Tunnel, Meet Light - Trinity Magazine Spring 2021

THE MAGAZINE OF TRINITY UNIVERSITY SPRING 2021

TUNNEL,

MEET LIGHT

Tiger leaders shine beacons of hope on campus, in the community, and across the nation.

left A student sleds down Cardiac Hill in 1985. right A student sleds down the hill between Prassel Garage and the football stadium in 2021.

SNOW DAY On Valentine’s Day evening , soft snow began piling up on

photos by Taylor Stakes and Joshua Moczygemba ’05

Trinity’s campus. Snowflakes fluttered to the ground, falling faster and faster as the night stretched on until, finally, students woke to a campus covered in thick, powdery snow.

It was the perfect snow day, one Trinity hasn’t seen since 1985 (barring a light dusting in 2017). Delighting in the crisp, cold air and a cloudless sky, students flew down hills in makeshift sleds, built twig-armed snowmen, and created snow angels on the athletic fields.

But, in this case, there was too much of a good thing.

Trinity’s beloved snow day turned into a bemoaned snow week as students on campus were not immune to Texas’ failing power grids. Turn to page 28 to read how Tigers stepped up during the resulting power and water outages over the following week.

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Coates Esplanade, with the iconic “Large Interior Form” sculpture, remained a snowcovered gathering space for the Trinity community.

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TRINITY Spring 2021

left A lone snow angel rests on the baseball field. below The southern end of campus, including the football field, baseball field, and North and South Halls, is blanketed with snow.

Tiger statue, Bell Athletic Center

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Northrup Hall

Tigers stroll near Miller Fountain and Northrup Hall.

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San Antonio averages 220 days of snow-free sunshine a year. February 15 was not one of them.

Adirondack chairs are camouflaged by the snow.

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PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE TRINITY Spring 2021 Editor Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ’08 Managing Editor Molly Mohr Bruni Art Director Laura Kaples Copy Editor Ashley Festa

In front of Northrup Hall in November 2020, President Anderson announces a partnership between Trinity University and Community

Editorial Team Jeremy Gerlach Joshua Moczygemba ’05 Sydney Rhodes ’23 Garrett Robertson Madison Semro ’21 Taylor Stakes Fred Valenzuela

Labs for asymptomatic COVID-19 testing. Read more about the University’s ongoing coronavirus response on page 33.

Contributors Tess Coody-Anders ’93 Courtney Cunningham Tamara Dillow Ryan Finnelly Ted Gartner ’91 Joy McGaugh ’04 Kathy McNeill Justin Parker ’99 Carla Sierra Samantha Skory Burgin Streetman Alyssa Tayrien ’17 Cynthia Uviedo ’93

At Trinity, we recruit students, faculty, and staff who demonstrate

leadership—whether it’s leading their studies, their peers, or their communities. Once on campus, we encourage and empower them to follow their passions and become even more effective mentors.

It’s often said that the true test of leadership is how well a person functions in a crisis. If that’s the case, then the past 12 months have offered a seemingly endless supply of tests. I am happy to report, however, that the Trinity family—students, faculty, staff, and alumni alike—have aced their leadership exams. This issue of Trinity magazine is a proud case study in how Tigers have risen to the occasion by helping others through challenges big and small, on campus and around the nation.

But Trinity-style leadership isn’t necessarily about fancy titles and power suits. (These days, we all know formidable Zoom maestros who prefer hoodies and pajama pants.) Trinity standouts are not defined by their titles, but instead by the traits they possess when engaging with others.

Confidence, curiosity, discovery, integrity, wisdom, empathy, and empowerment are what Trinity leaders are made of, and those traits are honed right here on campus, every day, no matter the circumstances. So while I marvel at these stories of achievement, I’m not at all surprised by them. We are a community of problem solvers, critical thinkers, and compassionate caretakers. That’s what we’ve been doing at Trinity for more than 150 years.

I have no idea what’s in store for the rest of 2021, but I rest easy knowing that if there’s a Trinity Tiger nearby, we’re going to be just fine.

Danny J. Anderson President

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TRINITY Spring 2021

Trinity is published by the Office of Strategic Communications and Marketing and is sent to alumni, faculty, staff, graduate students, parents of undergraduates, and friends of the University.

Editorial Offices Trinity University Strategic Communications and Marketing One Trinity Place, San Antonio, TX 78212-7200 jgoodri1@trinity.edu | 210-999-8406 trinity.edu/trinity-magazine

President Danny J. Anderson Board of Trustees Ruth K. Agather April Ancira ‘02 Erin Baker ‘99 Annell R. Bay ‘77 Ted W. Beneski Stephen W. Butt ‘77 Miles C. Cortez ‘64 Janet St. Clair Dicke ‘68 Cydney C. Donnell Thomas Evans ‘84 Douglas D. Hawthorne ‘69, M’72 Marshall A. Hess ‘88 Gen. James T. Hill ‘68 Jelynne LeBlanc Jamison M’88 E. Carey Joullian IV ‘82 The Rev. Dr. Richard R. Kannwischer ‘95

Christopher M. Kinsey ‘79 Katherine Wood Klinger ‘72 John C. Korbell Oliver T.W. Lee ‘93 Steven P. Mach ‘92 Robert S. McClane ‘61 Melody Boone Meyer ‘79 Michael F. Neidorff ‘65 Thomas Schluter ‘85 Thomas R. Semmes L. Herbert Stumberg Jr. ‘81 Jessica Thorne ‘91 Scott Tinker ’82 Michelle L. Collette ’06 Alumni Adviser The Rev. Dr. James D. Freeman ’83 Synod of the Sun Rep.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

TUNNEL,

MEET LIGHT Tiger leaders shine beacons of hope on our campus 28 Sparing Snow Expense 33 Index to Success 38 Channeling Trinity’s Story

in our community 42 Hall in the Family 50 City Center 52 Buddy Buddy 56 Supply Securer

and across our nation 58 Tunnel, Meet Light 64 Longhorn Leader 66 Presidential Appointment

Raises Trinity’s Profile

68 Accreditation Education

DEPARTMENTS 12 Trinity Today

24 Lit Picks

18 Tiger Pride

70 Class Notes and In Memoriam

23 Trinity University Press

79 Commentary

MEET THE STAFF This issue’s magazine staff answers, “What types of leaders do you most admire?”

Instagram “I’m like a grandma who has all these kids,” says Alice Garcia, who has worked at Trinity’s Provisions On Demand (P.O.D.) for 10 years now. “The connection I have with students is even more important now because I am here all the time, and they always know that I’m here.”

Trinity Online Web Extras Interact with videos, slideshows, and other content through the magazine’s web extras. Type the URL as printed directly into your web browser.

Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ’08 editor

Leaders I most admire lead with humor and drive— the Leslie Knopes of the world.

Molly Mohr Bruni managing editor

Laura Kaples art director

My mom was a fulltime working mother and present at every single choir concert and volleyball game.

Social Media Follow Trinity on social media and stay updated with stories from students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends.

Show your Trinity spirit with #TigerPride! facebook.com/TrinityUniversity youtube.com/TrinityUniversitySA twitter.com/Trinity_U instagram.com/TrinityU gotu.us/linkedin

Jeremy Gerlach words

Joshua Moczygemba ’05 photos + videos

Garrett Robertson photos + videos

Madison Semro ’21 words

Taylor Stakes photos + videos

Fred Valenzuela graphic design

Jane Austen: For a woman in the 1800s to hold that kind of lasting influence is pretty incredible.

Gregg Popovich inspires people around him to become better humans, to always learn more.

Leaders I admire generate enthusiasm and develop people.

Abraham Lincoln faced a house divided, then was called on to create a better, compassionate future.

Instagram Not even a global pandemic can get in the way of the world's favorite confection. The Trinity community devoured socially distanced tables of chocolate goodies in the University’s tastiest tradition: the Chocolate Festival.

EDITOR’S NOTE

There’s a light at the end of the tunnel.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR I wanted to tell you what a good job I thought you did on the fall issue of the Trinity magazine. I found the article, “Breaking Bread,” of particular interest. Years ago I worked as a waiter in the dining room for fundraising dinners. As I recall, the woman who was director of Dining Services was Blanche King, a nice person.

- Tom Wilbanks ’57

SURVEY SAYS In our Fall 2020 issue, we asked readers to share their thoughts about Trinity magazine.

feel the magazine strengthens your connection to Trinity

class notes what you most like to read COVID -19

most memorable magazine topic of the last year

Have more to say? Take the survey:

Tigers, this time last year, I was penning an editor’s note two weeks after losing my father-in-law to the coronavirus. Turns out it would be two weeks before losing my grandmother, too. In this short-term-thatseemed-long-term, my tunnel was dark; it had no end, much less a light.

Then June passed, then July, and before I knew it, brightness was in my arms squealing with glee. While he joined this crazy world five weeks before we expected him to, our second son braved the brutal August heat to become our calming, cooling light.

I spent the majority of my maternity leave obsessing about our new new normal. Home, alone, together—an infant, a 3-year-old, a writer, and a math professor. No visitors to bring food or hold the baby so his mom could take a much-needed shower. No family to distract a stircrazy toddler so his baby brother could catch a much-needed snooze.

No change in sight.

Soon enough, my obsession shifted to getting the hell out of this new new normal, and fast. Between feedings and diaper changes, sleep eluded me; instead, I devoured research and dashboards and conversations among the city, the nation, and the world’s leaders. (I even contemplated a move to New Zealand if Jacinda Ardern would have me.) They became my beacons of hope.

I listened to women world leaders—Ardern and Angela Merkel and Erna Solberg—as they urged immediate, comprehensive, compassionate action in their countries. I listened to Anthony Fauci let science speak for him. I listened to San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg ’99 give nightly updates that prioritized our local community when the State of Texas wouldn’t. “Find what you’re passionate about,” Nirenberg says on page 42 of this issue of Trinity magazine, “and place yourself in a community that you love and appreciate. Your path will lead you to service. You won’t have to seek to be a leader: Leadership will come to you.”

I have a community—several of them, in fact—that I love and appreciate more than I have words for. One is a community of four (plus a cat) on Magnolia Avenue. One, within biking distance, is our church home and the school where my sons go to learn and play. And then there’s Trinity, quite literally a beacon on a hill, even remotely. These communities produce leaders: creative, confident lifelong learners who know how to lead and how to follow.

These leaders are lights. They put Band-Aids on boo-boos and on broken pipes; they ask ‘Why?’ (sometimes incessantly) and craft answers with empathy and equity; they model humility and ambition.

They are in the thick of it with us—they are us. Together.

There’s a light at the end of the tunnel.

Find your light—or, if and when you can, be a light for others.

Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ’08

gotu.us/magazinesurvey

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The Big Picture While Bid Day 2021 looked and felt different from recent years, the excitement still resonated across campus. Over the span of five hours, individual Greek organizations met their new active classes at the top of Cardiac Hill to celebrate. Sticking to tradition, the Chi Beta Epsilon new active class poses for a group photo in Miller Fountain. photo by Ryan Sedillo

TRINITY TODAY

left Outside the Witt Center, Trinity students learn about the voter registration process.

Student Voting Gets Turbocharged Trinity ranked in top 15 in nation for undergraduate student voter registration

Trinity Partners with SAISD Trinity Community Investment makes a Trinity education more accessible for local students

Partnership Increases Asymptomatic COVID-19 Testing Trinity partners with Community Labs for widespread campus testing

Trinity and San Antonio Independent School District (SAISD) announced the creation of the Trinity Community Investment partnership this past September. The partnership aims to make an education at Trinity accessible to top graduating seniors within SAISD by providing students the financial resources and academic support to navigate the higher education process. Trinity will meet the full demonstrated financial need of SAISD seniors who qualify for admission, allowing them to graduate with very minimal student loan debt.

Beginning in November 2020, Trinity partnered with Community Labs, a nonprofit based in San Antonio, to deliver weekly COVID-19 surveillance testing and mass testing for its students, faculty, and staff. The partnership aids in identifying asymptomatic COVID-19 cases by providing 24-hour test results, scale, accuracy, and a less invasive test by swabbing the front of the nostril. With this testing strategy, Trinity can better monitor the presence of the virus on campus, making a pathway for the University to continue to safely reopen.

Trinity Welcomes New Trustee UT Austin professor Scott Tinker ’82 joins Board of Trustees Trinity announced the appointment of Scott Tinker ’82, Ph.D., to its Board of Trustees.

Tinker is the director of the Bureau of Economic Geology at the University of Texas at Austin (UT), the State Geologist of Texas, and a professor who holds the Edwin Allday Endowed Chair in the Jackson School of Geosciences at UT. He is involved in academic administration, corporate board work, professional society leadership, government policy, program and infrastructure growth, and global outreach.

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Trinity Named Top 50 Liberal Arts College Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education names University No. 42 liberal arts college in nation The Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education (WSJ/THE) named Trinity the No. 42 liberal arts institution and the No. 113 college in the nation for 2021. Trinity is also the first and only liberal arts college in Texas ranked in the top 50 liberal arts colleges in the U.S. by WSJ/THE.

Trinity was the No. 6-ranked college in the nation for undergraduate students who had registered to vote in the presidential election through TurboVote. More than 30% of Trinity undergraduate students (and faculty and staff, but primarily students) had registered to vote on the TurboVote website leading up to the presidential election. Trinity’s 2020 Census and Voter Engagement Task Force drove registrations on TurboVote and encouraged Tigers to vote.

Trinity Joins Liberal Arts College Racial Equity Leadership Alliance Effort is part of University commitment to diversity and inclusion Trinity is one of 53 inaugural member institutions of the University of Southern California Race and Equity Center’s Liberal Arts College Racial Equity Leadership Alliance. “Trinity’s participation in this Alliance is an important component of our diversity and inclusion commitment, which is focused on implementing practices that foster an inclusive and anti-racist campus where all students, faculty, and staff feel welcomed and valued,” says Trinity President Danny J. Anderson, Ph.D. “We look forward to working together with our peers to engage in critical dialogue, self-evaluation, and open listening and learning in order to make Trinity more open and inclusive to all.”

Spring 2021 Lecture Series University brings diverse speakers to campus virtually Despite the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the University brought several speakers to the Trinity community through its virtual named lecture series: Martin Luther King Jr. Commemorative Lecture

Ashley Blaine Featherson actor Policy Maker Lecture Series

Anja Manuel, J.D. former diplomat, author, and international business consultant Stieren Arts Enrichment Series

Annette Lawrence, MFA mixed-media artist Robert Stecker, Ph.D. professor at Central Michigan University Kristin Newbom and W. David Hancock, MFA, playwrights Cristina Henríquez, MFA author Roger Zare, DMA composer MAS Álvarez Seminar Series

Luis Urrieta Jr., Ph.D. professor at UT Austin José Medina, Ed.D. founder of Medina Educational Solutions Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D. professor at UT Austin This list of lectures is accurate as of press time and is subject to change.

Visit events.trinity.edu for up-to-date events information.

ReWear clothing closet in Coates Student Center

The Bare Necessities Cross-campus partnerships provide students with resources for essential needs

by Sydney Rhodes ’23 In the face of emergencies , some students may struggle to get even the most

basic of human needs.

“For someone to be the best they can be in the classroom, we have to think about the hierarchy of needs outside the classroom,” says Trinity chaplain Alex Serna-Wallender ’08, M’09. “The last year has exposed or increased the needs students are facing as they try to navigate school on top of a global pandemic. If the basic necessities of life aren’t cared for, we can’t expect students to persist in the classroom and be successful in the larger mission of why they are here at Trinity.”

Raymond Judd Student Emergency Fund

The Raymond Judd Student Emergency Fund, established in 2004 in honor of former University chaplain Raymond Judd ’56, has been used to help bridge the gap for students facing unexpected financial emergencies. The Judd Fund helps students afford food and other necessities, such as unexpected medical care or emergency plane tickets home. Since March 2020, the Judd Fund has distributed more than $160,000 to more than 380 students.

Nourish

The Judd Student Emergency Fund provided seed money for a new virtual food pantry, Nourish. The pantry operates through the Dean of Students Office and the Chapel. Students who request funding receive either H-E-B gift cards or direct deposit into their bank accounts. At the most recent count, Nourish has received 35 student requests and distributed $2,450.

A cross-campus team also created the Care and Share meal swipe pilot program, where students can donate one of their meal swipes to their peers in need.

ReWear

A major project headed by both the Dean of Students Office and student organization EcoHabits aims to address another basic necessity—clothing. The ReWear closet, housed in Coates Student Center, provides sustainable clothing options for students, giving life to garments that may have been disposed of otherwise and providing clothing options for students in need. Faculty, staff, and students can donate clothing to ReWear.

Read more about the Raymond Judd Student Emergency Fund on page 35.

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More Than Just a Moment Trinity choirs, alumni create musical compilation based on children’s book

by Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ‘08 His head swirling with the national conversation

about social justice this past summer, Gary Seighman, DMA, Trinity’s director for choral activities and associate professor of music, could not imagine himself returning to the classroom in the fall to teach Mozart and Haydn. Instead, he spearheaded a musical art project based on My Hair is a Garden, a children’s book written and illustrated by Cozbi A. Cabrera. The book follows the journey of a young Black protagonist—a girl named Mackenzie who is questioning the beauty of her natural Black hair.

