Ann Hare
Dr. Kenneth Mufuka
Dr. Jean Paquette
Dr. Robert Taylor
Professor and Director of the Larry A. Jackson Library – 41 years of service.
Professor of History – 34 years of service.
Professor of History – 21 years of service.
Professor of Education – 15 years of service.
Dr. Kenneth Mufuka came to Lander over 30 years ago from Zimbabwe and he has never wavered in his resolve to better his home nation. He and other family members living in the United States have helped many young Zimbabweans pay for and earn degrees from Lander. The Kenneth and Mashura Mufuka Scholarship was established in 1999 but he started helping Zimbabwean students with their education several years earlier. His brother and sister-in-law, Douglas and Jean Mufuka, established the Mufuka Private Foundation in Chicago, which also assists in bringing Zimbabwe’s brightest young Christian minds to Lander. Students who attend Lander on these scholarships follow the Mufukas’ lead when they graduate by putting money back into the scholarships that made it possible for them to get a Lander education. Their gifts not only open the door of opportunity for even more Zimbabweans, they solidify the Lander community’s connection with the world.
Dr. Jean Paquette’s history courses encompassed the causes, strategies and implications of war and she went to extraordinary lengths to broaden her knowledge of the subject by taking part in military maneuvers. For example, she attended a summer seminar on military history at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, a program designed to acquaint participants with the aspects of war. She has also spent a summer in a military operations and strategy workshop organized by Columbia University’s Center for War and Peace Studies. She feels these and similar military training exercises enhance her history classes. Paquette has also taken students to the heart of ancient civilization’s historical beginnings with a tour of Egypt and the Great Pyramid of Giza. She has hosted a tour of Rome, giving students the opportunity to climb to the highest points in Vatican City and gaze out over centuriesold human architecture. Through her tours of World War II concentration camps, she has also given many students a firsthand glimpse at the atrocities of war.
In addition to his teaching duties at Lander, Dr. Bob Taylor was director of Graduate Studies in Education. He was also a member of the Teaching Fellows Advisory Board and faculty sponsor of Kappa Delta Pi. In 1994, he received a Disney American Teacher Award, and five years later he was named a National Disney Learning Partnership Fellow, an initiative the Walt Disney Company established to support creative teaching strategies. Taylor, who describes himself as “a creator of art,” and his wife, Donna, own and operate Taylor Galleries in Greenwood.
When Ann Hare arrived at Lander in 1968 with her husband, religion professor Dr. John Hare, Lander’s library was housed in a 9,000-squarefoot building that had outgrown its capacity because of a large collection of books and other material. After Lander received state support in 1973, the university relied on her experience to plan the new 60,000-square-foot Jackson Library, which opened in 1977. Under her direction, the library became computerized in 1993, and she views the development and growth of electronic resources as the biggest change in the library under her tutelage. In 2007, she was awarded the Medallion of Honor, which is given to select members of the Lander community who have contributed significant amounts of their time, talents and energies to help maintain, improve and illuminate the university. As for future endeavors, Hare has accepted appointment as the Interim Dean of the College of Arts and Humanities.
Lander Magazine • Fall 2009
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