8 minute read
Messages for mentors
How Pitt-Bradford professors changed the lives of their students
Last summer, Portraits asked readers about the ways Pitt-Bradford had changed their lives, and we got the same response from everyone we heard from – professors.
Pitt-Bradford has always specialized in nurturing and inspiring students to be the best they could be. Whether or not they knew it when they applied to teach at Pitt-Bradford, the campus’ faculty have always (and continue to) put students first with their gifts of time, mentoring and friendship.
Patrick “P.J.” Mogon ’79 came to Pitt-Bradford after serving eight years in the U.S. Navy. “I knew I didn’t want to be lost on the Oakland campus,” he wrote. “I arrived in Bradford somewhat adrift and foundering as a veteran adult freshman. I found a small group of similar adult students, including Dave and Robert Newcombe, whose father (Bob Newcombe) was on staff, and became comfortable in the helpful academic atmosphere.
“When Professor (Bob) Laing marched the chicken across my first paper with red ink, his comment was that it was a well-written piece, but I needed some remediation in writing technique and met with me to facilitate that. A full senior professor! Wow!”
How else did faculty affect their students? We have some messages from alumni to faculty members who shaped their lives in ways large and small.
FROM: WILLIAM “JOEY” HANNON ’13, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES, GUILFORD (N.C.) TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE
TO: DR. MARY MULCAHY, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF BIOLOGY, PITT-BRADFORD
“I don’t know to what extent you’re aware of this, but when I first enrolled at Pitt-Bradford, I had NO IDEA what I wanted to do. My second semester, I enrolled in Bio 102 with you. That represented a turning point in the trajectory of my life. Your enthusiasm for the subject and brightness and excitement when communicating with students awakened something in me that had long been dormant. It reminded me that, as a child, learning about living things was inherently rewarding to me.
“You seemed to believe in me, to encourage me. I can’t really count the number of times that I was granted unique opportunities by you and Dr. (Lauren) Yaich.”
Those opportunities included conducting pollination research, serving as a student representative on a faculty search committee, and launching a college teaching career of his own as an adjunct biology professor.
“I’m reaching out not only to thank you, but I also have some good news to share with you. I was selected to receive the GTCC Excellence in Teaching Award out of more than 200 faculty.
“There are times when working for a bureaucratic institution is frustrating; sometimes students can be very challenging, and sometimes it’s easy to lose sight of the impact that we have on our communities. But every single year when I read my student evaluations and I’m reminded of that impact, you’re one of the people I count as responsible for putting me here, and I’m sure I’m not the only student who remembers you this way.
“Thank you for your patience, kindness and dedication to your students. Thank you for being you.”
From an impromptu speech given by Jennifer Lewke ’05 (inset), investigative reporter at WHEC in Rochester, N.Y., at a retirement reception for Jeffrey Guterman, associate professor of broadcast communications.
“As an 18-year-old girl on campus, I think you saw something in me that I hadn’t yet seen, and I thank you every day for that. You helped to nurture it in a supportive and thoughtful way and a creative way, which I think is impor tant in our business, too.
“I had big dreams of becoming a reporter, but I had never picked up a camera. I had never shot a stand-up. I had great big dreams, but no actual tangible skills until I met Jeff. He is the kind of person who doesn’t just talk to you, he teaches. He took us out in the field with cameras and showed us how to shoot video, how to find a story, how to make a story good, how to talk to people. To me, that’s teaching.”
Guterman is retiring Aug. 20 from the broadcast communications program he founded at Pitt-Bradford in 1985.
An interview with Susan Silvestri ’72-’74 about Dr. Janet McCauley, first chairperson of the Social Sciences Department
“I worked as a student assistant for Dr. Janet McCauley (inset), who was instrumental in developing my interest in government and human services. She taught most of the political science classes and was a very special person. She was very bright and personable. I was in a couple of classes where there were no women. Women didn’t really go into political science at the time.”
As an assistant, Silvestri corrected tests and helped McCauley with her research. She said that McCauley’s husband was the city manager of Bradford, and it helped her bring politics and reality together.
“I just thought it was fascinating,” Silvestri said. Silvestri went on to earn a political science degree from the Pittsburgh campus in 1976 and worked 40 years for the Area Agency on Aging in Westmoreland County, Pa.
From an Instagram post by Troi “Tee” Williams ’17
@traveling.tee – first semester of my freshman year of college at @upittbradford I was randomly placed in a Japanese language and cultures class.
I tried to switch into a Spanish class, but they said no, so I committed to taking the class. I ended up liking it and did pretty well, so my professor suggested I apply for a Cultural Exchange experience in Yokohama, Japan, with our sister school.
I ended up applying for the trip, got accepted and stayed with a host family for two weeks. After Japan, I was gassed to keep traveling, so I kept up with the study abroad office and planned to do a semester abroad in London during my junior year.
While in London, I traveled to 10 countries across Western Europe, took my first solo trip, and started blogging about all of my travels.
I fell in love with writing about my travels and decided to be a travel writer.
Without that random Japanese class and Professor Don Ulin (inset), I wouldn’t be where I am today (Thailand).
Williams has been traveling the world as a social media strategist and writer since 2018. Follow her at onecupoftee.com.
From an interview with Celeste Myslewski ’77 about Dr. Steven Hoffmaster, assistant professor of physics
“The two classes that I really remember and think about all of the time were both ones that I had to take – geology and physics.”
Physics was taught by Dr. Steven Hoffmaster, who would later teach at Gonzaga University in Washington.
“You have no idea how much I dreaded taking physics. I was running a 4.0 GPA, and I thought, ‘This is the end. Science. I can’t do this.’”
Not so. She could not only “do it” she fell in love with it.
“It was the way he taught it. He was a funny guy. He had a great sense of humor. Sometimes as he was teaching a physical principal, he would tell a joke. When I was taking an exam, I would laugh thinking of it. It made me so relaxed.”
After a career in retail, Myslewski retired and pursued a passion made possible by that one physics class – aviation.
“I love airplanes and how they work. I go to airshows.
They bring together everything I love – planes, history and science.”
She’s even now a member of The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, “I never thought I’d be into science and aviation, and I have thanked in my mind many times Steve Hoffmaster, wherever he is. That one class just opened up a world that is amazing to me. It was his class.”
Donny Kemick '04 on his pledge to create the Donald C. Lewicki Technology Fund
Donny Kemick ’04 and his wife, Amanda Wentworth Kemick ’04, made a pledge last summer to create the Donald C. Lewicki Technology Fund to provide scholarships to Pitt-Bradford students in honor of Donny Kemick’s faculty mentor.
Kemick is the owner of protocol80, a business he started with classmates while still a student at Pitt-Bradford.
The two first met in Lewicki’s Microsoft Office class.
“He just made it interesting to me,” Kemick said.
“He was so instrumental and helped so many students.”
Lewicki went on to start the computer information systems and technology major at Pitt-Bradford, which encourages projects like the one that became protocol80.
While Kemick took that first class with Lewicki, Lewicki noticed Kemick taking an interest and encouraged him to pursue a minor in management information systems.
“That was huge – a pivotal moment,” Kemick said. Lewicki continued to make suggestions and provide opportunities for Kemick. “Nobody in my life has really directed me and pushed me the way Don did.”
