the organization to inspire chapters around the nation to engage in Founders Day Activities (Bond 2011b). These activities were intended to promote awareness of the history of the organization and inspiration for the 2011 Centennial celebration. Throughout his life Bond has continued to contribute to the field of teacher education with a commitment to challenging his students to be future teacher leaders and committed professionals. He contributes to the Eta Zeta chapter of Kappa Delta Pi by encouraging his members to be ambassadors to their university, dignitaries of their profession, and leaders of their organization. He contributes to the Executive Council of the Society by supporting previous projects and facilitating collaboration

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amongst all members. He leads by example making sure that everyone’s view is mutually respected and this helps sustain his role as a leader within the Society. The members of Kappa Delta Pi realize that it’s all about relationships - the relationships between the counselor and his or her officers, the relationships between members and the organization, the relationships between the U.S. and members abroad - and if we can do things to facilitate these relationships it will keep the organization viable. (Bond, pers. comm.)

As his term winds it course, he likely will continue to strengthen vital relationships amongst his college, his chapter, his professional organization, and his colleagues in the U.S. and abroad. The Fall 2011 Convocation marks the centennial celebration for the Kappa Delta Pi international honor society. Bond will serve as the president during this celebration, the Society’s 48th convocation, known as “Crossroads of Excellence”. As he continues his term as president, the future of Kappa Delta Pi will continue to be carved.

REFERENCES Bond, Nathan. 2007. 12 questioning strategies that minimize classroom management problems. Kappa Delta Pi Record 44(1): 18-21. Bond, Nathan and Fite, Kathleen 2007. Texas cybertext companion website to Introduction to teaching: Becoming a professional edited by Donald Kauchak and Paul Eggen, second edition. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Bond, Nathan, Beesley, Susie and Dehr, John. 2009. KDP chapters partner with alternative schools. Kappa Delta Pi Record 46(1): 44-45. Kappa Delta Pi. 2011a. KDP Connect. http://kdpconnect.kdp.org/ Kappa Delta Pi. 2011b. Nathan Bond KDP Founder’s Day webinar. http:// www.kdp.org/100years/foundersday.php Texas State University. 2010. http://www.txstate.edu.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

ABOUT THE AUTHORS John Baran is a doctoral student in the social studies education program at the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia. A former United States history teacher, his research interests include the teaching and learning of history and the Advanced Placement curriculum and testing. He has served as an Advanced Placement exam reader for four years. Michelle Bauml completed her Ph.D. degree at The University of Texas at Austin in 2010 where she served as president for the Delta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. As an undergraduate at Texas A&M University, she was initiated into the Mu Chi chapter and elected to the position of treasurer. Currently, Michelle is an Assistant Professor of Early Childhood/Social Studies education at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas. Her research interests include new teacher development, teacher thinking and decision-making, and ECE/elementary curriculum and instruction with a special emphasis in social studies education. Cheryl J. Craig is a Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education, University of Houston where she is the Coordinator of Teaching and Teacher Education and Director of Elementary Education. She was awarded the Omicron Omicron Chapter’s “Educator of the Year Award” in 1990 and served as Omicron Omicron’s President in 1992. Omicron Omicron’s institutional home is the University of Calgary, Canada. Cheryl Craig is currently a member of the Zeta Omega Chapter at the University of Houston, Main Campus. Recently, she was named an AERA Fellow.