Seighman reached out to the author herself, who not only offered narration in her own voice— she sent Seighman a clip of her and her daughter singing parts of the text, and she helped supply high-resolution illustrations. More than a dozen guest artists and 85 singers in the combined Trinity choirs contributed more than 20 musical, artistic, and visual components to the program.

From spoken word poetry to personal storytelling, from impromptu jazz to classical piano, the breadth of genre and depth of technique spans media and generations.

“Doing what we did is a start, but that’s not where it should end,” says Taylor Black ’23, a narrator for the project. “It means a lot in the moment, but I want it to be more than just a moment.”

Experience “My Hair is a Garden” at bit.ly/38uY3px.

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Zachary Taylor and Tara Lujan

Go with the Flow Stumberg Competition crowns 2020 champion

by Jeremy Gerlach Whether you’re a casual hiker or an elite athlete, you

can’t wait until thirst sets in to start hydrating.

But how do you accurately keep track of your water intake? You could purchase an expensive smart water bottle that tracks it for you. Or, coming soon, you could simply upgrade your existing bottle with a smart lid from Sapphire.

Sapphire, created by Tara Lujan ’22 and Zachary Taylor ’20, is a water bottle lid with patent-pending technology that tracks water consumption automatically and displays the amount of water you consume on a small screen on top of the lid. The lid also connects wirelessly to devices such as phones and smartwatches and will be compatible with major water bottle brands.

The product took home the $25,000 grand prize from Trinity’s annual Louis H. Stumberg New Venture Competition this fall.

“There are lots of niche, popular products in this space. But Sapphire isn’t competing with smart bottles,” Taylor says. “We’re the only retrofit solution in the market. So if you’ve already got a $50 bottle you love so much that when you dropped it down the Grand Canyon, you hiked for four hours to go get it back—we let you keep that bottle; we just make it better.”

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Graduation, Commence!

From the rocks of Tehuacana to the stage of Laurie Auditorium, Tigers have donned cap and gown to take their first steps as Trinity graduates in myriad places. The Spring 2021 commencement ceremonies will again provide a different backdrop, as outdoor, socially distanced events are scheduled to take place at the newly renovated multi-purpose stadium on May 22.

For up-to-date commencement information, visit trinity.edu/commencement.

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1. Students from the Class of 1899 pose on rocks on the Tehuacana campus. 2. During the 1950s and ’60s, Trinity held its commencement exercises outdoors in Brackenridge Park at the Sunken Gardens. 3. Traditionally, Graduate Student Commencement is held in Parker Chapel. 4. The Trinity Multi-Purpose Stadium will host the Spring 2021 commencement ceremonies.

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TRINITY TODAY Megan Mustain, Ph.D.

Vice President for Academic Affairs Mustain will helm Academic Affairs as chief academic officer beginning June 14. Mustain will oversee all academic programs, develop and mentor faculty and professional staff, and contribute significantly to the University’s vision and strategic goals.

The people at this University are what make a Trinity education so special. While we are sad to see much-loved faculty and staff start different journeys, we are also excited to welcome new, smiling faces on Trinity journeys of their own.

GOODBYE

Dimitriums (Demi) Brown, Ed.D.

Associate Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students Beginning May 31, Brown will serve students as they manage academic and personal concerns, and he will work with the University, faculty, and parents on issues related to students at Trinity.

HELLO

Learn more about each of these new Tigers at www.trinity.edu/news

Deneese L. Jones, Ph.D.

Courtney Balderas

Vice President for Academic Affairs 5 years at Trinity

Director for Student Diversity and Inclusion Balderas steps into a new role reconfigured for a clearer, more deliberate emphasis on the student experience at Trinity.

Michael Soto, Ph.D.

Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs: Student Academic Issues and Retention 22 years at Trinity Gary W. Neal, Ph.D.

Senior Director of Counseling 38 years at Trinity David Tuttle

Associate Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students 33 years at Trinity

Spencer Scruggs

Director for Student Accessibility Services Scruggs emphasizes solutions to accessibility and learning challenges unique to the pandemic, ensuring all students can succeed regardless of where they live and learn.

Read more from Dean Tuttle on page 79.

Myron Hodge

Learning Specialist Hodge enters a brand new role that is dedicated to creating individualized plans that support students overcoming learning barriers.

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FACULTY AND STAFF FOCUS Read these stories and more in Trinity’s News Center at www.trinity.edu/news/faculty.

Biology professor James Shinkle, Ph.D, and biology major Grace Hanshaw ’22 studied the effects of ultraviolet radiation on plant physiology in a natural

Our students are eager not only to learn, but to learn more.”

light environment. This past summer, because of the coronavirus, that environment happened to be Hanshaw’s Houston backyard. Research continued on the CSI Green Roof in the fall.

- Dante Suarez, Ph.D.

Grants and fellowships abound: Physics professor Jennifer Steele, Ph.D., and chemistry professor Christina Cooley, Ph.D., both received grants from the National Science Foundation to support research in nanotechnology and fluorogenic polymerization, respectively. Classical studies professor Lawrence Kim, Ph.D., received a fellowship from American Council of Learned Societies to study ancient Greek culture. And mathematics professor E. Cabral Balreira, Ph.D., received a collaborative grant from the Associated Colleges of the South to develop teaching materials to better understand the societal impact of COVID-19.

For the Fall 2020 semester, finance and international business

When human communication and

professor Dante Suarez, Ph.D.,

theatre professor Scott Neale, MFA,

took the perceived downsides of

taught “Introduction to Set Design” as a

the pandemic—the asynchronous

TigerFlex course in Fall 2020, he sent his

online classes, the lack of personal

distance-learning students a “scene

face time with students, the limited

design kit”—a cardboard box with

scope of hands-on internships—

everything students needed to work on

and dug into the positives, opting

their course projects, ranging from scale

to develop a collaborative online

rulers and drafting triangles to pieces of

learning experience: bridging two

black foam core, matte board, drafting

classrooms in Texas and Mexico.

paper, and Exacto knives.

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TIGER PRIDE

18 in the Spring All nine men’s and nine women’s teams compete during spring semester

by Justin Parker ’99

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Men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams took home SCAC Championships in February.

Following the cancellation of Tiger Athletics in the spring of 2020 due to COVID-19 concerns, as well as the subsequent cancellations of sports by the NCAA and professional teams, Trinity athletes looked to the 2020-21 school year as a chance to return to the sports they love. Even though the fall brought another semester of cancelled sports, including the NCAA Championships events, many on campus continued to work toward bringing sports back to Trinity.

That hard work finally paid off in 2021, as all 18 of Trinity’s intercollegiate sports competed together in one semester.

Trinity, in conjunction with the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference and with guidance and recommendations from the NCAA, built a schedule that allowed Tiger Athletics to come back in a safe and responsible way. At a minimum, each team would have the chance to win a conference title during the spring.

While Trinity parents, alumni, and fans were not allowed to come on campus to attend games due to health and safety concerns, the Tiger Network broadcast most of the sports for everyone to keep up with their favorite teams.

Almost every one of Trinity’s teams competed in regular season competition in the month of February—a first in the history of Tiger Athletics.

Both men’s and women’s basketball got things started with conference play beginning in early January, while other teams got going later in the month. With the exception of men’s and women’s track and field, every one of Trinity’s teams competed in regular season competition in the month of February—a first in the history of Tiger Athletics.

February brought both good and bad news for Tiger teams. The NCAA announced the cancellation of the

left Tiger sports practiced, played, and celebrated in masks this year.

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Staffing Changes Athletics staff take on new roles and promotions

by Justin Parker ’99 Harrison LaLone was promoted to

Women’s cross country captured its fifth overall SCAC Championship.

winter sports championships—a decision that affected basketball and swimming and diving at Trinity. But in a glimmer of good news, the NCAA also announced that student-athletes would not be charged a season of eligibility, meaning that those who want to return can compete as a Tiger again next year.

The second part of the good news came in the form of SCAC Championships. Because the men’s and women’s cross country teams also compete in track and field in the spring, both Tiger teams had to get their conference meet done early in the semester.

Trinity’s women’s cross country team captured its fifth overall SCAC Championship on Feb. 6 in Irving, Texas. Jordan Juran was the women’s individual winner with the ninth-fastest time in conference history earning SCAC Runner of the Year honors. Abby Blackwood took the SCAC Newcomer of the Year award with her second-place finish in her first conference cross country meet.

Just a week later, Trinity had two more SCAC Championships to celebrate. The Tiger men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams were already set to compete in the conference meet in mid-February, but the cancellation of the postseason meant that the SCAC Championship event would be their only action of the semester. Both teams took full advantage by winning two more conference crowns.

The men’s team won its 13th overall SCAC title, while the women won the SCAC meet for the 18th straight year. Mabel Fowler was the SCAC Women’s Swimmer of the Meet for the second straight year, while Katarina Partalas took the SCAC Women’s Diver of the Meet honors. Michael Kohl was the SCAC Men’s Swimmer of the Meet and Anthony Liva repeated as the SCAC Men’s Diver of the Meet.

At the end of both the swimming and diving and cross country championships, the SCAC also handed out the Elite 19 awards, which go to the student-athletes in each conference sport who are considered the best of the best in both athletic and academic achievement. Keaton Holt won the award in men’s cross country for the second straight year, while Anabelle Conde was the honoree for women’s swimming and diving.

While the fate of the NCAA Championships for the spring sports still hangs in the balance as of press time for this edition of Tiger Pride, all of the Tiger teams are doing what they love once again: playing the game.

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assistant director of Athletics for sports communications. In his short time at Trinity so far, LaLone has elevated the social media presence for Athletics and been a valuable member of the department’s continuing marketing and promotional LaLone efforts.

Former collegiate and professional soccer player Michael Lahoud joined the Athletics staff in January as an assistant men’s soccer coach. Lahoud is a former top-10 Major League Soccer draft pick who retired from his playing career last summer.

Trinity also bolstered its Lahoud compliance staff for the 2020-21 school year. Associate Director of Athletics, Senior Women’s Administrator, and Head Volleyball Coach Julie Jenkins returned to a role she previously held as compliance director. Joining Jenkins are fellow head coaches Dylan Harrison ’02 (women’s soccer), Abby Martin (softball), and Russell McMindes ’02 (men’s tennis), as well as Athletics Office Manager Stacey Lenderman. The group is responsible for helping the Athletics staff interpret and understand the NCAA rules and regulations as well as monitor each team’s adherence to those rules.

Multi-Purpose Stadium Undergoes Renovations Stadium receives new video scoreboard, turf field, and home bleachers

by Justin Parker ’99

The Trinity Multi-Purpose Stadium, home to Tiger Football and Track and Field, closed out a third round of renovations this year.

First Round of Renovations New Video Scoreboard Renovations began in 2018 with the addition of a 28-by48-foot video scoreboard, made possible by donations from two Trinity alumni. The video scoreboard includes new graphics and instant replay on the big screen, as well as a new sound system.

Second Round of Renovations Turf Field Installation Trinity transitioned from a natural grass surface to FieldTurf in 2019, finishing in time for the Tiger football home opener that fall. The move improved safety and maximized performance for the football team and also transitioned the space into a true multi-purpose stadium.

Third Round of Renovations New Home Side of Stadium The next phase of the renovations arose largely from a safety issue, as the home-side bleachers at the stadium were in desperate need of attention. The new stands feature seat backs for every seat, deeper rows, and increased capacity.

Trinity also upgraded its coaching boxes, broadcast booths, and operations areas. The coaching boxes are now a climate-controlled weatherproof area for both teams’ coaches. The broadcast boxes provide increased space for Tiger Network and staff, as well as a separate space for visiting teams to bring media. The operations box improves working conditions for the game day management staff, including Athletics employees and officials. The second level of the improved press box area includes roof deck patio areas that also serve as prime spots for Tiger Network cameras. In the middle of the two decks is an entertainment suite that can be used for special guests. The third phase of the renovations was made possible by a combination of University funds and donor gifts.

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TIGER PRIDE

Leadership During a Pandemic SAAC president offers his take on doing the right thing

by Molly Mohr Bruni Trinity’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) is made up of

trinity.edu/live Tiger Network is Trinity’s livestreaming network, covering athletics and special events for a worldwide audience.

Tiger Network showcases #TigerPride in full HD with realtime replays, color commentary by professionals and student-athletes, and on-demand options.

student- athletes from every Tiger sport, assembled to provide insight on NCAA rules, regulations, and policies. These student-athletes are leaders both on and off the field, nominated by their coaches to represent their team. Together, the SAAC gives a voice to all student-athletes on campus.

SAAC President Ian Blount ’21 offers his take on how student-athlete leadership has shifted this past year: “In my opinion, leadership in athletics is not simply about hard work in relation to the sport one plays. Leadership is just as equally about the relationship we have with the greater community of Trinity and San Antonio. It encompasses setting an example for the broader community by practicing proper social distancing standards in practice and in life. It encompasses a continued dedication to academic excellence despite the added difficulties we face in everyday life. It includes the philanthropy student-athletes do and their efforts to make a positive impact on those around them. Ultimately, leadership Blount comes down to individuals doing the right thing, whether in their sport or their community, regardless of if anyone is watching or how difficult doing the right thing may be. Through pandemics, winter storms, and everything else life has thrown at us, our athletes have shown diligence and leadership.

“As seasons were canceled in the wake of COVID-19 last spring, student-athletes were tasked with maintaining their ability and fitness on their own. They showed accountability to their teams by continuing to improve, despite the difficult circumstances many faced. Already this year, they have seen their hard work pay dividends, with multiple SCAC titles already this semester and nationally ranked teams. I’m proud to be able to call myself a Trinity student-athlete.”

The Student-Athlete Advisory Committee partnered with Trinity Buddies this spring to raise money for local families in need. Read more on page 52.

Watch events ON DEMAND On-demand videos include: • Tiger Enrichment Series webinars • Concerts and performances • Archived speakers and lectures • Commencement exercises • And more!

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“Ultimately, leadership comes down to individuals doing the right thing, whether in their sport or their community.”

TRINITY UNIVERSITY PRESS

La Finca: Love, Loss, and Laundry on a Tiny Puerto Rican Island Corky Parker At age 40, Parker surrendered to her Swept Away meets Swiss Family Robinson fantasy of running an inn far from her home in the Pacific Northwest.

For the next 20+ years, Parker ran La Finca Caribe, an ecolodge in Vieques, Puerto Rico, that grew into a paradise enjoyed by guests from around the world.

Sketchbook in hand, Parker chronicled her daily adventures living with the land. La Finca is a lively graphic memoir about a woman creating a new life amid countless challenges.

Rambling Prose: Essays Steven G. Kellman Rambling Prose is a collection of playful and insightful essays culled from Kellman’s lifetime of work on comparative literature, criticism, and film studies.

The collection demonstrates his range as an essayist and invites us to explore the human experience through refined literary analysis. Kellman explores such topics as animal rights, silence, mortality, eroticism, film, and language with his unique critical perspective and offers complex investigations of eternal human quandaries that raise more questions than they answer.

Trinity University Press’ events have moved online, making it easier than ever to access its programming from anywhere in the world. To be the first to know about these events as well as new books and exclusive discounts, sign up for the TU Press email newsletter at tupress.org/contact-us.

The Artist’s Field Guide to Yellowstone: A Natural History by Greater Yellowstone’s Artists and Writers edited by Katie Shepherd Christiansen The Artist’s Field Guide to Yellowstone introduces readers to the wildlife of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem through the works of 50 of the region’s distinguished writers and artists. This anthology of artwork and storytelling offers an enlivened take on the traditional field guide and argues for the intrinsic value of this world-renowned ecosystem.

Christiansen, a Yellowstone naturalist and artist, has compiled this guide to highlight the area’s unique biodiversity.

All the Powerful Invisible Things: A Sportswoman’s Notebook Gretchen Legler All the Powerful Invisible Things is an eloquent memoir of self-discovery and a chronicle of outdoor life. Legler writes about the complexities of being a woman who fishes and hunts, as well as about the more intimate terrain of family and sexuality.

Like many women, Legler finds that her presence identifies the unmarked boundaries of where she is and is not welcome, learning when it is advantageous to pass as male and when it is better to disappear into the woods and trees around her.

Trinity University Press is committed to civic engagement with ideas.

Published books, public programs, and related media focus on helping us all understand our place in a crowded world with a particular focus on the following areas: bilingual early childhood literacy; the human relationship to the physical environment, ranging from wilderness to constructed, urban life; social equity and justice; the interdependence of animal and human life; and southwestern U.S. and Mexican regional studies. For more information, visit tupress.org.

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LIT PICKS

LEADER

Remarkable Gifts and Promise Coleen Grissom’s reading list and thoughts on leadership

One of Trinity’s challenges of which I’ve been aware since I first came to work here in 1958 is that (as we

used to whine in administrative staff meetings in the Calgaard era) the University just didn’t attract enough “average” students. Admissions staff through the years considered applicants with strong academic records as well as indications of involvement in co-curricular activities. Before I realized what was happening, it came to me in an east Texas cliché from my youth: “Too many chiefs, not enough Indians.”

(Which I’d now consider politically incorrect!)

So, here we were in the late sixties realizing that this University had a responsibility as well as a new aspect of Trinity to brag about. Compatible with these responsibilities were (and are) the commitment to small classes, well-designed advising, and, in classes where it is appropriate, emphasis on students’ developing speaking and writing skills.