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David M. Callejo Pérez is the Carl A. Gerstacker Endowed Chair in Education at Saginaw Valley State University. His work includes books, chapters, articles, and academic papers on Civil Rights, urban schooling, leadership, educational policy and higher education. He is also a member of several national and regional advisory boards and journals in the field of education. Callejo Perez is Immediate Past-President of the American Association for Teaching and Curriculum, a member and Factotum (2012) of the Society for Professors of Curriculum, and a research fellow at several centers. He has authored more than 20 white papers, technical reports, and evaluations for school districts, universities, communities, and companies; Mexico and the Middle East. His most recent books are Higher Education and Human Capital (2011), Red Light in the Ivory Tower (2012) with Donna Adair Breault and The Stewardship of Higher Education with Joshua Ode (2012). Jamin Carson is an Associate Professor of curriculum and instruction at East Carolina University. He graduated from The University of Texas at Austin with a Ph.D. degree in curriculum studies, has taught secondary English Language Arts for several years, and serves on the editorial review panel for The Educational Forum and the communication committee for Kappa Delta Pi. His current research and teaching interests include the philosophy of education, effective instruction, and curriculum development. Antonio J. Castro is an Assistant Professor at the University of MissouriColumbia and coordinates Social Studies Education undergraduate and graduate programs. His research interests include the recruitment, preparation, and retention of teachers for culturally diverse schools, as well as multicultural citizenship and democratic education. He acquired his doctorate in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Social Studies and Teacher Education from The University of Texas at Austin in 2009, his MEd in Curriculum Studies from the University of Texas at Austin in 2002, and a BA in History from Southwestern University in 1997. He taught in the public schools for seven years and worked with various nonprofit educational organizations prior to becoming a faculty member. Dr. Castro currently serves as a co-Chapter Counselor for the Mu Delta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi at the University of Missouri. Sherri Rae Colby taught high school in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and serves as an Assistant Professor of curriculum and instruction at Texas A&M University-Commerce. In this role, she teaches courses in secondary education, qualitative research, and educational studies. She joined Alpha Iota Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi in 2002 during her graduate studies at the University of North Texas at which she earned her Ph.D. degree in

About the Authors 367

2007. In 2008, she was awarded the Dissertation of the Year in Teaching from the American Association of Teaching and Curriculum. Her research interests include historical thinking, educational history, qualitative methodology, and transformative learning. Matthew D. Davis is an Associate Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. His research interests include history and politics of education. He has published extensively on the history of Mexican American and African American schooling history. In 2005, his Exposing a culture of neglect: Herschel T. Manuel and Mexican American schooling was published. As a graduate student, Davis served as Delta (The University of Texas at Austin) Chapter President and held KDP’s Hollis, L. Caswell Laureate Doctorate Scholarship. He also received an AERA/Spencer Doctoral Research Fellowship for the 1997-98 academic year. Later, he served as Eta Psi (Rowan University) Chapter Counselor and was an Editorial Board Member for the Kappa Delta Pi Record. Davis also served as President of the Society for the Study of Curriculum History from 2005 to 2007. Mark David Dietz holds a Ph.D. degree in Curriculum and Instruction from The University of Texas at Austin, an M.B.A. degree with a focus on Organization Behavior from the University of Texas at Dallas, and a B.A. degree in History from Vanderbilt University. An Awkward Echo: Matthew Arnold and John Dewey, Mark’s first book, was published in 2010 through Information Age Publishing. O. L. Davis, Jr., is Catherine Mae Parker Centennial Professor of Curriculum and Instruction, Emeritus, The University of Texas at Austin. Holding a Ph.D. degree from George Peabody College for Teachers, he has specialized in the study and research of curriculum practice and theory, curriculum history, and social studies education throughout his career. He has served as President, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, the Organization of American Educational Historians, the Society for Curriculum History, and Kappa Delta Pi as well as Vice-president (Div B), American Educational Research Association. Author or coauthor of more than 200 scholarly articles and author, co-author, or editor of more than 25 books, he also was Editor, Journal of Curriculum and Supervision for 12 years. Of his awards for research and leadership, perhaps most notable was his being named in 1994 a Laureate of Kappa Delta Pi, international honor society in education. Angela Eckhoff is an Assistant Professor of Teaching and Learning in the Department of Early Childhood Education at Old Dominion University

368 ABOUT THE AUTHORS

in Norfolk, Virginia. She received a dual Ph.D in Educational Psychology and Cognitive Science from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She was initiated into the Iota Xi chapter of Kappa Delta Pi as an undergraduate student at Kansas State University. She served as co-counselor for the Mu Upsilon chapter of Kappa Delta Pi at Clemson University from 20072011. Her research focuses on visual arts pedagogy in early childhood education, imagination and creative development during childhood, and informal learning environments for children and families. Sherry L. Field is Associate Dean for TeacherEducation, Student Affairs, and Administration and Catherine Mae Parker Centennial Professor of Education at The University of Texas at Austin. Her research interests include social studies teaching and learning, learning in diverse settings, and history of curriculum. She has published more than 125 books, chapters, and articles. Dr. Field has served as Vice President of Kappa Delta Pi International in 2002-2004, and chapter counselor of Beta Kappa, Sigma Epsilon, and Delta Chapters of Kappa Delta Pi. She won the O. L. Davis, Jr., Counselor of Distinction Award in 2009. In addition, Dr. Field has served as President of the Society for the Study of Curriculum History, Chair of the Research in Social Studies SIG of AERA, and Chair of the College and University FacultyAssembly of the National Council for the Social Studies. Dr. Geneser was awarded the TAMUSA Teaching Excellence award in 2011. Vivien Geneser is an Assistant Professor of Early Childhood at Texas A&M University-San Antonio. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 2005, where she served as the Historian for the UT Delta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi while completing her doctoral studies. Dr. Geneser teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in Early Childhood education. Her primary research interests involve topics pertaining to teacher preparation, early childhood education, and social studies. She is co-counselor of the Alpha Delta Omega Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi at TAMUSA, serves on the Head Start Policy Council in San Antonio, and is a Co-Advisor for the San Antonio Chapter of the Association of Childhood Education International (ACEI). Paula K. Greene is Associate Professor for the College of Education, Northern Arizona University. She leads two cohort programs in Prescott, Arizona for elementary education students in partnership with statewide community colleges. Greene has served as Counselor of the Society’s Beta Chi Chapter at the Prescott satellite campus since 1995. Recipient of Kappa Delta Pi’s 1996-97 Distinguished Dissertation Award, Greene has multiple publications in both The Educational Forum and The Record, as

About the Authors 369

well as her 2003 booklet, Dear John Dewey: Reflections About Teaching and Learning. She has served as reviewer for KDP scholarships and chairs a scholarship committee of an international philanthropic educational organization, helping to award over $20,000 in grants to local coeds in the last 10 years. Receiving her doctorate from Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, where she was an active member of Kappa Delta Pi, Greene brings scholarship, dedication, and best practice to pre-service teachers in north-central Arizona. Janet Hammer earned her Ph.D. degree from the University of Texas at Austin in 2003 and has been a member of Kappa Delta Pi since her attendance at U.T. She is an Associate Clinical Professor at Texas A&M University and has taught in the Department of Teaching, Learning, and Culture (TLAC) since 2004; previously she taught in Texas public schools for nineteen years. She teaches social studies methods, curriculum and instructional theory, and ESL courses at the undergraduate level. She also teaches graduate level ESL and curriculum theory courses. In 2009, she was awarded the Association of Former Students College-Level Distinguished Achievement Award for Teaching. Since 2008, Dr. Hammer has co-led seven study abroad programs. She is the facilitator of the middle grades program and coordinator of the M.Ed. online program for TLAC. Dana Lewis Haraway is an Associate Professor in the Department of Middle, Secondary and Mathematics Education at James Madison University and a nationally certified school psychologist. She teaches assessment, collaborative leadership, and internship seminar in the MAT program as well as supervises initial practicum experiences in middle schools. Her research interests include at-risk youth, transition to and from middle school, classroom management, and assessment. She has more than 10 years working in the public schools as a teacher of special education, a school psychologist, and an administrator. Elizabeth Smith (Betty) Harrison currently serves as an adjunct lecturer at Texas State University in San Marcos, TX., having retired after 33 years in public education as an English teacher, campus administrator, and central office curriculum director. She holds a Master of Arts degree in English from the University of Tulsa (1972) and the Ph.D. degree in Curriculum Studies from the University of Texas at Austin (2005). Her research interests center around the history of public school education, especially of children from African American and Hispanic families in Texas. Dr. Harrison was selected for Kappa Delta Pi membership in the Eta Epsilon chapter as an undergraduate at McMurry College (now University).