Trinity’s academic departments also helped students begin early associations with scholarly journals, as well as assume (with the assistance of an adviser experienced in the field) the vast majority of the job of

Guiding students to not overload themselves with responsibilities with teams and clubs was a challenge. When their social or athletic commitments hampered their academic performance, the parent or adviser intervened helpfully.

Everyone here, however, was so proud of the promising students choosing to attend Trinity, that even the malcontents such as myself realized that this was a good thing of which we should take advantage to enrich the undergraduate experience on this campus.

Many entering students already had leadership skills, and staff, faculty, and student leaders worked together to enrich their experiences, both in and out of the classroom. Not only did an almost unbelievable variety of clubs with diverse interests evolve, always—as I recall it—at the instigation of students, but also, staff and faculty added roles as advisers and sponsors to their already heavy workload.

Guiding students to not overload themselves with responsibilities with teams and clubs was a challenge. When their social or athletic commitments hampered their academic performance, the parent or adviser intervened helpfully.

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producing an article, an exhibition of student creative work, and introductions to the many “celebrity” scholars and writers who come here, thanks to our several generously endowed speakers’ programs.

I would never proclaim that Trinity solely developed the skills of leaders; through the decades this exciting institution, with its superb faculty, staff, and facilities, has accepted first-year students who bring with them remarkable gifts and promise. Instead, it helped them hone their skills so they have the ability to lead and to motivate others.

Speaking of such ability, I leave you with a list of leaders I most admire from my readings. If you dare admit to not recollecting the source of any, please let me know.

Coleen’s Birthday Campaign Donors step up to support the Coleen Grissom Endowed Scholarship Fund

List of Literary Leaders I Most Admire 1. Atticus Finch

Established by alumni to honor Coleen Grissom, Ph.D., the Coleen Grissom Endowed Scholarship Fund has helped students access and thrive at Trinity University.

A month-long campaign to celebrate Dr. Grissom’s 87th birthday in January yielded historic levels of giving for this scholarship fund.

Thanks to the generosity of hundreds of donors and dollar-for-dollar matching challenges of $25,000 from Coleen Grissom and $10,000 from Kay ’62 and Kelsay ’61 Meek and Mary Ritter ’59, the Coleen Grissom Endowed Scholarship Fund surpassed $500,000. This milestone means more scholarship support for students.

2. Nancy Drew 3. Miss Marple 4. Perry Mason 5. Hercule Poirot 6. Simon Peter 7. Celie 8. Elizabeth Bennet 9. Jane Eyre

392

10. Lord Peter Wimsey 11. Lisbeth Salander

totaling

12. Jo March

70,682

$

13. Katniss Everdeen 14. James Bond 15. Sydney Carton 16. Gabriel Oak

gifts made

540,000+

$

in the Coleen Grissom

Endowed Scholarship Fund

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Tigers Are Leaders...

On Our Campus 28 Sparing Snow Expense 33 Index to Success 38 Channeling Trinity’s Story

In Our Community 42 Hall in the Family 50 City Center 52 Buddy Buddy 56 Supply Securer

Across Our Nation 58 Tunnel, Meet Light 64 Longhorn Leader 66 Presidential Appointment Raises Trinity’s Profile 68 Accreditation Education

Welcome to Hammock Grove, a gathering space on the lawn near Parker Chapel—one of many new outdoor “paw”tios where students can safely relax together. Photo by Taylor Stakes

SNOW Departments across University work together creatively to keep students warm and fed during winter storm

by Madison Semro ’21 When snow fell overnight in San Antonio, Trinity students, staff, and faculty all awoke to a powdery winter wonderland. Students spent the morning sledding through the walking trails on campus, oblivious to what the next few days had in store.

What was supposed to be a small amount of snow quickly became an intense winter storm that none of South Texas was truly prepared to handle. Many homes were without heat or water—or both—and the University’s campus effectively shut down.

Yet, many of Trinity’s departments, such as Facilities Services and Dining Services, refused to leave Tigers on campus in the cold. Using the same creative problem solving Trinity students use in the classroom, University staff found innovative ways to conquer the many challenges posed by the storm, all to keep students warm, comfortable, and fed.

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Who You Gonna Call?

“The care of our students is a strong concern. We don’t have the ability to shut off the lights and tell everybody to go home,” says Ivan Pendergast, Trinity’s emergency manager. “We have students on campus we need to make sure are fed and still have the basic essentials.”

So, while students sledded down hills on cookie sheets and basked in the powdery snow, Pendergast and Trinity’s Crisis Management Team (CMT) were planning steps to keep the campus operational. When unexpected crises arise that affect Trinity’s campus, the CMT works together to solve whatever issue—whether it be a pandemic or an apocalyptic winter storm— is threatening the University.

Pendergast acts as the central organizer for the representatives from various departments who make up the CMT, bringing them together and facilitating all sides of a problem “so the heroes can accomplish what they need to accomplish,” he humbly says. And in this situation, Pendergast explains, the storm was worse than early reports from the National Weather Service indicated. Pipes were freezing, Texas’ power grids were failing, water pressure was dropping, and roads were icing over, setting up a disaster situation.

So the CMT met every day during the winter storm to creatively brainstorm ideas and find ways to implement solutions to the problems facing campus. “Our goal was to not have the students feel any hiccup and not lose any resources,” Pendergast says.

“We were plagued with the same thing everyone else was.

Everybody else in the city was trying to ... get water. In order to get water, you had to drive to the coast and pump it out of the ocean,” Pendergast says, laughing.

“We don’t have the ability to shut off the lights and tell everybody to go home. We have students on campus we need to make sure are fed and still have the basic essentials.”

top right City Vista apartments faced flooding issues from frozen, burst pipes. right The Trinity University Police Department helped make water deliveries while responding to emergencies all week long.

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top Trinity’s outdoor pool offered a unique water source that Facilities Services used to keep the residence halls warm. above Facilities Services used a pump traditionally reserved for Miller Fountain to pump water into the boiler loop to heat lower campus for 36 hours during the storm. right Mabee Dining Hall served as a potable water station for students to get drinkable water when campus lost water pressure.

Just Keep Swimming

Or if you’re Jim Baker, you could pump the water out of a swimming pool.

“A winter storm in South Texas rarely occurs to this magnitude,” says Baker, director of Facilities Services. “The sheer bottom end of the temperature caught us by surprise. We knew it was coming, but there was nothing we could do to prepare for it.”

Facilities Services was prepared to de-ice sidewalks and help with freezing pipes, but they were not expecting all of campus to lose water pressure. “Losing the water was a gamechanger for us,” Baker recalls.

Like much of San Antonio, all of Trinity’s campus lost water pressure extremely quickly, within the span of 15 minutes. For many people, a loss of water pressure means a loss of running faucets and flushing toilets. But for Trinity, it almost meant the loss of heat in the residence halls, too.

The buildings on campus are heated by a boiler system where hot water is funneled through pipes to heat each space in a closed loop. The system requires the input of 100 gallons of water per hour to maintain. “Without the 100 gallons of water added to the system, the system basically stops flowing and there is no hot water,” Baker says.

So when campus lost water pressure, Baker and the rest of the team at Facilities Services scrambled to find a solution to heat the buildings. First, they diverted water from administrative buildings on upper campus, which were closed

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“It was a pretty amazing set of consequences and things that had to happen to get things running, and they stayed running.” due to the storm, to conserve water. However, that was not going to be enough.

Then, a lightbulb switched on—Trinity had plenty of water available for them to use. It just happened to be sitting in the outdoor pool.

Once the facilities team had this idea in mind, it was just a matter of finding a way to pump the water from the outdoor pool into the boiler loop. They considered using hoses and pumps before realizing the locker rooms at the outdoor pool provided access to the pipes they needed.

“We did a little bit of backcountry engineering, and we figured out how to pump water from the outdoor loop right there within the building,” Baker says. “With a little bit of welding and some electrical work, we got the pump to operate.

It was a pretty amazing set of consequences and things that had to happen to get things running. And they stayed running.”

Family Dinner

To keep things running in Mabee Hall, Dining Services prepared for anticipated icy conditions by placing larger food orders ahead of time with their vendors in case delivery trucks couldn’t reach them.

But a surplus of food would be useless if there weren’t people around to cook it—and the snowy weather meant roads would ice and lead to dangerous driving conditions overnight.

So, to keep students living on campus fed with hot meals, Dining Services asked for volunteers to spend the night at Trinity.

It’s a move the department has made in the past for hurricanes, and even during a similar snowstorm in 1985.

“A lot of us who volunteered have our own families... and we wanted to make sure (Trinity students) were taken care of in the same way.”

“When it came time to ask for volunteers, it was heartwarming and a little shocking to see how many people put their hands up right away to be a part of the team and help out,” says Charles Robles, Trinity’s Dining Services director.

“A lot of us who volunteered have our own families, and some have young ones who have already left the home. We wanted to make sure [Trinity students] were taken care of in the same way,” he says. “We made sure our families were safe, but we wanted to make sure students didn’t feel much of what was going on outside the campus.”

Of the couple dozen staffers who volunteered, many slept in empty residence hall rooms—a fortunate side effect of the pandemic—or in Mabee Dining Hall.

After a week of trying to control the chaos, including tracking down stranded food delivery trucks around town and unloading deliveries in the snow, Robles says, “We were all kind of down and tired at that point—and in walked these flowers and a huge card.” Students, led by InterVarsity, had gathered more than $2,700 in donations for the Dining Services employees and delivered the money to the staffers, complete with a large handmade card. “It really lifted everybody’s spirits,” Robles says. He emphasizes that his team wasn’t looking for recognition—they did it because it was the right thing to do.

“For a lot of us, it was the camaraderie of doing the right thing for everybody and taking care of people,” Robles says.

“That’s our number one goal—to always do right by the students, faculty, and staff.”

Students made a giant card to thank Dining Services employees for keeping them fed with hot meals throughout the storm.

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We’re All in This Together

From pumping pool water to housing staffers overnight, Trinity’s employees put their heads together for creative solutions—a necessity when resources were lacking, says Ivan Pendergast.

“The biggest frustration was when we knew what we needed, but couldn’t access the limited resources,” Pendergast says. “It drove us to be creative in other ways to still try to provide those resources because, at the end of the day, it still needs to be done.

We’ll try this avenue and that avenue, and if it doesn’t work, we’ll keep trying until something works.”

It was this creative thinking that led a variety of other departments to navigate this avalanche of a winter storm so successfully, too.

Residential Life exemplified what it means to put students first, communicating with students and parents daily and helping students move out of water-damaged City Vista apartments.

Trinity University Police Department officers worked long shifts responding to emergencies, delivering water to students, and helping students access flushable toilets across campus. Academic Affairs and faculty revised teaching and testing schedules and foresaw faculty and student concerns. Strategic Communications and Marketing provided constant updates to on- and off-campus Tigers to keep Trinity connected. Information Technology Services worked around the clock to restore internet service to campus while monitoring and protecting network security, campus hardware, and infrastructure.

“All throughout the ranks, there were a lot of people who made sacrifices and went above and beyond,” Pendergast says proudly.

“It makes Trinity not just a university, but a community and one heck of a large family.”

Charles Robles agrees. “When I first got to Trinity, they talked about being a part of the family. This experience was where I realized what my staff was saying,” he says. “This was one of those moments where everybody came together not for themselves, ego, or monetary rewards or bonuses. They came together to be a part of something bigger. This is what we do for family.”

Photo courtesy of Trinity Mutual Aid

Through the Storms and Beyond Trinity Mutual Aid raises more than $110,000 for San Antonio community members in need during winter storm During the winter storm , students in the Trinity Mutual

Aid organization stepped up to help South Texans, as many struggled with power, water, and heat outages. Trinity Mutual Aid, a collective founded in October 2020, is dedicated to helping the San Antonio community by connecting families in need with resources, services, and supplies. With the money and materials they collect, Trinity Mutual Aid fills food pantries in the community, provides rent relief, helps cover costly medical expenses, and more.

“The ability to provide temporary relief for those disadvantaged by our current social systems is a crucial aspect of grassroots change needed to remedy institutional inequality,” says Rachel Kaufman ’22, one of Trinity Mutual Aid’s organizers.

During the winter storm, the organization’s Venmo handle appeared in an infographic that reached millions of people after being shared by several celebrities, including Anne Hathaway and Chrissy Tiegen. In just that week alone, Trinity Mutual Aid raised more than $110,000 from people across the world. In turn, they distributed everything they collected during the storm to about 700 families who requested aid.

Kaufman is thankful for the bond she has made with her fellow organizers. “The way we all put our whole hearts into this project reminds me why I chose to go to Trinity,” she says.

“It is the immense passion to provide aid to a community we love, the incredible use of knowledge and scholarship in our meetings, and the never-ending learning of how to be better and how to better serve those in need.”

Dining Services staffers remained in high spirits throughout the duration

Learn more about Trinity Mutual Aid through its Instagram

of the storm.

account, @trinitymutualaid.

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INDEX SUCCESS to

An alphabetized guide to Trinity’s COVID-19 response

by Molly Mohr Bruni

It’s been a year—and what a year it’s been.

March 2021 marked the anniversary of Trinity’s move to remote learning in the midst of the emerging COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, Trinity has been adapting and evolving, inching closer and closer to a return to normal life.

Colleges around the country have faced COVID-19 outbreaks and public health crises as they, too, navigate the difficult decisions around returning to campus, balancing safety with budgetary concerns and other factors. The New York Times reports nearly 400,000 positive COVID-19 cases at colleges since July 2020, with more than 31,000 of them in Texas alone.

But at Trinity, where more than 10,000 COVID-19 tests have been administered to students, our positivity rate has consistently remained lower than Bexar County’s, typically by leaps and bounds.

Until the winter storm forced unprotected exposures, Trinity had hovered at a less-than-1% positivity rate over the past year.

Trinity’s success isn’t sheer luck: It’s due to an unwavering commitment to put the students first. “Even as staff and faculty faced their own personal hardships and challenges, there was a universal, shared enthusiasm for re-imagining how Trinity could deliver on its mission safely, without sacrificing our value of enduring excellence,” says Tess Coody-Anders ’93, vice president for Strategic Communications and Marketing and leader of Trinity’s Nerve Center. “The transformation of our campus, classrooms, common spaces, programs, and activities is a testament to Trinity’s ability to be nimble, creative, and collaborative in service of our students.”

So, how did we transform the Trinity experience in the face of crisis? A, B, C for yourself.

Geosciences professor

A

Brady Ziegler, Ph.D.

ACCESSIBILITY

Once Trinity moved to remote learning in Spring 2020, Trinity’s Information Technology Services department (ITS) worked overtime to ensure all students, faculty, and staff were equipped with laptops and WiFi access wherever they were logging in around the world.

But ITS needed to find a more stable, long-term solution for the fall to ensure students at home had an equal share of the Trinity experience compared with students on campus. ITS teamed up with the Collaborative for Learning and Teaching, Academic Affairs, and the President’s Task Force on Teaching and Learning to completely re-imagine Trinity’s classrooms.

ITS ended up equipping more than 60 classrooms with new technology that allowed faculty to teach in-person and remotely at the same time. Classes are stocked with videoconferencing units and tripod cameras with microphones, while professors are mic’d up with personal lavaliers for quality audio.

“This is no longer a temporary BandAid—this is a paradigm shift,” says Katie Troyer, Ph.D., assistant director of the Collaborative. “We’re trying to build our classes with remote students at the forefront to make things more equitable.”

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BROADCASTS Tiger Network, Trinity’s livestreaming video platform, brought virtual events to life for Trinity’s community.

Over the past year, Tiger Network delivered important campus updates from administration, hosted music performances from various ensembles, streamed milestone moments such as commencement ceremonies, and broadcasted the return of athletics in Spring 2021.

Watch Tiger Network at

trinity.edu/live.

DE-DENSIFICATION In other words, just having fewer people around. Trinity de-densified campus, allowing only about 960 students to live on campus in the fall, as opposed to more than 2,000 in a typical semester.

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C COLLABORATIVE FOR LEARNING AND TEACHING The Collaborative for Learning and Teaching is a braintrust for Trinity faculty, sharing best practices for effective teaching and learning.

Who better to lead faculty through the transition to remote learning? Once Trinity announced its plans to go remote in Spring 2021, the Collaborative partnered with ITS to shift Trinity’s classrooms toward new models of learning and instruction they’d need to survive—and thrive—in the COVID-19 era. After just a week of dawn-to-dusk, hair-on-fire work, the Collaborative launched a website filled with the best remote teaching practices and spent spring break training faculty how to use the new technology that would become a staple of life over the course of the year.

EIGHTEEN SPORTS SEASONS RE-IMAGINED Football in February? It’s not the Super Bowl—it’s 2021 Tiger Football.

Last year, spring sports faced devastating cancellations to their seasons while fall athletics were delayed, with no guarantee of when—or if—they’d return.

All 18 Tiger sports were back in action in Spring 2021, thanks to frequent COVID-19 testing, strict socializing rules, and workouts in “practice pods” of just a handful of student-athletes at a time, to limit their exposure to each other. Despite compromises such as shortened seasons and empty stands, student-athletes were grateful for the opportunity to play.

f 153 students evacuated from 52 countries within 48 hours

FLIGHTS More than 150 of them, to be clear.

Once the pandemic became a global disaster and borders began closing around the world, faculty and staff in Trinity’s Center for International Engagement worked tirelessly to bring home students studying abroad who otherwise might have been stranded in those countries for an undetermined amount of time.