370 ABOUT THE AUTHORS

David Hicks is an Associate Professor of history and social science education at Virginia Tech. A former middle and high school social studies teacher and museum curator/educator, he is past chair of the College and University Faculty Assembly (CUFA) of the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS). His works include a co-edited book with E. Thomas Ewing entitled Education and the Great Depression: Lessons from a Global History published by Peter Lang. Recent journal articles have been published in Theory and Research in Social Education, Social Education, Social Studies Research and Practice, The International Journal of Social Education, Disability and Society, and Journal of Education Policy. He has served as a co-PI on a Library of Congress - Teaching with Primary Sources Grant, a number of Teaching American History Grant projects with schools in Virginia, and also on the NEH funded Digital History Reader. Denisha Jones received her B.S degree in Early Childhood Education from the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) in 2003. She taught kindergarten in Washington D.C. before deciding to attend graduate school at Indiana University (IU). There she studied Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis on Early Childhood Education while teaching undergraduate courses in early childhood education and diversity. Currently Denisha is writing her dissertation, planning to defend the work in 2011. Recently she was selected to participate in the 2011-2012 Preparing Future Faculty Fellowship at Howard University. Jones was initiated in the Theta Sigma Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi while studying early childhood education at UDC. She served as the chapter vice president and president before becoming the counselor of the Rho Nu Chapter at IU from 2004-2009. She currently serves on the membership committee and will be a presenter at the 2011 Centennial Convocation.  Robin Robinson Kapavik currently serves Texas A&M University-San Antonio as an Assistant Professor in the School of Education & Kinesiology in San Antonio, Texas. She is the Co-Counselor of the Alpha Delta Omega chapter, which was chartered under her counsellorship in 2008. Dr. Kapavik is a graduate of The University of Texas at Austin (PhD, 2006; BA, 1994) and Texas A&M University (MS, 1996). Her research interests include social studies education and technology integration in content area coursework. Dr. Kapavik is a two-time recipient of the Teaching Excellence Award, a student-selected award program established by the Chancellor of the Texas A&M University System, to recognize excellence in classroom teaching. Larry J. Kelly received his Ph.D. degree in 2002 from The University of Texas Austin. He joined Texas A&M University in 2002 as a Clinical Assis-

About the Authors 371

tant Professor, Teaching, Learning and Culture department, and as Director of the Secondary Graduate Certification Program. As Secondary Graduate Certification Director he is responsible for the oversight and leadership of the ongoing preparation for initial secondary (8-12) teacher certification providing for the growth and experience of each student by coordination of program objectives, policies, and procedures by working with other faculty members. His research interests include the history of secondary education and the circumstances in which teachers’ practical experiences join the theoretical insights of researchers in order to create a culture of excellence. He currently serves as co-counselor for the Mu Chi Chapter for the Kappa Delta Pi chapter at Texas A&M. Kelley King is an Assistant Professor of Secondary Education in the Department of Teacher Education and Administration at The University of North Texas. Her research interests include the social and historical foundations of education, particularly the historical role of women in the teaching profession. Her book, Call Her a Citizen: The Life of Progressive Educator-Activist Anna J. H. Pennybacker, was recently published by Texas A&M University Press. She holds a doctoral degree in Curriculum and Instruction from The University of Texas at Austin, at which she also completed a portfolio in Women’s and Gender Studies. Prior to earning her doctoral degree, she supervised student teachers and taught special education and English Language Arts and Reading at the elementary and secondary levels. Ron Knorr is Assistant Professor of Education in the Tift College of Education at Mercer University. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Curriculum and Instruction, an M.A.T. degree in Middle Grades Education, and a B.S. degree in Financial Management from Clemson University, as well as an M.B.A. degree from the University of North Florida. Prior to entering education, he was a CPA and financial executive. His public school experience included teaching Middle Grades Language Arts and Social Studies and his university teaching includes courses in Middle School Curriculum, Language Arts and Social Studies Methods and Content for Teachers, and Qualitative and Quantitative Educational Research. His research interests include bullying prevention, teacher education, early adolescent literacy, the history of education in the American South, and the application of Activity Theory in education. He is a member of Alpha Epsilon Lambda, Beta Gamma Sigma, Kappa Delta Pi, and Phi Kappa Phi. Marcella L. Kysilka is Professor Emerita, Educational Studies at the University of Central Florida (Orlando, FL.). An experienced teacher of secondary school mathematics in Ohio and Florida, she received her Ph.D.