Once everyone was back in the U.S., the Center shifted its focus to helping international students navigate the ever-changing travel policies, whether they stayed on campus or returned to their home countries.

GREEN SCREEN To Tigers living on or traveling to campus, the ProtecTU HealthCheck is as ingrained in their morning lives as brushing their teeth or eating breakfast. The simple, online questionnaire preemptively screens students, faculty, and staff for potential COVID-19 symptoms or exposure risk. Passing the questionnaire awards Tigers with a green clearance badge to use for the day, while failing raises a flag for Trinity’s Clinic Team to reach out and make a more thorough assessment.

JUDD STUDENT EMERGENCY FUND

j

The Raymond Judd Student Emergency Fund, named in honor of the Rev. Raymond Judd ’56, Chaplain Emeritus, was created to help students facing emergency financial need.

“Life doesn’t stop when you come to school,” says Trinity Chaplain Alex SernaWallender ’08, M’09. “There are these unexpected moments, these unforeseen realities that can’t be planned for.” With students now scattered around the globe, some are missing the built-in structures for technology, food, and housing that living on campus provided. “If the basic necessities of life aren’t cared for, we can’t expect students to persist in the classroom and be successful in the larger mission of why they are here at Trinity,” Serna-Wallender says.

While the fund has provided assistance to students over the past two decades, distribution ramped up during the pandemic. Students requested aid for expenses related to remote learning, medical costs, job loss, transportation, and basic necessities such as food and housing.

Donors stepped up to meet this increased need, with nearly 700 gifts made to the fund since March 2020.

$160,103 distributed since March 2020, helping

383

students

HAMMOCK GROVE Bringing competition to Trinity’s famous adirondack chairs, Student Life set up Hammock Grove and other outdoor spots for students to take a “paws.”

ISOLATION HALL Better known as Murchison Hall in normal times, this residence hall acts as a base camp for COVID-19 operations at Trinity. The COVID-19 Clinic Team of nurses and physicians use the ground floor for testing and operations. The rest of the hall is dedicated to managing the ebb and flow of students in isolation or quarantine.

Learn more at gotu.us/juddfund.

k KEEPING TIGERS INFORMED You’ve got questions, and Trinity has answers. From the get-go, Trinity prioritized frequent and thorough communication with parents, students, faculty, and staff to navigate uncharted territory for all.

Trinity launched its COVID-19 website, gotu.us/covid19, in March 2020, paired with live webinars, social media updates, video messages from administration, advice about managing new learning and working environments, new and amended policies—and a lot of emails. The website contains the most up-to-date info about Trinity’s COVID-19 response, including a daily dashboard.

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MASKS Even mandatory face coverings couldn’t mask the excitement of students returning to campus in Fall 2020.

LABS Trinity partnered with local labs, including Avero Diagnostics and Community Labs, to conduct and process baseline, on-demand, and randomized COVID-19 tests. These partnerships allowed Trinity to expand its reach to include mass testing of all faculty, staff, and students multiple times each semester, and to increase surveillance testing to 500-1,000 tests per week.

p q

Trinity formed a cross-department team, dubbed the Nerve Center, in May 2020 to act as the central group responsible for COVID-19 planning and operations. Instead of asking what they do, it might be better to ask what they don’t do! The team’s purview includes monitoring higher education best practices and public health trends, planning various scenarios for campus reopening, creating testing, tracing, and treatment procedures, and managing COVID-19 operations, education, and communication.

n

OTHER DUTIES AS ASSIGNED It’s a phrase tacked to the end of every job description, but this year it was more important than ever.

For example, Marc Powell, Trinity’s head athletic trainer, oversaw the University’s robust testing program, while Ryan Hodge in the Center for the Sciences and Innovation fabricated each plexiglass partition on campus.

PROTECTU Trinity’s Health and Wellness Working Group launched the ProtecTU public health campaign in Summer 2020. The campaign centers around a pledge that the health of the individual is dependent on the actions of everyone—essentially, we’re all in this together.

Signage and promotional materials emphasized the five campaign pillars of hand washing, staying home when showing COVID-19 symptoms, wearing a mask, practicing social distancing, and sanitizing spaces and surfaces.

As the year progressed, the ProtecTU campaign adapted to focus on sharing the latest evidence-based guidance on how to prevent the spread of the disease. The ProtecTU team also worked to create spaces where students could safely socialize and enjoy fresh air.

QUARANTINE Trinity’s dedicated care team ensured students in quarantine had all their needs met during this trying time. Trinity staff helped students communicate with their professors, relayed information to worried parents, and coordinated daily cross-campus services, including: • • • • • •

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NERVE CENTER

O

Medical check-ins and medication deliveries Hot meal deliveries Trash pickup Laundry services Library and bookstore orders Designated “fresh air breaks”

TRINITY Spring 2021

“My daughter was sick with COVID-19 and isolated in her dorm.

Anything she needed, from meals to over-thecounter meds to snacks— they were right on it.

My daughter felt very supported, and that is worth a lot to me.”

– Alex Hamilton P’24

RESIDENCE HALLS Students who returned to campus in Fall 2020 enjoyed the single life—single rooms, that is. To decrease risk of exposure, students lived by themselves in Fall 2020, with the option to add a suitemate in Spring 2021.

SOCIAL DISTANCING Tigers took 6 feet apart to heart with socially distanced living and learning spaces.

UNCONVENTIONAL CLASSROOMS From parking lots to grassy spots, Tigers took to unusual locations to distance themselves for in-person classes.

17,264 COVID-19 tests have been administered on campus to students, faculty, and staff

TEST, TRACE, AND TREAT The fundamental principle of Trinity’s reopening plan relies on approaching campus as we would a small town. This means aggressive plans for testing, contact tracing, and treatment of all Tigers who live, work, or learn on campus. Trinity conducted baseline and mass tests multiple times each semester for all students, faculty, and staff on campus as well as randomly sampled weekly surveillance testing and on-demand tests for symptomatic or exposed individuals.

And if one of those tests came back positive? You couldn’t be in better hands. Trinity’s Health Services practitioners, alongside a team of nurses and physicians, would quickly jump into action to trace and quarantine any exposed Tigers and develop a personalized treatment plan for the affected Tiger.

V VACCINATION SITE In January, Trinity was approved to be a vaccination site for University faculty, staff, and students.

Distribution began for faculty, staff, and students in April.

w

WARM WELCOMES

In 2020, Trinity’s New Student Orientation (NSO) and Welcome Week looked different.

After a move-in spread out over two days, students experienced all the usual staples from NSO, just in a virtual space. Welcome Week was full of movie nights, a student-produced Zoom play, virtual escape rooms, Drag Queen Bingo with Alyssa Edwards from RuPaul’s Drag Race, a pair of performing mentalists on YouTube live, an interactive murder-mystery event, and even a Trinity-themed trivia night.

Read more about NSO at gotu.us/nso2020.

YOUTUBE LABS Trinity faculty have shown creativity, resilience, and adaptability over the past year. Given just two weeks to overhaul their syllabi, faculty adapted their classrooms to a completely remote environment, from uploading chemistry labs to YouTube to building virtual spaces for student music performances.

Nearly 150 students engaged in experiential learning during Summer 2020, mentored by 67 faculty members across 27 academic departments.

EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING

At Trinity, experiential learning is more than words on a whiteboard: It’s a spirit of collaboration and enterprise that transcends limitations—which 2020 was full of.

Last summer, Trinity students pursued hands-on experiences in undergraduate research, entrepreneurship, and internships.

Students conducted research in their backyards, built businesses at their dining tables, and interned remotely at organizations all around the world.

61,441,065 minutes

Trinity faculty, staff, and students have used Zoom since March 2020

1,869 times per day Tigers say, “You’re muted.”

(That’s our unofficial estimation!)

ZOOM Zoom, well, zoomed to popularity, becoming a household name almost instantly.

The video conferencing platform became the setting for more than 143,000 virtual meetings created by Trinity faculty, staff, and students since March 2020.

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Channeling Trinity’s Story Student media keeps campus connected through highs and lows of a historic year

by Jeremy Gerlach

Stories, whether told through words, pictures, or a screen, have a connective power.

At Trinity, there’s no better example than the students leading the University’s student-run media: the Trinitonian newspaper, the Mirage yearbook, TigerTV, and jazz radio station KRTU. Across these radio waves, television cameras, and computer screens, Tigers are connecting audiences throughout Trinity’s community by documenting a historic chapter of the University’s story: one filled with resilience and innovation in the face of new challenges.

As Trinity’s campus seemed impossibly fragmented during a disruptive pandemic, the students who run TigerTV, KRTU, and campus publications pivoted drastically to develop new skills and abilities needed to bring the Trinity story to the community. Regardless of their individual roles, each of these students share one critical characteristic: They have emerged as leaders, creating a connective tissue for Trinity’s community through storytelling.

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A New Angle

At TigerTV, students are always looking for a fresh take on current events. Run out of Trinity’s Department of Communication, this professional-level, student-run television station operates three shows: Newswave (hard news), Studio 21 (entertainment news), and the Not So Late Show (sketch comedy).

But when most of a college campus goes remote, how does a student news crew pivot?

If you’re an executive producer like Natalia Salas ’21 or a package producer like Danny Nguyen ’24, you do it by constantly looking for a new angle. Salas, a communication major from Houston, runs Studio 21 and is responsible for editing all the show’s Salas segments together on a weekly basis.

“This year we’ve had to be really creative with the ways that we make the shows because we can’t be in person. Ordinarily we would come up into the studio every day that each show is filmed, but this year we’ve had to find Nguyen ways to create the shows remotely,” says Salas, who manages a mix of 12 veterans and newbies, “all reliable and amazing.”

For Nguyen, a marketing major from San Antonio who works for Newswave, finding fresh ideas is as simple as giving each member of the team a chance to shine, regardless of class year or background. “TigerTV has real openness for people of all backgrounds and all majors to work together to create these engaging and new products,” he says. “And that really highlights what Trinity and TigerTV are all about: that collaboration, working together to create something new.”

Salas says this collaborative approach has worked wonders during a year where she was worried students might not even want to show up to work. “I was proud to see that so many students stepped up and got super creative with the way that they made the show,” she says.

“We can come together and create these new and big opportunities that hopefully will create long-lasting, positive consequences for the community and beyond.”

Salas beams as she recounts how her team pitched original (and safe) ideas for TV segments that would help highlight the vibrant scene both on and off campus. After being shipped their camera equipment, instead of having to come into the Richardson Communication Center every day, the creative minds of TigerTV developed content such as “What’s the TriniTea?,” a hilarious student-onthe-street gossip segment where students are grilled with questions such as differentiating One Direction lyrics from Shakespeare quotes.

“It’s silly, but it gives you this sense of normalcy, having something else to talk about besides COVID-19,” Salas says.

Nguyen and other students are quickly mastering a remote model of TV production with virtual interviews, connecting campus with Trinity President Danny Anderson, San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg ’99, and other local figureheads. Across each of these conversations, Nguyen says he sees a theme emerging in Trinity’s story: “I see this kind of collective unity throughout the Trinity community where we really want to show everyone that we’re more than this little liberal arts college in San Antonio. We are made up of diverse people from different backgrounds and different ideas and cultures and political views, and we can come together and create these new and big opportunities that hopefully will create long-lasting, positive consequences for the community and beyond.”

Read more about the mayor and other Tiger city leaders on page 42.

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Call and Response

Shifting to a partially remote campus has disrupted the tempo of every Trinity student’s life. Still, Sarah Hadsell ’21, a music education major and KRTU intern, says a change of pace isn’t always a bad thing.

Now a senior, Hadsell recalls settling into a smooth life at Trinity’s jazz and indie radio station during her sophomore year, before the current state of the campus. After taking a radio hosting class with KRTU music director Kory Cook, she went on to learn about the systems and software needed to be a live radio host and then worked on a live show her next semester. Hooked, Hadsell started writing for the KRTU blog and handling social media, then began her current stint of working with music promoters to identify and chart rising performers.

“At KRTU, Kory, (general manager) JJ Lopez, and (station manager) Monica Reina put my learning above everything else.

They help me develop skills that I can use in the real world, even outside of radio,” Hadsell says. “The things I’ve learned here will help me with teaching and connecting.”

At KRTU, Hadsell notes she has been able to learn a variety of new skills. “I’m not stuck just doing one thing,” she says. “I’m learning about producing, curating shows, the music industry as a whole, and how charting works.”

And while KRTU was popular with San Antonio and Bexar County audiences pre-COVID-19, Hadsell says more people are turning to good music during stressful times.

“Art, movies, music ... listening to a good album that I just heard about—that’s what has kept me going through all this,” Hadsell says. “Art is important, especially when we don’t have access to many of the things we normally do.”

Hadsell The disruptions of the past year have meant more personal changes for Hadsell.

She’s learned how to use Adobe to do her own audio editing—a skill she hadn’t ever imagined needing before realizing she was about to be cut off from other members of her station who usually did that type of work. She’s also had to get better at making more time for her own music, since practicing voice and piano at Trinity in 2020-21 now means having to schedule time in Trinity’s practice facilities instead of just walking in on her own schedule.

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When you’re challenged, Hadsell says, don’t forget to find time to listen to yourself. “Go easy on yourself,” she says. “I came into college as a neuroscience major, and it was hard to find what I was passionate about. Let yourself make mistakes, and learn from them.”

Image of Innovation

If a college yearbook is a snapshot of “a year in the life,” Trinity’s 2021 Mirage has captured a historic moment.

Abigail Ghorbani ’21, the managing editor of the Mirage, says her staff has worked around the clock to document a year unlike any other. From social distancing, masks, and virus testing to disrupted sports schedules, Trinity’s campus has never looked so different.

Different doesn’t always mean worse, says Ghorbani, a psychology major on Trinity’s pre-med track from Pearland, Texas.

“I think the story our photos are telling is one of innovation,” Ghorbani says. “This yearbook is going to be very different from previous years, which is why we’ve titled the book ‘Not Exactly.’

Trinity students have experienced a lot of change, so we’ve in turn had to change almost everything we did to put this yearbook together.”

Along with editor-in-chief Hunter Nardiello ’21, Ghorbani first applied to lead the Mirage staff back in the spring of 2020.

After hearing back that she’d gotten the job a week before spring break, she left campus only to get stuck at home as Trinity shifted to remote operations.

Even with campus partially opening back up in the fall, Ghorbani ended up staying at her home just south of Houston.

Working remotely, Ghorbani would be tasked with helping Nardiello and the Mirage staff put together an entire yearbook.

The challenges, Ghorbani says, were immense. The yearbook depends on portraits of students and faculty and action shots of sports clubs and organizations—all difficult to get during a pandemic. Thankfully, Ghorbani says her team had a record-breaking level of interest for yearbook staffers. “We’ve never had as many people apply as we did this year,” she says, “so we were able to hire a really great staff.”

After assembling a fantastic team of on-campus photographers, Ghorbani says she and Nardiello told them, “‘Carry your camera everywhere. When you see anything interesting, take a picture.’ And they did a really good job of that.”

As Nardiello graduates, Ghorbani says she’s interested in taking the lessons she’s learned this year into a potential stint as editor-in-chief herself. “I’ve always been someone who’s loved having everything planned out, but this year has challenged me to be more flexible,” she says. “Taking tough Ghorbani classes, having a leadership role, all while living at home the entire time—every Trinity student has had to adapt to so much.”

Find Your Place

For Kayla Padilla ’21, editor-in-chief of the Trinitonian, a newspaper helps bind people together by connecting the experiences of readers.

Padilla, an English and anthropology major from Edinburg, Texas, came to Trinity unsure of her own place in the world.

But it didn’t take long for her to start finding it: She’d always wanted to study English, but she soon discovered a passion for anthropology. She also joined Trinity University Latino Association and worked with the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, helping other students feel welcome in the Trinity Padilla community, too.

But when she started writing for the Trinitonian as a sophomore, she says, “It felt like an outlet to express myself that I’d never had before. I felt that people were reading what I had to say, and what I had to say mattered.”

Tucked downstairs in the Coates Student Center West Wing, just past the campus mailboxes, the Trinitonian newsroom had hummed for years with the same energy and enthusiasm that comes with any room full of reporters, designers, and

editors. Students tapped away on keyboards, drafting their articles and designing the pages of the paper—until Spring 2020.

But at this same time, Trinity’s campus had just started coming to terms with the true impact that an international pandemic would have on in-person operations. “We were all naive when we thought this would only last two weeks,” Padilla says. “And I was angry: Of all the years for this to happen, why did it have to be during the year I was editor-in-chief?”

Returning to campus in the fall, Padilla found a much different place than she’d remembered. Her team needed to work separately to assemble the paper, which was moved entirely online. That meant no newsroom, no-face-to-face contact, and no place to work and grow as a team.

“What kept me going was seeing everyone take their writing and reporting so seriously, starting the first week we came back,” Padilla says. “That took me back to the newsroom. That made me feel like, OK—this won’t be a regular year, but I have to stop being angry and keep being a leader.”

This semester, Padilla has led the newspaper in several new directions. She’s placed a greater emphasis on brainstorming with all members of her staff—meaning anyone, not just editors, can attend traditional story idea meetings to pitch ideas for articles. Her editorial team keeps in touch with writers through regular Zoom calls, and the staff has gotten together for virtual movie nights. Her team even wears special-ordered Trinitonian masks while on campus.

For a campus that feels all over the place—split up by distancing and geography, social and political differences, academic stresses and more—Padilla says the Trinitonian remains a place for Trinity’s student community to come together.

“This paper,” Padilla says, “is where your writing can let others know they aren’t the only ones struggling. That there’s a community out there that supports and understands them.”

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HALL IN THE FAMILY Meet the mayor, councilman,and city manager with Trinity roots leading San Antonio by jeremy gerlach photos by josh huskin

If Texans treated city hall like they do football, Trinity University would lay claim to a star-studded segment of San Antonio’s starting lineup: REPRESENTING District 8 city council seat

Two-time defending mayor

City manager

the consensus builder

the risk taker

the man in the trenches

Manny Pelaez ’97

Ron Nirenberg ’99

Erik Walsh ’91, M’94

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Known for his critical thinking and collaboration, Nirenberg (center) is also developing a reputation for a decisive action.

“All three of us are so different,” Nirenberg says, “but

we have complementary leadership styles.”

San Antonio, Nirenberg explains, runs a council-manager form of government, with a mayor and 10 council members forming a deliberative body, and a city manager tasked with turning their policy decisions into professional recommendations. Having a mayor, councilman, and city manager all with the same alma mater, Nirenberg says, creates a governing team with incredible chemistry.

Pelaez, says Nirenberg, “is our star wide receiver.

He’s a lawyer, he’s talented, he can put people at ease.

When you have a big issue you want to debate, you give Manny the ball.”

Walsh, Nirenberg continues, is the offensive lineman. “Erik is team-oriented, collaborative, builds morale. He’s our team captain, the guy in the trenches doing the hard work that people don’t always see, but it’s incredibly important. And that’s an easy choice: Erik actually played that position for Trinity’s football team.”

And that makes Nirenberg—reluctant as he is to step into the spotlight—the quarterback. “You want

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your mayor to be able see the whole field, and to call the right plays, and get it done.”

Running America’s seventh-largest city is a tough enough job on its own. But there’s no playbook for what this trio has encountered over the past year, where San Antonio has stared down an international pandemic, economic and social unrest, and the onset of natural disasters such as statewide snowstorms.

How does San Antonio move forward in the face of these obstacles?

According to Nirenberg: with vision. For Pelaez: with a go-big-or-go-home attitude. And for Walsh: by getting back to basics.

A Vision for the Future

For a South Texas city that’s experienced its share of notable “shoot-from-the-hip” mayors, having a self-described “critical thinker” at the helm might seem like a change of pace.

But don’t let Nirenberg’s analytical approach fool you. Right now, he’s leading San Antonio decisively through one of the toughest stretches of its modern history.

“We’re running on adrenaline right now—and it’s been that way for 12 months,” he says.

Facing spiking virus cases, natural disasters, and vast social upheaval—and yes, there’s still a city to keep running—Nirenberg prides himself on being able to remain focused on the bigger picture: “I’m committed to a vision of San Antonio being an inclusive, culturally rich, and diverse place, but also a city that is one of the premier cities in our country.”

Ironically, the only part of this future that Nirenberg didn’t originally envision was himself.

“I never had a goal to be mayor,” he says, pointing to his original career in public policy research and a stint at Trinity’s KRTU jazz station as his original passions. “I had no interest in office until I started getting involved in SA 2020,” a community visioning project launched by then-mayor Julian Castro in 2010.

But when Nirenberg, the husband of H-E-B executive and former Hispanic Chamber of Commerce chair Erika Prosper, became a new father, the family decided to plant roots in San Antonio forever. “I realized that my passion is community building—improving our city and doing my part to leave this city a better place for my son,” he says. “I came home one day, told Erika, ‘I need to be doing this community-building full time, so I’m running for city council,’ and she said, ‘You know what, you’ve already made up your mind, so let’s go.”

In just a few short years, Nirenberg went from not knowing how to run a campaign to winning and then serving on a council spot. Then, he defeated former mayor Ivy Taylor (who assumed the office after the departure of Castro) for the mayoral seat in 2017. After being re-elected in 2019, he’s gearing up for another election in May 2021.

We’ll spare you the full re-election pitch, but in short, Nirenberg says, “I got into this field without lofty personal goals, so I can take risks—implementing bold ideas, going out on limbs where you’re going to pay a political price.”

Occasionally, those risks include reaching out to stakeholders with a different vision from his own.

It’s a move Nirenberg says he learned at Trinity: learning to work with people who have different views, backgrounds, and expectations.

“That’s really what critical thinking means. How do you examine and distill information coming from different places? That’s what Trinity taught me, and that’s the touchstone of leadership itself,” Nirenberg says. “My leadership style is, by nature,

“My leadership style is, by nature, collaborative.

I want the best ideas to win, so I try to bring as many people with divergent views to the table as possible.”

– Ron Nirenberg

collaborative. I want the best ideas to win, so I try to bring as many people with divergent views to the table as possible.”

But as collaborative as Nirenberg prefers to be, he’s also the first to admit that leaders are eventually challenged to make decisions. And in the middle of an international pandemic, for example, these decisions need to get made faster than usual.

“We have to be willing to abandon the bureaucracy to make things happen in the middle of a pandemic,” Nirenberg says. “We still need collaboration, we still have to work together, but that also means we aren’t waiting around for folks who can’t—or won’t—shift gears politically to come up with solutions. I believe there are important, fundamental values for which we cannot compromise.

“If I’m going to be bullheaded in city hall,” Nirenberg adds, “it’s in defense of values, human values, that are nonnegotiable.”

And when it’s time to envision this type of major action, Nirenberg looks to one of the biggest voices on the council dais.

Go Big or Go Home

“At Trinity, they throw you into the deep end. You pull all-nighters.

You develop a love affair with caffeine.”

– Manny Pelaez

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Manny Pelaez is made for major moments.

“I came to city council thinking that San Antonio was the seventh-largest city in the United States, but we don’t act like it,” he says. “We celebrate that we’re a ‘big small town,’ but we’re a ‘big small town’ with 1.5 million people and some huge problems.”

Even before the advent of COVID-19, San Antonio grappled with major issues such as poverty, displacement, domestic violence crises, and subpar international relationships. Pelaez notes that the city was “doing victory laps for economic development that happened a decade ago.”

“Can you believe,” Pelaez adds, “that a year ago we thought our biggest problem in San Antonio was electric scooters?”

Pelaez has been tackling these issues even before coming to council. After majoring in communication at Trinity and earning his J.D. from St. Mary’s University School of Law, Pelaez held positions as managing counsel for Toyota Motor Manufacturing, chairman of Brooks City Base Board, and as a trustee for the VIA Metropolitan Transit Authority.

But as a councilman, Pelaez wants San Antonio to keep thinking bigger.

“When I hired my chief of staff, I told them: On any given day, if you find me only making small decisions, remind me to think bigger,” Pelaez says.

“Some people can get re-elected just by showing

up—and yes, we can and will fix that pothole on Babcock and UTSA Boulevard or the broken swing set in that park, but that cannot be all we do.

We cannot allow small stuff to distract us from the big things.”

And as bigger and bigger problems mount, seemingly by the week in Texas, Pelaez says San Antonio must consider how these problems can exacerbate each other.

“As we’ve had to move into more isolation, that also affects our city’s domestic violence crisis, because now fewer people who are trapped can get help,” says Pelaez, who served for a decade as volunteer general counsel for the Bexar County Battered Women and Children’s Shelter.

you’re hired to do. At Trinity, they throw you into the deep end. You pull all-nighters. You develop a love affair with caffeine,” Pelaez says. “And that’s what helps as a city councilman when you realize that crises don’t just happen between 9-5. We’ve got shootings and street racers in the middle of the night.

Water mains break. We have hospitals with all their beds full from COVID-19. Here, you understand, in sharp value, the value of work. And that’s what I take from Trinity: There’s no half-assing your work.”

But dreaming big is not a one-person show. With nine other members on the city council, Pelaez knows that you need to build consensus to solve major problems. And that consensus really comes down to community building.

“At Trinity, ‘community’ is a verb,” Pelaez says. “When you see what a community, a real community, can build working together as a group of people, you can’t help but get hooked on that.

At the end of the day, there’s no more powerful force than that.”

For all the big dreams and ideas that come with a city council job, the past year of isolation has shown Pelaez that the little moments can add up, too.

“I’m not good at much, but I’m good at being with people,” Pelaez says. “Being in the same room with my neighbors and the communities I represent has always been important to me. Right now, I can’t high-five my neighbor whose kid just got into college or hug someone whose mother just passed away. And in San Antonio, we’re a hugging city. I’m starving to have those moments with my constituents again.”

“Right now, I can’t high-five my neighbor whose kid just got into college or hug someone whose mother just passed away. And in San Antonio, we’re a hugging city. I’m starving to have those moments with my constituents again.”

“One third of our San Antonio women have or will have a domestic violence story to tell—a much higher rate than anywhere else in Texas. We have to treat this like it’s an epidemic, too.”

When these obstacles seem overwhelming, Pelaez says he leans on the work ethic he developed at Trinity.

“At the end of the day, you can talk about solving problems all you want, but the actual work is what

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"Pandemics, disasters, these things will pass. But the city's role is key to making sure we return to normal."

Finding the Fundamentals

Those same constituents might not be hugging Erik Walsh on a daily basis, but whether they know it or not, he’s also a big part of their support network.

As city manager, Walsh proposes and oversees San Antonio’s annual $2.9 billion budget, managing more than 12,000 employees spread across 40-plus offices. From airports and police stations to parks, libraries, senior services, and more, he says San Antonio’s basic municipal services play an invaluable role in residents’ lives.

Walsh (right) receives a commemorative Trinity jersey from Nirenberg (left) and former San Antonio City Manager Sheryl Sculley (center) at his confirmation to the city manager post in January 2019.

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“Going back to high school, I was always interested in local government because it wasn’t just politics,” Walsh says. “Trash pickup has to run every week. The 9-1-1 emergency system, the traffic signals, the streets, our airport, all have to be running.

These services touch everybody, every day, not just during emergencies. We all rely on them, regardless of who is in power.”

During a year when hundreds of thousands of residents have lost power, been affected by pandemics, or suffered any number of hardships, simply returning to a pre-2020 normal seems like

a lofty goal. But it’s a challenge that Walsh says San Antonio is up for.

“We have a responsibility to be level-headed.

Even in the midst of an emergency, services have to continue,” Walsh says. “Pandemics, disasters, these things will pass. But the city’s role is key to making sure we return to normal.”

And the only way the city of San Antonio is going to do that, Walsh says, is as a team that supports each other.

“I’m a team sport guy, and I always have been.

I’m a firm believer, whether it’s in the private sector or in government, that any organization has to have that mentality. This is not an individual sport,” Walsh says. “So as a leader, it’s my job to make sure we embrace that. At city hall, I understand our strengths and weaknesses as a team, and how we cover each other’s weaknesses. I’ve got my own weaknesses, so I welcome people who can help me cover those. That’s the biggest thing I’ve learned as I’ve grown professionally, and that’s something I can point back to my time at Trinity.”

As a Trinity undergraduate, Walsh recalls seeing the value of a strong support network firsthand.

Balancing a rigorous academic schedule as a political science major with a strong football career that culminated with an All-SCAC (Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference) honorable mention season as a senior, Walsh says he owes much of his current success to supportive professors and classmates.

“The atmosphere at Trinity created by students and faculty acts as a community within itself,” Walsh says. “Going to Trinity was one of the best decisions I ever made.”

Walsh earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Trinity in 1991 and a Master of Science in urban administration from the University in 1994. (This program has since shifted to an undergraduate major in urban studies.) Shortly after obtaining his master’s, Walsh became a budget and management analyst for the City of San Antonio and has worked for his hometown ever since.

“It’s unwritten, unsaid recognition that Ron, Manny, and I had the same type of experience at Trinity,” Walsh says. “We may have been there at different times—I’m the oldest of the three of us— but the fact that we have walked the same grounds and hallways, had the same social interactions, that’s comforting. It gives you a level of familiarity, even if you’re just meeting (another alumni) for the first time.”

Routes to Leadership

Erik Walsh But as high as Walsh has climbed, and as complicated as his tasks have become, he has always been a “back-to-basics” type of guy.

“I know everyone says this, but in college some of the most valuable things you learn are the basic things, like time management,” Walsh says. “Playing football forced us all to balance our priorities.

Eventually you’re going to be balancing a demanding career with family, other obligations. Had I not stressed (time management) in college, my life today would be harder to deal with.”

This commitment to time management is even helping Walsh’s team find silver linings within the challenges of the pandemic-era workplace.

“The last place I envisioned myself as city manager is sitting by myself in an office, talking to a laptop. But we’ve turned around and done things like have employee town halls [online], and it’s pretty powerful when you have 1,800 employees on at the same time. Before (the pandemic), I could not have gotten to 1,800 people in one day.”

And as Walsh works around the clock to keep supporting San Antonio’s residents, he says it’s nice to have a support network of his own in city hall.

This type of connection extends far past San Antonio’s city hall. Across countless cities, workplaces and career fields, Tigers of all stripes are stepping into similar leadership positions.

And Walsh, Nirenberg, and Pelaez each have words of encouragement. Nirenberg encourages all Trinity grads to be patient with their vision.

“Elected office wasn’t the goal for me—it became a vehicle for building the city that I dream of,” Nirenberg says. “So, find what you’re passionate about, whether it’s an academic subject or a career field, and place yourself in a community that you love and appreciate. Your path will lead you to service. You won’t have to seek to be a leader: Leadership will come to you.”

Once you find your calling, Pelaez urges you to make the most of your chance.

“There’s nothing casual about leadership. If you choose this path, the route of leadership, you have a responsibility to not screw it up,” he says. “The decisions you make impact lives, and if the past year has shown us anything, it’s how delicate and precious these lives are.”

And Walsh reminds you to never forget the fundamentals that brought success in the first place, even as new obstacles arise.

“I never anticipated times like the ones we’re all living in now,” Walsh says. “This is a challenging position even during normal times. But with any other leadership position throughout history— things happen. What sets us all apart is how we are going to react.”

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Photo: Anh-Viet Dinh ’15

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ALUMNI PROFILE

Jelynne LeBlanc Jamison M’88 City Center

by Carlos Anchondo ’14

When the coronavirus pandemic began to upturn lives across the

country, Jelynne LeBlanc Jamison knew that time was of the essence.

As president and CEO of the Center for Health Care Services, LeBlanc Jamison M’88 oversees more than 30 locations where Bexar County residents receive a variety of services for mental health, wellness, and substance use.

Face-to-face interactions stopped seemingly overnight, LeBlanc Jamison says, and given the “vulnerable nature of our population and criticality of their disease,” the Center pivoted quickly.

Joking about her ready use of sports terminology with staff as the Center adapted, LeBlanc Jamison led the expansion of telehealth capabilities, improved cybersecurity measures, and established a work-from-home policy.

urban studies. Although she originally entertained plans to attend law school, things changed when Earl Lewis—Trinity’s first tenured Black professor—came on a recruiting trip to Southern University and A&M College in Baton Rouge. Lewis, director of Trinity’s urban studies program, struck up a conversation with LeBlanc Jamison, then a senior, and convinced her law school could wait.

At the encouragement of her mother, LeBlanc Jamison decided to stay in San Antonio for an internship required by the program.

“I accepted her advice and took an internship with the City of San Antonio, and 24 years later, I retired as deputy city manager,” she says, laughing.

Trinity’s reputation for producing leaders who can successfully run cities stems largely from Lewis’ tenure, LeBlanc Jamison says.

“As we grow the ability to talk about and embrace mental health and substance use as a disease and support those in need of treatment, we’ll be much better off.”

In an inversion of pre-pandemic times, more than 75% of patient interactions are now done via phone or through telehealth, LeBlanc Jamison says. Not only that, but the Center’s “no-show” rate has plummeted and adherence to medication has improved, she says.

“I think they feel safe connecting in their homes,” LeBlanc Jamison says of patients, noting a heightened need for services because of pandemic-induced uncertainties.

Although COVID-19 has certainly brought its fair share of challenges, she says one upside has been a greater public recognition of mental health and combating a persistent stigma for those seeking treatment. That also extends to substance use disorders.

Increased conversations around mental health and substance use are key to breaking down common misconceptions, LeBlanc Jamison says.

“As we grow the ability to talk about and embrace mental health and substance use as a disease and support those in need of treatment, we’ll be much better off,” she says, noting an influx in new patients as people cope with everything from job loss to family deaths to a new learning environment for students.

LeBlanc Jamison—the former executive vice president and chief delivery officer for CPS Energy—found her way to the Center from retirement, called to give back to her adopted city of San Antonio.

A Louisiana native, she came to the Alamo City for her master’s in

She remembers not only his booming voice, but also his passion for teaching and challenging students to think more broadly about the different aspects of government and inclusion.

“He used to say, ‘Politics permeates all systems,’” LeBlanc Jamison recalls. “He would challenge us to think beyond those aspects of government that we assumed entering the program.”

Today, LeBlanc Jamison also serves as a member of Trinity’s Board of Trustees, elected in 2019. After President Danny Anderson approached her about joining the body, LeBlanc Jamison accepted, not only because it offered an opportunity for her to give back to the school, but also because of her mother’s decades-long career in higher education.