372 ABOUT THE AUTHORS

from The University of Texas at Austin in 1969 with an emphasis in curriculum and instruction. She took a position at UCF as a charter faculty member. UCF is currently the second largest university in the nation. Throughout her career, she focused on curriculum practice and theory in her teaching, research, and service. She continues in her retirement to consult with emphasis on the improvement of teaching and learning in an inner city charter high school in Cincinnati, Ohio and for a pre-school in Orlando. Dr. Kysilka has presented and published research based and analytic papers at local and international organizations. She has served as editor for The Educational Forum and Florida Educational Leadership and as Associate Editor, Journal of Curriculum and Supervision. Her recent coauthored books include: Applying Multicultural and Global Concepts in the Classroom and Beyond, the Adjunct Professor’s Guide to Success, and Teaching College in an Age of Accountability. Her recent co-edited and edited books include Contemporary Readings in Curriculum and Critical Times in Curriculum Thought: People, Politics, and Perspectives. She has served in leadership positions in the American Educational Research Association, the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development and as Executive Secretary of the American Association for Teaching and Curriculum. She is Past-President of Kappa Delta Pi and Chair, Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation. Karon N. LeCompte holds an appointment as Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Instruction at Baylor University. She teaches courses in social studies education and serves as chapter counselor for the Beta Xi chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. Previously, she was member of the faculty at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. In 2007, she was named the Kappa Delta Pi Outstanding Regional Counselor for her leadership of the Society’s Alpha Pi chapter. Earlier, she participated in the 2004 Kappa Delta Pi Democracy in Education Fellowship at the University of Washington, National Network for Educational Renewal, Agenda for Education in Democracy, directed by Laureate John Goodlad. Her research agenda focuses on citizenship education and she is an active member of the National Council for the Social Studies. Stephen S. Masyada is a long time Florida Gator, graduating with a BA in History in 2000 (following four years of active duty in the Air Force), and a MEd in Social Studies Education in 2002. Currently, Masyada is a doctoral candidate in Social Studies Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Florida, studying under Dr. Elizabeth Washington. Much of his work and research involves citizenship education and history instruction, and he has taught both social foundations and elementary methods courses at the University of Florida. He continues as a full time social

About the Authors 373

studies teacher and department chair at a small rural high school in Florida and is currently studying how social studies educators develop their perceptions of the “good citizen” and reconcile that with their own textbooks. Writing is a joy, but teaching remains his passion. Sarah Mathews received her BSED in Secondary Social Studies Education in 2000 and her MED in Secondary Social Studies Education in 2002 from the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia. After teaching in Georgia and in Ohio she returned to school to work on her PhD. While at IU she was initiated into the Rho Nu Chapter. She received the O.L. Davis, Jr. Laureate Doctoral Scholarship from Kappa Delta Pi in 2007 using the funds to support her dissertation work in Kenya, East Africa. In 2008, Sarah completed her Ph.D. in Curriculum Studies with an emphasis on Social Studies and Minors in Urban and Multicultural Education. Dr. Mathews is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of Social Studies Education at Florida International University in Miami, Florida. There she teaches social studies methods courses for undergraduate students and curriculum and research courses for graduate students. Wesley Null is Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education at Baylor University. He is also an Associate Professor of Curriculum & Foundations of Education in the School of Education and the Honors College. He completed his PhD degree at The University of Texas at Austin, where he studied curriculum theory and the history of education. Null is the author of Curriculum: From Theory to Practice (2011), Peerless Educator: The Life and Work of Isaac Leon Kandel (2007), and A Disciplined Progressive Educator: The Life and Career of William Chandler Bagley (2004). He is also co-editor, with Diane Ravitch, of Forgotten Heroes of American Education: The Great Tradition of Teaching Teachers (2006). Null has co-edited several other books as well, including American Educational Thought: Essays from 1640 to 1940 (2010) and The Pursuit of Curriculum: Schooling and the Public Interest (2006). Null served as president of the Delta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi while a doctoral student at UT-Austin. He also has served as Chapter Counselor of the Beta Xi chapter at Baylor. In addition, Null is Editor of the American Educational History Journal and is the current president of the American Association for Teaching and Curriculum. Sarah B. Shear is currently a doctoral student in Social Studies Education with an emphasis in Curriculum Policy and Native American Studies at the University of Missouri. She earned a BS in Mass Communication-Public Relationships at Boston University and a MS in Education at the University of New Haven. Her research interests include the experiences of Native students in the social studies classroom, Native American representations in