“It was an opportunity for me to enjoy an aspect of her life and get to know more about it,” she says. LeBlanc Jamison complimented Anderson’s diversification of the board, which she calls “a very safe environment to have very robust conversations.” In particular, LeBlanc Jamison is closely tracking conversations at Trinity around diversity and inclusion and how she can offer her voice to that space.

In June 2020, Anderson created the Diversity and Inclusion Task Force in an effort to foster a more inclusive future for the University.

“That’s a goal of mine because I do believe in the Trinity mission, and I believe in their genuine efforts to enhance that experience for all at Trinity,” LeBlanc Jamison says. “And I’m hoping to be a part of that.”

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Buddy Buddy Trinity softball player founds nonprofit mentoring program

by Robin J. Johnson

For as long as softball outfielder and Trinity Buddies founder Gina Monaco can remember, sports have been a vital part of her life. above Gina Monaco ’21 addresses children at a Trinity Buddies skills camp in January 2020. below Tiger sports teams raised more than $3,000 for local families in need by selling silicone Trinity Buddies wristbands this spring.

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With both her parents working in the sports industry, Monaco ’21 grew up surrounded by San Antonio’s professional athletes. The athletes spoke in her classes at school and led her through drills at summer camp, teaching her along the way that sports can be a platform for something bigger than herself.

“I saw athletes using their platform to give back to their fans and young athletes, and I remember always being amazed by their kind-heartedness and their ability to not take their position for granted,” says Monaco, a communication major minoring in both sport management and film studies. “I’ve always wanted to be like them and do something of my own and give back to my community.”

This early inspiration became Monaco’s motivation to found Trinity Buddies, a nonprofit mentoring program that uses softball to foster growth on and off the field. Monaco formed Trinity Buddies with the help of its partner charity, Wish for Our Heroes, which she was part of before attending Trinity.

Through Trinity Buddies, Monaco and her Tiger teammates work with the McAllister Park Little League, instructing skills camps for the Little Leaguers and hosting them as honorary players at Trinity softball games to give them an experience of a collegiate athlete. Monaco and her teammates also take to the stands to cheer on the players at their Little League games.

“One goal of Trinity Buddies is to show the kids that they can dream of being college athletes, but also that sports aren’t the only thing. There are plenty of things [they can do],” says Monaco, whose

“Switching spots with the students was heartwarming,” Monaco says. “I was able to mention I was a former student, and they got wide-eyed and just thought it was the coolest thing. It was so awesome to give back to an elementary school that I have such fond memories of.”

These nostalgic visits are part of the reason Monaco wanted to develop a program that helped the very community that shaped her. She was a Little Leaguer in the same McAllister Park Little League she mentors, and she also grew up attending sports camps hosted at Trinity. She still keeps in touch with former coaches and teachers, which created a perfect setup for Trinity Buddies.

“I wanted to give back to the local community that helped me along the way,” Monaco says. “I wanted to help out the same kid who I once was.

[Being a college athlete] was the same dream I had when I was their age playing on the same field.”

left A McAllister Little Leaguer runs through the high-five tunnel with Monaco at a Trinity softball game in March 2019. middle and right Monaco with a Trinity Buddy at a skills camp held at McAllister Park.

“(Being a college athlete) was the same dream I had when I was their age playing on the same field.” most recent skills camp, held before the pandemic, welcomed 80 participants. “We express to them that hard work goes into whatever they do, and as long as they go for it, they can achieve it.”

Along with softball skills and game knowledge, Trinity Buddies teaches young athletes to focus on a healthy lifestyle. Players from Trinity’s softball program speak at local elementary and middle schools about positive self-talk, healthy choices, and their journey to becoming collegiate student-athletes. One of the visits included Monaco’s own elementary school, with her first-grade teacher’s class.

Along the way, Monaco has developed close relationships with the parents and children who attend her skills camps and school talks. Parents text Monaco after her camps, sharing that their children are now begging to play softball and be coached by a Trinity player. Most of the time, though, the parents just want to say thank you.

“They’ll say, ‘Thank you for being there and being in the moment,’ because you can have some athletes show up [to events like these] and they just do it to cross off something on their agenda,” Monaco says. “All of those compliments will stay with me forever.”

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Monaco says the time her teammates put into these events is well spent: Children leave not only knowing about softball, which can be an underrepresented sport, but also about how women can succeed in athletics.

“Some of them didn’t even know that you could play college softball or you could have a female coach,” Monaco says. “For young girls who are looking for role models, hopefully they find one in us.”

above Trinity softball players teach skills and drills to children at McAllister Park in October 2019.

“Unsung Hero” Student Leadership & Service Award.

This spring, she took home the top honor in one of her minors: Outstanding Senior in Sport Management.

Monaco is in her fourth season as a team attendant for the NBA San Antonio Spurs and is also a former team attendant for the WNBA San Antonio Stars and a former statistician for the AHL San Antonio Rampage. She volunteers with Lone Star Play Ball to help adults with special needs play softball, as well as with

“Being someone for young female athletes to look up to is huge. I feel female role models aren’t as highlighted or broadcasted in the sports world or in the media.”

Monaco is surely one such role model. Her career accolades include selections to the All-SCAC Second Team, the SCAC Academic Honor Roll twice, and the SCAC All-Sportsmanship Team. She also earned the SCAC Character and Community Women’s Student-Athlete of the Week honor twice for her work with Trinity Buddies. She’s made the dean’s list twice, and she won the 2020 Thurman Adkins

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her church to teach sign language for worship songs to autistic children. She represents all Trinity female student-athletes on the SCAC Student Advisory Academic board, bridges the relationships between student-athletes and professors on the Intercollegiate Athletics Committee, and leads students in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. It might just be easier to ask what she hasn’t done during her time at Trinity.

“Being someone for young female athletes to look up to is huge,” Monaco says. “I feel female role models aren’t as highlighted or broadcasted in the sports world or in the media. Being able to be that role model for them is a big goal for Trinity Buddies.”

Thrown a Curveball

When the pandemic started shutting events down in March 2020, Monaco regrouped with her teammates to find a way to move their work online—she felt they owed it to the families who had been with them from the start. “No matter what obstacles we hit, we were going to find a way around them,” she says.

Though the Little League camps were put on hold, Monaco moved their school talks online, an undertaking she calls hard but humorous.

“Going from being surrounded by 80-plus Little Leaguers to talking to kids through a screen, it’s obviously pretty tough, and it can be harder to form those relationships that you’re trying to form,” Monaco says. You can’t help but smile though, she says, when the Zoom conversations with 7-year-olds derails into their favorite colors and animals. “But what do you expect?” Monaco says, laughing.

Monaco also wanted to find a way to give back financially during the pandemic. As part of the NCAA’s United As One campaign, Trinity Buddies partnered with the Trinity Student Athlete Advisory Council (SAAC) to support homeless families in San Antonio’s North East Independent School District, the same district Monaco attended. Student-athletes from every Tiger sport sold silicone Trinity Buddies bracelets to parents, alumni, students, and other fans, held local spirit nights at restaurants, and encouraged donations. As of press time, the partnership has raised $3,000 for these families.

Monaco says none of this would have been possible on her own. “You’re only a leader if followers follow you,” she says. “At the end of the day, I was grateful to be surrounded by people who were still supporting me despite the setbacks that we had.

Trinity Buddies would be nothing if my teammates weren’t invested, and if kids and families didn’t think we cared about them.”

top A McAllister Little Leaguer runs through the high-five tunnel with Monaco at a Trinity softball game in February 2020. above Monaco high-fives a teammate during a Tiger softball game. below Monaco fist-bumps head Trinity softball coach Abby Martin during a game. bottom McAllister Little Leaguers listen to the national anthem as honorary players with the Trinity softball team.

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Matt Johnson ’98 Supply Securer

by Madison Semro ’21 When most people go to work , they don’t spend a lot of time thinking

psst: Wondering why Matt only has one “T” on his H-E-B name tag? We were too! When he started at the company, there were two Matt Jonhsons, so he dropped a “T” on his name tag to help with differentiation.

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about toilet paper. Matt Johnson ’98 does.

The New York City native is a director of supply chain management at H-E-B, the No. 2 grocery store in the U.S. with 340 stores in Texas and Mexico. Johnson stumbled into the position after originally joining H-E-B in an operational leadership role. Normally, his position entails forecasting demand and collaborating across many supply chain teams to replenish more than 300 stores’ groceries, but the onset of COVID-19 and the subsequent pandemic has narrowed their focus.

Now, Johnson and his team are heavily focused on the forecasting

ALUMNI PROFILE

behind keeping shelves stocked with pandemic essentials—especially toilet paper and hand sanitizer—that customers need.

“The approach that we take when planning for things like this has a lot more to do with what the community needs versus how to maximize profitability or sales,” Johnson says. “We’re much more targeting the issues that will negatively impact our community.”

H-E-B began monitoring COVID-19 as soon as news emerged about the virus in China. Johnson and his team started collaborating with business partners on what potential store demand might look like to help with planning different scenarios to assist in the buying and sourcing decisions they make for critical amounts of supply ahead of time. This gave H-E-B stores an advantage when the U.S. effectively shut down in March 2020. They have been adapting ever since.

“When we were at the peak [of the pandemic], there wasn’t an effort to push people. We actually had to tell them to stop,” Johnson says. “There is this element of ownership at H-E-B, and it’s driven a lot by leadership. There’s a culture that’s very prevalent across the entire company that you know that what you’re doing has some purpose—to a greater degree than I’ve ever seen before.”

The creative thinking and problem solving Johnson and his team have honed to get through this unprecedented time were skills he developed during his years at Trinity. “Trinity wasn’t about memorizing content—it taught me how to learn,” Johnson says. “From the nature of language classes to the case study classes to classes in art and cinematography in the Vietnam era, it taught me to be a critical thinker about what I was consuming.”

“The approach that we take when planning for things like this has a lot more to do with what the community needs versus how to maximize profitability or sales.”

This is not the first time Johnson and his team have faced supply chain issues brought on by a crisis. In fact, their COVID-19 planning procedures were largely informed by hurricane preparedness after facing Hurricane Harvey a few years ago. However, the whole world was affected by COVID-19 simultaneously, which presented new challenges to all retailers.

“In retrospect, once COVID-19 hit, [emergency response] for a hurricane did not seem as overwhelming because there is an end in sight,” Johnson explains. “But when we started to approach two to three months into the pandemic, our volume [of goods needed] remained as high as it was, and it was hard to maintain.” To help fix this issue, Johnson and his team pressed pause mid-pandemic to completely redesign their systems, which had become muddled and difficult to use. A necessary stressor, he says, to make the process less stressful long-term.

Johnson cites the extreme length of the pandemic as one of the biggest challenges for all H-E-B partners.

“One of the really concerning things is you’re running at 120 miles per hour for a long period of time,” Johnson says. Store partners and warehouse partners were putting in extended effort to support us, not because H-E-B required it, “but because they felt an ownership in it,” Johnson says.

While at Trinity, Johnson double majored in communication and psychology and minored in finance. He fondly recalls his classes with communication professor Bill Christ, Ph.D., who Johnson says “brought me around to the idea that psychology, marketing, and communications all tie together into a place that can have a positive impact on the world. He taught me that you should recognize that as you craft a message and send it out, it’s not necessarily what you say but how it’s heard.”

And around the world, people are hearing about H-E-B, whose tagline accurately rings true: Here, Everything’s Better.

The company has received several awards in the past few months, including being named No. 10 in Glassdoor’s “Best Places to Work” as well as one of the top 10 private companies in America by Forbes.

One of H-E-B’s stores even made national news in February for letting customers leave with their groceries, sans payment, when the power went out during the winter storm.

“When I first moved here, I saw people had this die-hard love for their grocery store, and I did not understand it for the life of me.

And it’s still mildly confusing, but at the same time, I get it,” Johnson explains. “H-E-B is built on the ideal that you do good for the sake of doing good and good things will come of it, and I think you can watch that happen in times like this.”

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TUNNEL, MEET

Health care administrators demonstrate unwavering leadership through unprecedented change

by Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ’08

It’s a cold morning in mid-February, and Mary Wey ’13, M’19 is checking in on nurses and staff who are manning a community vaccine clinic in Austin, Texas. Frost dusts the windshields of the cars in the parking lot; a chill snaps through the lobby every time the front door is propped open.

But let’s stop there. There are no lines of people waiting outside, their breath visible from the sides of their face masks. There is no traffic jam or battle for parking spaces or line of idling vehicles on the street. There’s no confusion, no anxiety, no endless stream of questions or loud demands. The only thing seemingly disruptive today is the weather—“Just in case, we’re all hands on deck,” Wey says—but for now, there’s a smooth transition of scheduled patients in and out of the clinic like clockwork.

“It’s our goal for today to get everybody vaccinated who comes,” Wey says matter-of-factly. Wey, an economics major and graduate of Trinity’s on-campus health care administration program who also logged several years working in a pharmacy, is currently a program manager for Ascension Medical Group Texas. Ascension outpatient clinics dot the landscape from Hillsboro to San Marcos, and all clinics—including the one in Austin that Wey helps lead—are focused on strengthening the network for vaccine distribution under Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines and prioritizing patient experience. “A successful patient experience means getting our patients in and out quickly and making sure that we’re still here when a patient needs us. We have a lot of great teamwork and good leadership that values that.”

And that Thursday, when the clinic wrapped for the evening, Wey deemed it successful. No lines, no wait, few no-shows. Yet little did she know, the next week would bring record winter weather, dangerous travel conditions, and statewide power and water outages, and much of the Lone Star State would come to a grinding halt.

Across Texas, vaccine rates plummeted. In the seven days before the storm, almost 1 million Texans had received injections; on Monday, Feb. 15, the first day after the storm, only 10,495 doses were administered, and more than 450,000 doses were halted in transit. Overall, the state saw an 85% drop in average daily doses administered from Monday, Feb. 7 through Sunday, Feb. 20.* So how does this community clinic recover and get back on track? Wey suggests the same thing she and her

team have been doing, day after day since the beginning of this pandemic: tenacious agility and an unabating willingness to “do whatever it takes.”

“As a health care administrator, being agile is a core competency,” says Piotr Gorecki M’18. Gorecki, a graduate of Trinity’s on-campus health care administration program, is an assistant administrator at Methodist Hospital and Methodist Children’s Hospital in San Antonio. This position has qualified him to lead non-clinical operations for the hospitals’ COVID-19 vaccine clinic.

Development of this on-site clinic required immediate and iterative innovation and creativity: From the moment the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the Pfizer vaccine, Gorecki and his team had limited time to size and scale an operation that could provide vaccines to hospital employees, physicians, and affiliated staff within CDC guidelines. “The teamwork involved in establishing the clinic was truly remarkable,” Gorecki says, noting that from software infrastructure to data reporting to care within the clinic itself, the spin-up wouldn’t have been possible without the HCA Healthcare network, of which all seven San Antonio Methodist acute care facilities are a part.

“Being able to serve our hospitals in this way means that we have a safer workforce, and that our caregivers have the ability to provide high quality care in an environment where we see patients every single day,” Gorecki says.

“We’re also making sure that our team members’ families are safe; we’re very fortunate in our country and in our health care system to have vaccines accessible to them.”

above Armed with PPE and disposable gear, Mary Wey ’13, M’19 works with colleagues in a COVID-19 vaccination clinic in Austin.

* Vaccine rate data gathered from the Texas Tribune, “Texas’ COVID-19 vaccinations begin to rebound after plunging during last week’s winter storm,” published Feb. 23, 2021.

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Gorecki’s eyes soften as he speaks from his heart.

A Poland native, Gorecki immigrated to the United States at a young age with his parents, who were “lucky enough to win the visa lottery.” He spent his formative years in Chicago, where he helped his parents who had limited English proficiency and financial resources navigate a complicated set of social systems. “Health is one of the greatest gifts that one has,” says Gorecki, who volunteered in hospitals through grade school and college. “Health care is scarce, even in a developed country like Poland. So from an early age, health care was a calling for me. Both witnessing and having an impact on health care journeys are incredible, and this continues to drive me every single day.”

Channeling Humbition

Across the nation, “drive” is a common word used to describe the grit and determination of caregivers and administrators navigating unknown territory within a health care system on overdrive. After a full year when the only constant has been change, long hours and fatigue have become the norm. Will “drive” continue to be enough to push health care administrators back through the front door of the hospital, day after day?

Ask health care administration professor Amer Kaissi, Ph.D., and he’ll say yes—because that is who the Trinity Department of Health Care Administration (HCAD) has developed these leaders to be.

“When we interview students for our program, we ask them, ‘What is your Why?’ With their answers, we want to know that the students are committed. We want people who are passionate about serving others and helping patients,” Kaissi says. He reflects on a conversation he had with a physician student in the HCAD executive program amid the rise in cases last summer: “He told me he would sit in the parking lot of his hospital every morning when he gets to the hospital and ask himself, ‘Can I do this one more day? Am I able to bring myself to go back in there and see patients, but also plan and manage and lead knowing that each day is getting worse?’”

So, how did he bring himself to go back in there? Kaissi notes that the HCAD program teaches students to “put your oxygen mask on first” before assisting others, as administrators’ assistance is vital to the health of the system

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“An executive student told me: ‘Am I able to bring myself to go back in there and see patients, but also plan and manage and lead knowing that each day is getting worse?’”

as a whole. “From the first day of class on, it’s always about how your actions ultimately impact the patient— you’re doing all of this so that you can be there for people,” Kaissi says. “We want you to be the best leader ever.”

According to Kaissi, author of the book Intangibles: The Unexpected Traits of High-Performing Healthcare Leaders, research shows that the best leaders are not necessarily the loud, charismatic ones. “If we look at all the evidence together, high-performing leaders—inside and outside of health care—have traits that build longterm success and long-term performance.” Kaissi’s research and teaching focuses on four of these traits: humility, compassion, kindness, and generosity.

“Leadership starts with understanding your strengths and understanding your areas for improvement,” Kaissi says, “and humility is key. The starting point in our HCAD curriculum is that you must truly know yourself first, lead yourself first, before you can lead others.”

Both Piotr Gorecki and Mary Wey give enthusiastic nods to the concept of servant leadership and a lasting, Kaissi-dubbed component therein: “humbition” (incidentally the title of his upcoming book). Kaissi admits that often, humility and ambition are seemingly polar opposites. However, in great leaders, these two traits intertwine to ensure empathy and accountability through the lens of self-reflection.

“You have to be humble, but at the same time remain ambitious. You have to show care and be understanding, but at the same time hold people accountable to getting things done,” Kaissi says. “Especially in the midst of this COVID crisis, that is one of the biggest challenges our health care leaders face: They know that their staff is stretched, they know that their people are running on empty. They empathize with them, but still need to hold them accountable for getting the job done because people’s lives depend on that.”

above Health care administration professor Amer Kaissi leads a master’s-level course on coaching and public speaking.

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“Having an impact on health care journeys is incredible, and this continues to drive me every single day.”

above Piotr Gorecki M’18 rounds on hospital physicians and staff late on a Friday afternoon. right Katie Fiedler M’19 and Jared Shelton M’10, FACHE, president of Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Allen, discuss the hospital’s daily operations dashboard.

Being “humbitious” has always been central to Wey’s professional goals, but the pandemic has shed a new light on how she’s applied the concept to her career. “It is my job to make sure that my staff and physicians can do what they do to the best of their abilities, and that has been amplified with COVID,” she says. “Whether it’s making sure we have the correct safety protocols, making sure we have enough protective equipment, driving from clinic to clinic to deliver supplies—my primary job is to make sure our staff have what they need to take care of our patients and keep them safe.”

Keeping people safe, protected, and cared for is a core tenet of the job for Gorecki, too. “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel,” Gorecki says, reciting his favorite Maya Angelou quote. Reflecting on the key role humility plays in caring for those around him, he adds, “It’s how I grew up and part of the values my parents instilled in me. Give back, no matter how little you have. It’s the core of what I do.”

Beckoning Change

Further north in Allen, Texas, a week has passed since the winter storm. For the most part, power is back on, tap water is potable, and impassable roadways have thawed. And Katie Fiedler M’19 is doing what Wey and Gorecki ultimately had to do, too: help spin a vaccination

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clinic back up after being forced to cancel the previous week’s appointments. Like Wey and Gorecki, Fiedler is a graduate of the on-campus health care administration program who credits her team with exceptional agility and innovation in the throes of a historical moment in health care.

“The first day we were giving vaccines, one of the physicians who received it started crying—it was the moment I really realized the moment we were in, and how much he has actually seen and been truly affected by this,” she says.

At this point, Fiedler has been able to take a bit of a step back from the clinic and begin a comprehensive assessment. At its peak, the hospital was administering 75 vaccinations per day to physicians, nurses, staff members, and their families—but with a majority of employees having received the vaccine, the clinic was beginning to wind down. Fiedler and her team could start shifting focus: What worked? What didn’t? ... What’s next?

“People are going to notice how the pandemic has accelerated the change and development of health care,” she says. “More than anything, it’s made us a little bit more flexible in certain areas”—particularly in Fiedler’s areas. As director of operations for Texas Health Allen, a Dallas-area acute care facility, Fiedler oversees respiratory services, environmental services,

and inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation. Respiratory services and environmental (cleaning and housekeeping) services were overwhelmingly affected by constant changes to health and safety standards.

And what’s next for Fiedler is illuminated by a light at the end of the pandemic tunnel: the potential for today’s improvements in health care delivery to benefit care in the future. “Pivoting through the pandemic has necessitated more modern ways of delivering medicine,” she says. “The launch into virtual care is much better for a consumer-faced health care system; it also allows us to refocus on the importance of having acute care hospitals and triaging people’s care into appropriate areas.”

Yet, in Fiedler’s eyes, the most important shift may be toward putting prevention and preventive care first.

“The biggest change has really been the importance of the infection prevention team,” Fiedler says. In the past, infection control had been seen as a group of experts “working in the background.” But with the onset of the pandemic, “suddenly everyone in the hospital had their cell phone numbers.” Notably, new practices and procedures are run by the infection prevention team prior to implementation.

“These are all good improvements that should stay,” Fiedler says with confidence—and with humbition.

“You learn how to work in a different environment. It’s what you do. It’s what you live. It’s what you find is your purpose in life.”

“Innovation makes our physicians’ and staff’s lives better.

Day after day, even the smallest improvements and gestures help make caregiving as bearable as possible, particularly through something like this—whatever we can do to help them remember why they picked this profession and to continue to want to be here.”

Mary Wey couldn’t agree more as she smiles toward the small slits of light she can see in the tunnel, too. “You learn how to work in a different environment. It’s what you do. It’s what you live. It’s what you find is your purpose in life. You don’t see it as something that keeps you up at night; rather, it’s how you can do your best to serve your community. And that’s why we will be okay.”

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Photo: The University of Texas at Austin

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ALUMNI PROFILE

Jay Hartzell ’91 Longhorn Leader

by Miriam Sitz Grebey ’10

In May of 2020, as the pandemic raged and social movements swelled

across the nation, 1991 Trinity University graduate Jay Hartzell, Ph.D., was named interim president of the University of Texas at Austin (UT). Previously the dean of UT’s McCombs School of Business and a professor there since 2001, he officially became the institution’s 30th president in September 2020, stepping up to lead during a time of unprecedented challenges.

President of a flagship university is not the job Hartzell imagined he’d hold when he started college; “I mean, I didn’t even imagine I would end up in this role last February,” he says with a laugh. Coming from a large public high school in Oklahoma, Hartzell knew he wanted a smaller, more personal environment for college. He applied to Trinity (and only Trinity) as an engineering major, but he shifted gears to economics before even arriving on campus.

Hartzell looks back fondly on those years. “It was really the first time I was around that many really talented, smart people,” he says. “I remember a lot of deep conversations late into the night about absurd topics.” And the most important relationship of his life got its start in front of a sink in South Hall. “It was my 18th birthday, and my mentor group had gotten me milk and Twinkies to celebrate,” he recalls. “But

professor at Trinity was what I could expect,” he says—but still, “things have worked out wonderfully.”

After earning his doctorate in finance from UT, Hartzell accepted a position at New York University’s Stern School of Business. “New York is a great place to be a finance professor,” he says—but a challenging place to raise a young family. After a few years, an opportunity arose to teach at UT. “When Texas called, I hung up the phone and my wife had packed,” he jokes.

“We were moving!”

Hartzell, who became dean of McCombs in 2016, put his energy into making the business school a welcoming and supportive place for students of all backgrounds. He established an associate deanship for diversity and inclusion and convened the McCombs Diversity and Inclusion Committee. “In business and on campus, diverse teams make better decisions and get better outcomes,” he says. “We see that in academic literature and in practice, with the employers who recruit our students.” When he became the university’s president last year, just as conversations about equity and injustice rose to the fore of public consciousness, that mindset felt even more vital.

“We’re not talking about somehow taking something from one group and giving it to another. We’ve got to make the pie bigger, as a university and as a society.” the milk was sour, so I went to spit it out in the bathroom.” At just that moment, from the adjacent room, in walked the woman who would become his wife. “She was like, ‘What is this boy doing in my bathroom?!’” The two dated throughout college and were married at Margarite B. Parker Chapel on the Tuesday after their graduation.

During his years at Trinity as an economics and business major, Hartzell worked as a student assistant to business professor Phil Cooley. “I got to sit outside his office several hours a week for a couple of years, which was really important to me,” he says. A few years later, finding himself unsatisfied in his first post-graduate job, he turned to Cooley for advice. “He told me, ‘You know, Jay, why don’t you think about a Ph.D.?’ That was the first time it really clicked for me.” His work with Cooley during college emboldened him to make that call, he says, setting him down the path to a doctorate. There were, of course, surprising turns along the way—“I had the mistaken impression that his life as an established

“We all want students to thrive here at UT and leave equipped to change the world,” Hartzell says. “That’s our common ground.”

And it’s not a zero-sum game, he explains: “We’re not talking about somehow taking something from one group and giving it to another.

We’ve got to make the pie bigger, as a university and as a society.”

At the beginning of 2021, Hartzell and the UT leadership team embarked on a strategic planning process, which will chart the university’s course for the next few years. It’s a welcome change from the earliest days of his interim presidency, when a storm of urgent issues stemming from the global health crisis demanded nearly all of his attention. “It feels like we have the chance now to put our heads above the clouds and think about our culture and values, our priorities, and where we’re heading.” It’s the kind of forward-looking work he loves—and, he adds, is “a lot more fun than worrying about how to make sure students are 6 feet apart in classrooms.”

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PRESIDENTIAL APPOINTMENT RAISES TRINITY’S PROFILE Professor Juan Sepúlveda’s service on transition team elevates student experience and Trinity’s national status

by Jeremy Gerlach

When Trinity political science professor Juan Sepúlveda was called to

serve on President Joe Biden’s transition team in late 2020, it was tempting for him to get caught up in the star power of the group.

Each new U.S. president, Republican or Democrat, relies heavily on a transition team to prepare staffing and priorities for federal agencies and offices under a new administration. Biden’s team, composed of more than 600 people, was stocked with “powerful, experienced” voices, Sepúlveda says. This group also contained more than 80 representatives from universities, including traditional academic powerhouses.

“You expect to see your Ivy Leagues, your Stanfords, big public schools, but I was one of the few folks coming from small liberal arts colleges,” Sepúlveda says. “And what I loved about this was ... that it gets Trinity in the mix as a national power, especially as you build relationships with people at the federal level who are now asking me, ‘Hey, I heard you are at Trinity—is it good?’ It just felt good to represent.”

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Trinity would be hard-pressed to find a more ideal representative to send to the transition team than Sepúlveda, the Ron Calgaard Distinguished Visiting Professor of Political Science who has served in two previous presidential administrations. As part of the transition, from October 2020 to January 2021, Sepúlveda was placed on the Arts & Humanities agency review team. He led the public media agency review team, which includes presidential nominations for the board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the organization that distributes the largest portion of federal funding to PBS and NPR. This was a perfect fit for Sepúlveda, who also served as a senior executive for PBS before launching his academic career.

“You get selected [for a presidential transition team] because you know the area. I’ve been in public media, and that’s a complicated, confusing sector,” Sepúlveda says. “I came in knowing about public broadcasting, radio, and local media organizations.”

But even shoulder-to-shoulder with national agencies and appointees, Sepúlveda says he was reminded of what makes Trinity special.

“We don’t just come into class and push ‘our stuff.’ We come in here and push each other.”

Juan Sepúlveda at his desk in 2018.

“Honestly, my time working with agency review teams felt similar to the type of community building that we do at Trinity,” Sepúlveda says. “Your group is small, close, connected. You take care of each other; you jump in to get stuff done together.”

In turn, Sepúlveda is taking this working knowledge back to Trinity, where it’s already making a difference for his students. Since coming to Trinity in 2016, Sepúlveda has taught urban education and local, state, and national politics at Trinity, as well as helped lead the University’s Latinx Leadership Academy.

“It was ironic to me that right at the time I was asked to join this presidential transition, I was actually teaching a course about campaigns here at Trinity,” Sepúlveda says. “And the last segment of that course was about transitions.”

So, Sepúlveda became one of the few professors in the country who can say they were able to ditch the textbook for real-time practical experience.

“Without leaking any information, the way I designed the final segment of that class changed completely once I had been part of an actual transition—the final became the real thing,” Sepúlveda says. “We had students basically preparing virtual versions of the real-life memos I had to prepare. They know now about handling budgeting and staffing, establishing priorities, and vetting potential political appointees. It was incredible to be able to tell my students, ‘We’re not making this up; this is the actual work you’ll do in the field.’”

Sepúlveda’s experience has also spilled over into his spring semester, where he’s teaching an urban politics course in addition to a Latinx leadership course. “Taking our students through all the various political structures, I can still talk about how the work we did on that transition team will have an effect across different agencies, such as the State Department or the Department of Education.”

Sepúlveda says the lessons taught by this practical experience are invaluable, regardless of a student’s political lean: “Whether folks are Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, or anything in between, they’re telling me they just like the fact that my class can go beyond a textbook.

“I’m a big believer in my class,” he continues. “At Trinity, we don’t just say we’re developing critical thinkers, we’re pushing all students to see the other sides of various issues. Let’s say some students might be buying into a certain view—the classroom can be a great space to get them out of their comfort zones. We don’t just come into class and push ‘our stuff.’ We come in here and push each other.”

For all the practical knowledge he’s gained, Sepúlveda says that the events of the past year—a difficult one for the University and the nation at large—have compelled him to emphasize the idea of building community.

“This year, I’ve had great material, but I’ve also felt that I actually can’t just dive right into teaching without first just giving students a chance to voice what’s going on in their lives,” he says.

“And my students are opening up about real stuff. Someone’s friend had COVID-19, another student was having a hard time with too many kids in their house, the WiFi wasn’t working, and all these things were going wrong. But giving ourselves the space to talk about these issues, that’s the beauty of Trinity. We’re a small space, and we can take care of each other that way.”

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Photo: Lexey Swall

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TRINITY Spring 2021

ALUMNI PROFILE

Belle Wheelan ’72 Accreditation Education

by Miriam Sitz Grebey ’10

Belle Wheelan, Ph.D., has education in her blood. Her decades-long

career spans classrooms, community colleges, and capitol buildings.

Entering her 16th year as president of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC), an organization that accredits institutions of higher education in 11 states across the South, the 1972 Trinity alumna has seen firsthand how leaders are made through her dedication to lifelong learning.

Born in Chicago and raised in Texas, Wheelan graduated high school at 16. She came to Trinity University, where she studied psychology and sociology with ambitions of becoming a child psychologist. After graduation, she headed for Louisiana State University to pursue her doctorate. But fate had other plans, and two years later, when her mother fell ill, Wheelan returned to San Antonio with a master’s degree in developmental educational psychology.

She found herself drawn to teach at San Antonio College (SAC).

“I knew the students there were there because they wanted to make

60,000 students. Despite the difference in scale, she found the two experiences similar. “The issues were the same,” she says. “There were just more people to shuffle the issues through.”

Although Wheelan thought she would spend the rest of her career as president of Northern Virginia Community College, she received an unexpected call in 2001: Virginia’s newly elected Governor Mark Warner asked her to serve as his secretary of education. It marked a new chapter of her career—and new experience as a leader.

“For almost 15 years, I had been large and in charge as president at Central and Northern, and provost at Tidewater before that,” she says. “Suddenly, I had visibility but not authority. Secretary is an appointed position, one of leading by influence. Officially, I was in charge of nothing.”

In this role, Wheelan focused her efforts on streamlining the process for students transferring from community colleges to fouryear institutions, as well as improving the performance of K-12

“I often joke that my degrees in child psychology prepared me for dealing with legislators and college presidents.” a difference in their lives,” she says. “They weren’t there because they were a legacy or because they wanted a great music or athletic program. They were there because they wanted an education and job skills that would improve their life. I just felt like, wow, that’s what I want to do. That’s as close to helping children solve their problems as I’m going to get.”

The decision would shape the rest of her career: She spent 10 years as a faculty member of SAC before moving into administration, eventually becoming a director. Meanwhile, she commuted to the University of Texas at Austin, earning her doctorate in educational administration, with a special concentration in community college leadership, in 1984.

Wheelan left Texas in the late ’80s, accepting positions of leadership at Thomas Nelson Community College in Hampton, Virginia, and then at Tidewater Community College’s campus in the nearby city of Portsmouth. In 1992, she became the first Black woman in the state’s history to serve as a college president, at Central Virginia Community College, an institution with some 4,000 students. Six and a half years later, Wheelan made a “quantum leap,” as she puts it, over to Northern Virginia Community College—one of the largest multicampus community colleges in the country at the time, with more than

schools. The job also introduced her to the world of politics and governance. “I often joke that my degrees in child psychology prepared me for dealing with legislators and college presidents,” she says, “because sometimes they act like children.”

As the end of Warner’s administration approached, Wheelan left to take the reins at SACSCOC—a role seemingly tailor-made for her particular mix of education, experience, and skills. “I’ve been in the same position as the presidents of the institutions we accredit,” she says, having worked at both small and large schools. “I can not only be sympathetic, but truly empathetic to the issues they face.” These skills came in handy over the past year, when much of her time was spent offering reassurance and guidance to the leaders of colleges and universities facing unparalleled hardships due to the pandemic.