374 ABOUT THE AUTHORS

social studies curriculum, and the politics of curriculum reform at the state and national levels. She is a member of the National Indian Education Association, National Council for the Social Studies, and Native American and Indigenous Studies Association. Before entering the doctoral program, she taught middle and high school history, geography, and government. Edmund Short has been a member of Kappa Delta Pi since his undergraduate days at Purdue University. He taught English in secondary schools in Indiana, New York, and New Jersey before completing his doctorate at Teachers College, Columbia University, in 1965. He held faculty positions in Education at Ball State, Toledo, and Pennsylvania State Universities and has taught frequently in retirement at the University of Central Florida. His research and writing have centered on curriculum theory, research, and practice and he edited ASCD’s Journal of Curriculum and Supervision for eight years. Mindy Spearman is an Assistant Professor of Teacher Education at Clemson University. She received a Ph.D. degree in Curriculum Studies from the University of Texas at Austin in 2006, as well as a MA degree in Classical Archaeology from the same institution. At The University of Texas at Austin, Dr. Spearman served first as Historian and then later President, of the Delta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. During this time, she received KDP’s O.L. Davis, Jr. Laureate Scholarship (2003-2004) and Hollis L. Caswell Laureate (2004-2005) Scholarship. At Clemson, Dr. Spearman teaches classes in elementary social studies education, the historical foundations of education, curriculum studies and qualitative research. Her research interests include: the uses of arts and artifacts in elementary education, sustainability education for young learners, and the historical foundations of teacher professional development in America. She has served as Chapter Counselor of the Mu Upsilon Kappa Delta Pi chapter at Clemson since 2007. Jared R. Stallones received his Ph.D. degree in Curriculum Studies from the University of Texas in 1999, following a career as a teacher and school administrator. At the University at Austin, Dr. Stallones was inducted into the Delta Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi, was awarded the Alexander Caswell Ellis Fellowship in Education and the David G. Bruton, Jr. Graduate Fellowship, and the YMCA Distinguished Service Award for work in Austin’s schools. Dr. Stallones taught in the History Department at California State University, Fresno, before moving to California State Polytechnic University, Pomona as Professor of Education and Secondary Education Coordinator. He currently serves as University Coordinator of Secondary Education at California State University, Long Beach.. Dr. Stallones has

About the Authors 375

authored books and articles on education history and biography, and has been recognized for his scholarship with a Cal Poly Pomona Golden Leaves Award, and the Article of the Year Award from the American Educational History Journal. He is currently developing a KDP chapter at Cal Poly Pomona. Barbara Slater Stern is a Professor in the Department of Middle, Secondary and Mathematics Education at James Madison University. She teaches curriculum theory; methods of teaching middle and secondary social studies; and internship seminar in the MAT and MEd programs. Her research interests include curriculum, the history of teaching social studies/history, and integrating technology into social studies. She is the coeditor of Contemporary Readings in Curriculum, the editor of The New Social Studies: People, Projects and Perspectives; the author of Social Studies: Standards, Meaning, and Understanding and the former editor of Curriculum and Teaching Dialogue, the journal of the American Association of Teaching and Curriculum. She originally became a member of Kappa Delta Pi in 1971 and rejoined in 1993. She has served on the editorial board of the Kappa Delta Pi Forum for many years. Stephanie van Hover is an Associate Professor of social studies education at the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia. She serves as the program coordinator of secondary teacher education program. A former middle and high school social studies teacher, her research explores the professional development of teachers and the teaching of history in a high-stakes testing context. Recent journal articles have been published in Theory and Research in Social Education, The Social Studies, Social Studies Research and Practice, and The International Journal of Social Education. She currently serves as an evaluator for two Teaching American History grants. Vanessa M. Villate is an Assistant Professor of Pedagogy at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas. She received her Ph.D. degree from The University of Texas at Austin in Curriculum and Instruction, with a specialization in Curriculum Studies. Her involvement with Kappa Delta Pi began at UT, where she was an officer of the Delta chapter for 3 years. During that time, she was awarded the O. L. Davis, Jr. Laureate Scholarship (2006) and the Hollis L. Caswell Laureate Scholarship (2007). Dr. Villate also served as the student representative on the KDP Educational Foundation board from 2008 to 2011. Currently, she is the Counselor for the Sigma Beta chapter at Lamar University. Joshua M. Walehwa is a Ph.D. student in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Missouri Saint Louis. Earlier, he earned

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a B.A. degree in Art with a K-12 certification in Art Education, an MA in Art Education, and an M.A. degree in Student Development in Postsecondary Education, all from the University of Iowa. Currently, Joshua holds the position of Director for Housing and Residence Life at Saint Louis University in St. Louis, MO. In addition, he has continued to teach art to K-7th grade students through the Saint Louis Art Museum’s Art With Us program. Elizabeth Yeager Washington is Professor of Social Studies Education at the University of Florida in Gainesville, and a Senior Fellow of the Florida Joint Center for Citizenship. She earned her Ph.D. degree in Curriculum and Instruction from The University of Texas at Austin, previously served as editor of Theory and Research in Education (2001-2007), and currently coordinates the masters/certification program in Social Studies Education at UF, where she teaches secondary social studies methods, civics and government methods, and global studies methods courses. Her research interests include civic education in the middle school, teacher professional development in civic education, and the teaching and learning of history. Brenda Wheat Whiteman is currently the A+ Arts Education Specialist at the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. She holds a Ph.D. degree in Curriculum and Instruction from The University of Texas at Austin, as well as a Master of Music Education and a Bachelor of Education from the University of Georgia. Dr. Whiteman maintains North Carolina educator certification in Elementary (K-6), Music (K-12), and Academically and Intellectually Gifted (K-12). She has a total of 11 years public school teaching experience in those areas, and nine years of experience in higher education. She has taught undergraduate courses in arts integration for elementary education majors, supervised field experiences, and served as co-coordinator for the Elementary Education Graduate Program at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. She served Kappa Delta Pi as both Treasurer and President of the Delta Chapter (2002-2005) and as a co-counselor for the Alpha Alpha Pi Chapter (2006–2011). Patricia Wiese earned her Ph.D. degree from Texas A&M University in 2001. She is an Associate Clinical Professor at Texas A&M University and has taught in the Department of Teaching, Learning and Culture (TLAC) since 2003; earlier, she taught public school and at the University of Houston-Victoria, Blinn College, The International University in Geneva, Switzerland, and Webster University (Switzerland campus). She teaches writing-intensive (W) courses at the undergraduate level and graduate

About the Authors 377

online courses in children’s literature. She is the CEHD representative to the W Course Faculty Committee and handles all TLAC W Course certifications. Since 2004, Dr. Wiese has led or co-led seven study abroad programs and was awarded the university’s 2007 International Excellence Award. She is the faculty advisor for TLAC’s Undergraduate Peer Mentors and the university-wide Aggie Book Club. Ron W. Wilhelm is a Professor in the department of teacher education and administration and director of the Center for Educational Reform at the University of North Texas, teaches courses in multicultural education, curriculum implementation and evaluation, and qualitative research methods. Since 1992 he has served as counselor for Alpha Iota Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society in Education and also serves on the board of the Kappa Delta Pi Educational Foundation. In 2004 Dr. Wilhelm served as principal interviewer in a joint Kappa Delta Pi and UNT Texas Center for Educational Technology project to collect the thoughts of leading educators, KDP laureates all, on their work and their views on the status of education in the U.S. today. The interviews are posted on the “Laureate Interview” link of the Alpha Iota Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi website. Cynthia Hansberry Williams has been an educator for nineteen years. She has worked as a language arts teacher, a college writing instructor, a supervisor of elementary practicum and secondary pre-service teachers, a researcher, and a higher education administrator. Dr. Williams completed an interdisciplinary Ph.D. degree in Language, Literacy, and English Studies from Vanderbilt University and received a Master’s of Arts in Technical and Expository Writing from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. Owner of Educational Research and Consulting, PLLC in Little Rock, Arkansas, she currently serves as a researcher and literacy consultant. Her research interest examines complex language processes students from multiracial and multicultural backgrounds encounter in classroom settings, specifically in navigating language interactions in literacy activities. Her research work has been published in the peer-reviewed journal, Theory Into Practice, and presented at various national and international conferences, including the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), the National Council of Teachers of English Assembly for Research (NCTEAR), the American Educational Research Association (AERA), and the International Federation for the Teaching of English (IFTE). She was recently nominated to NCTE’s Middle Level Section Nominating Committee, and has completed appointed positions on NCTE’s Commission on Literature and the Committee Against Bias and Racism in the Teaching of English.