From Wheelan’s perspective, leadership—much like education— starts early and is a lifelong journey. She looks back at her own growth as a leader—from high school pep squad leader and captain of Trinity’s cheerleader team to college provost, college president, and secretary of education. Each step brought her closer to where she is today, and it’s this same mentality that she’s trying to impart to future leaders.

“You have to take advantage of every opportunity to learn and grow, whatever the context,” she says.

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CLASS NOTES

1969 Doug Hawthorne M’72 is now

an advisor in Dallas at Doug Hawthorne - Advisor. He officially retired from Texas Health Resources in December 2019 as founding chief executive officer emeritus.

W.W. Torrey was re-elected to

Show your #TigerPride Peggy (Zorola) Miller retired from the Texas Annual Conference of Methodist Churches as the controller/managing accountant and president-elect of the National Methodist Treasurer’s Association. She is enjoying retirement and her grandchildren.

1973

Steve Sanders retired in July 2014 after 32 years with Memorial Hermann Health System in Houston and as the CEO of Memorial Hermann The Woodlands Hospital.

Paul Jenson officially retired

1974

his third term as the Milam County district and county attorney in Cameron, Texas.

from daily health care management five and a half years ago but remains active in local health care activities. For the past two years, Jenson has been an active board member at two Oklahoma City hospitals: Oklahoma Heart Hospital North and Oklahoma Heart Hospital South.

David Davis published The

Mistakes with Koehler Books.

The science fiction humor book is relevant to current social and environmental problems and relates to senior citizens through young adults concerned about intolerance of “the other.” The

Extend your education beyond the classroom with Learning TUgether podcasts and webinars, which bring Trinity faculty and alumni experts together in conversations on timely topics.

New podcasts and webinars are released once a month.

Podcasts Listen to intellectually inspiring conversations in a

podcast series hosted by Nathan Cone ’95, vice president of San Antonio public radio station KSTX, and recorded and produced

by Trinity’s own KRTU 91.7.

Webinars Expand your perspective on social and political

issues dominating national and international discussions with webinars on topics including personal enrichment, life and family, and financial and career development.

Visit gotu.us/lifelonglearning for podcasts, webinars, and other Lifelong Learning alumni programs.

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TRINITY Spring 2021

book is now available in hardcover, soft cover, and ebook on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and through most bookstores. While this is Davis’ first novel, he has published poetry, magazine features, and scholarly articles.

He has had 17 plays produced, including productions in New York and Hollywood. Davis has worked as a physics and math teacher, actor, head of three college theater programs, technical writer, editor, and health communications specialist. He lives outside of Atlanta with his wife, Kathy, and daughter, Elizabeth.

Jake Henry submitted his resig-

nation to the board of directors of Saint Francis Health System (SFHS), effective June 30, 2021.

Henry will have completed 19 years at SFHS and considers this time to have been the capstone of his career. In his words, “We have accomplished a great deal during this time ... it has been a pleasure.” Henry is looking forward to retirement, the first time he will not have held a job since the summer after his sixth grade year.

1976 Bill Johnson is in his fifth year

of retirement and is still enjoying it very much. Johnson lives in Florence, Alabama, with his wife, Linda. They spend a lot of time traveling and have a grandchild in Virginia, where their daughter and her family live.

1980 Julie Napier Zoller heads Global

Regulatory Affairs for Amazon’s broadband satellite constellation, Project Kuiper. She and her husband recently celebrated

Submit your updates online at gotu.us/ alumniupdates

their 40th wedding anniversary.

Proud parents of two daughters, they enjoy their three grandchildren and summers in the Thousand Islands.

1981 Clifford Moy was named a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. He serves as medical director for behavioral health at TMF Health Quality Institute.

Mitch Shue left a long career in industry in 2019 to join the faculty in the School of Computing at Clemson University as a professor of practice. Prior to joining Clemson, Shue served as the chief technology officer at the financial services company Morningstar.

1982 George Brown is serving in his

fifth year as assistant vice provost for Student Affairs and director of University Recreation and Wellness at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities.

1987

David B. Schlosser

San Antonio alumni donned their best face masks and took part in a socially distanced outdoor miniature golf event at the Deco District landmark Cool Crest Miniature Golf Course in October 2020. Following the round of mini golf, the group headed next door to the outdoor Metzger Biergarten to catch up over beverages.

1984 In March 2018, John Yeary became the interim CEO at Freestone Medical Center, a Community Hospital Corporation-managed hospital in Fairfield, Texas, and he became the permanent CEO in August 2018. Yeary and his wife, Tena, make their home in Fairfield and are enjoying their life in the country. They are the proud parents of John (and wife Jennifer) and Justin (and white Kelsey) and very proud grandparents of Molly and Maggie, and they look welcomed a new grandchild in March 2021!

Before moving to Fairfield, they co-owned a DME company in Louisiana from 2010–16, when they sold the company and moved home to Texas.

Dayna Watson Culwell and her husband, Bill, work from home. Watson Culwell teaches virtual yoga classes and private sessions. She also applies yoga therapy with Thai massage maneuvers to in-home clients one to one. Her business has grown to be very successful since it started in 2013. Watson Culwell also teaches twice a year in Cozumel, Mexico, in both English and Spanish (thanks to her Spanish major!).

1989 Karen-Marie Yust received a

$4.5 million grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. to launch the Children’s Spirituality Research & Innovation Hub at Union Presbyterian Seminary, where she is the Rowe Professor of Christian Education. The Hub will explore ways to support spiritual well-being in children from birth to age 12 and their millennial and Gen X parents and caregivers.

Nora Munn Powers serves as

director of Northern California Network Management for Aetna, a CVS Health company.

1990 Cathy Marston is the grant

1986

coordinator for Mano Amiga San Marcos and was a 2020 Equity and Justice Scholar for the Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation.

Jerry Renaud and Laura (East-

Carole (Stewart) Anhalt

1985 Karl Schneider joined Verticurl (a

WPP company) as vice president of technology. He lives in Dallas and leads a busy life with his wife Joni, sons Matteo and Marco, stepson Brad, and granddaughters Ember and Briar. Oh, and dogs Heidi and Moose!

man) Renaud are retired and

live in Eagle, Colorado, along with their chocolate lab, Kobe.

They departed Saudi Arabia in September 2020 when Jerry Renaud elected early retirement from Saudi Aramco.

successfully defended her dissertation and received her doctorate in medical humanities with a concentration in bioethics and a minor in narrative and literary studies from the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, Texas.

republished his short story, “Pretzel Logic,” in November 2020 in The Best American Mystery Stories 2020, edited by C.J. Box. The story was originally published in 2019 in Die Behind the Wheel: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Music of Steely Dan.

1991 After 12 years in Boise, Idaho, Marci (Auld) Glass has been called to serve Calvary Presbyterian Church in San Francisco as its pastor/head of staff.

1992 Alicia Knoedler is Miami

University’s vice president for Research and Innovation, effective Nov. 1, 2020.

Susi (Beveridge) Mapp was promoted to associate provost of Institutional Effectiveness and Innovation at Elizabethtown College. In addition, the third edition of her text, Human Rights and Social Justice in a Global Perspective: An Introduction to International Social Work, was published this summer.

Twenty-five years after graduating law school, Joseph Peckham is proud to add a third state bar license after successfully passing the Florida bar exam.

1998 After retiring from active medical and medical administrative practice with Anthem Health Care, John Seidenfeld joined

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CLASS NOTES

the faculty at the University of the Incarnate Word (UIW) in San Antonio as an associate professor in clinical and applied science education at the UIW School of Osteopathic Medicine.

MARRIAGES

Peter Steinbach ‘15 and

Steven Leach ‘07 and

Becca (Burt) Steinbach ‘16

Adrienne Day

Oct. 9, 2020

Nov. 24, 2020

Monica Vargas-Mahar, CEO of The Hospitals of Providence East Campus, was appointed by the American Hospital Association to its Carolyn Boone Lewis Equity of Care Award Committee. This appointment is a one-year term beginning Jan. 1, 2021. The committee honors hospitals whose demonstrated strategies and outcomes advance the work of equity and support the goals of the National Call to Action to Eliminate Health Care Disparities.

NEW ADDITIONS 2002 Tracy (Cantu) Almanzan serves

Logan Rittiman to

Ila Rose to

Michelle (McCullough)

Matthew Meador ‘08

Bartonico ‘08 and

and Becci Meador

JP Bartonico M’09

July 20, 2020

as chair of the Diversity in the Profession Committee for the State Bar of Texas. Almanzan was selected as a Family Law Fellow with the American Bar Association and as a member of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Task Force for the State Bar of Texas.

Feb. 28, 2020

Save the Date Emilia to Catherine (Dickson) Riggle ‘10 and Scott Riggle ’12 April 3, 2020

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TRINITY Spring 2021

Alumni Weekend 2021 October 21-24

2003

Jessica Bodoh-Creed founded

The Cultural Consultants, a team of cultural anthropologists, all with doctorates, who help media and corporate clients navigate cultural representation. The Cultural Consultants help companies think through institutionalized racism and work toward a more just working environment.

International audiences want to know they are being respected, understood, depicted, and engaged, and the team helps media clients achieve this in their film and TV projects. The Cultural Consultants also give talks and lectures and run short corporate educational courses on critical social topics such as race, gender, cultural appropriation, and others.

Matthew D. Cavenaugh, an attorney with Jackson Walker, was selected for inclusion on the 2020 Super Lawyers list.

Super Lawyers, part of Thomson Reuters, is a rating of outstanding lawyers from more than 70 practice areas who have attained a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement.

The annual selections are made using a multiphase process that includes a statewide survey of lawyers, an independent research evaluation of candidates, and peer reviews by practice area. No more than 5% of the lawyers in Texas are selected

by Super Lawyers. Cavenaugh

Class Notes Submissions Send your class notes to alumniupdate@trinity.edu, or fill out the form at gotu.us/alumniupdates.

Photo Submissions: Bigger is better!

Digital photos should be saved at high resolution—300 dpi with dimensions at least 1800 x 1200 pixels.

Email photos to alumni@trinity.edu.

Prints can be mailed to Alumni Relations, One Trinity Place #49, San Antonio, Texas, 78212-7200.

was also selected for the Best Lawyers in America list for 2021. Best Lawyers listings are based on a peer review survey of thousands of attorneys who vote on the legal abilities of others in their practice areas.

Melissa (Fimbres) Manke has

been promoted to director of technical services for Valero Energy Corporation at the Benicia, California, refinery.

From February through April 2020, Alyson Rose-Wood deployed with the U.S. Public Health Service to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Washington, D.C., Quarantine Station to support COVID-19 enhanced passenger screenings. Rose-Wood managed the daytime screening operations, conducted tertiary screenings of symptomatic travelers, and led daily briefings for federal partners. While deployed, Rose-Wood completed her doctorate in public health from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Her research focused on improving infectious disease linkage to care and treatment for detainees repatriated from the United States to Mexico.

2007 Michael Klosowsky was appointed as an immigration judge in March 2020 by Attorney General William P. Barr.

Klosowsky earned a juris doctor degree in 2011 from the University of St. Thomas School of Law. From 2016 to 2020, he served as assistant chief counsel, Office of Chief Counsel, Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, in El Paso, Texas. From 2011 to 2016, he was an associate

attorney with Klosowsky Law Office PLLC in Sugar Land, Texas. Klosowsky is a member of the State Bar of Texas.

Steven Leach received a doctorate from London Metropolitan University in May 2020.

2008 Marney Babbitt-Pierce resides in Northern Arizona and was elected to her town council. She works at the health start-up Noom and believes it’s just as good as all the reviews say it is!

Babbitt-Pierce says, “If you’re looking for a change and want to come to a fun tech start-up where we work hard to change lives through behavior change, we are always hiring! We have remote and New York-based roles for recent grads, experienced Ph.D.s, and everyone in between. Feel free to reach out at marney.babbitt@gmail.com.”

McCall Wascher was named

patient experience and quality coordinator at Ascension Seton Hays in Kyle, Texas.

2010

Yvonne Freckmann released

2009 Miguel Perez III successfully

capital management from Bellevue University in Bellevue, Nebraska. Perez began teaching at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi (TAMUCC) in 2014 as an adjunct faculty member with the College of Nursing and Health Sciences. In 2017, he joined TAMUCC as a full-time faculty member. Prior to joining TAMUCC, Perez served as chief information officer for Driscoll Children’s Health System.

defended his dissertation and earned a doctorate in human

an album of music for cello and electronics with cellist Clara Rivière called UNDA Cellotrónica. It is available for streaming

Rosella at the Riverwalk Museum Reach was the site of a limited-attendance wine tasting event for a small group of San Antonio alumni and spouses in December 2020. Spaced out at a safe distance, the 10 attendees enjoyed a tasting that included a light assortment of cheese, cured meat, and crackers, a wine flight featuring five wines, and a presentation on each wine by a wine expert.

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CLASS NOTES

on Spotify and YouTube and for download on her website, yvonnefreckmann.com.

Christina (Carni) Rasmussen M’12 joined Tenet

Healthcare as senior director for enterprise operations in January 2021. She is excited to lead strategic initiatives across the organization in partnership with the hospitals serving communities across the country.

Trinity alumni around the

2011

nation used Zoom to discuss Fauja Singh Keeps Going,

Lindsay Landgraf Hess

the story of a Sikh man who

published her debut fantasy romance, Storysinger, in March 2021. It is a blend of otherworldly magic and fiercely feminist romance, with a fresh take on life with anxiety and depression.

Maxym M. Martineau, fantasy romance author of Kingdom of Exiles and The Frozen Prince, called it “a masterful tale of beauty, romance, and magic.”

Storysinger is available for purchase on Amazon.

in 2011 became the oldest person believed to have run a marathon at the age of 100. Authored by Simran Jeet Singh ’06, it is the first children’s book by a major publisher to center on a Sikh character.

In September 2020, New York alumni held an intimate discussion over Zoom (pictured above) with Singh about issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion both in children’s literature and in the wider world. In October 2020, Fort Worth alumni and their families were treated to a special bedtime reading of Fauja Singh Keeps Going.

More Chapter Activities The St. Louis Chapter Board held a virtual meet-and-greet event via Zoom in September 2020, allowing members of the St. Louis alumni community to learn more about the Chapter’s work and explore opportunities to get involved.

The New York Alumni Chapter hosted a “Thurs-Bays” virtual happy hour in October 2020. Each participant was sent a set of

2012 Andre Storey was named vice

president and chief operating officer of Memorial Hermann Cypress in the Greater Houston area in November 2020.

2014 Grant Magness was promoted to CEO of TOPS Surgical Specialty Hospital. The facility is located in North Houston and is one of the first hospitals in United Surgical Partners International.

Magness considers himself very fortunate and has had some amazing experiences in his career. Here’s to more health care fun!

Shane Manning is the deputy

chief privacy officer of Texas Health and Human Services.

2015 Jimmy Clark M’17 was promot-

ed to assistant administrator at UT Health Tyler in 2020. In addition, Clark was named administrator of UT Health East Texas Long-Term Acute Care in 2019.

Kelsey Kirkman completed

her medical degree from UT Southwestern in 2019 and is completing her pediatric residency at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston.

Bombay Bicycle Club virtual backgrounds to give the group the feeling of being back in San Antonio at a quintessential Trinity watering hole!

National Capital Area alumni teamed up in groups of six for virtual trivia with Lou’s City Bar in November 2020. Alumni tested their knowledge with rounds of questions on pop culture and music.

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TRINITY Spring 2021

Katy Norman successfully

defended her doctorate in biomedical engineering from the University of Michigan in July 2020. In addition, she accepted a scientist position with the pharmaceutical company Sanofi.

2016 Sarah Longridge M’17 is owner of Artworks Art Studio, an art studio for children in San Antonio. Feb. 1, 2021, marks the 25th anniversary of Artworks Art Studio, one of the longest-running dedicated art studios for children in the San Antonio area. Artworks Art Studio is a space where creativity can flourish for children of all ages!

Offerings include early childhood, home school, and after school art classes. When school is out of session, daily camps and open studio hours are offered to promote free-play creative exploration.

Artworks Art Studio hosts and administers birthday parties, school

field trips, scout troop events, and team-building events. Despite the pandemic, Longridge has safely provided limited services to children of first responders and essential workers and maintains hope for a full re-opening in the future.

For more information, contact sarah@artworksartstudio.com, or visit artworksartstudio.com.

2019 Aida Kajs is serving a two-year term on the board of the Young Nonprofit Professionals Network of Chicago.

Stay Connected “Trinity University Alumni Association” “Trinity University Alumni Group”

2020 Reunion Giving Breaks Records In early 2020, the Reunion Committees for the 0/5 classes began planning outreach to their classmates to encourage them to both attend Alumni Weekend and make their class gift. When Alumni Weekend 2020 was postponed, the committee members continued to work, asking their fellow classmates to support Trinity during this critical time by raising funds for Trinity students.

In early January, the committees came together to celebrate their reunion giving totals, presenting a check for a record-breaking $4.2 million from the 10 classes (1970 to 2015) to President Danny Anderson.

4.2 million*

$

raised from 10 classes (1970 to 2015) *all-time record for reunion giving

19.5%

@TrinityUAlumni

total reunion

@trinityu.alumni

class giving rate

2.1 million

“Trinity University Alumni” group

$

Trinity University Alumni Association

highest amount raised from a single class (Class of 1980)

Find a Chapter or Network City Join thousands of Tigers nationwide in volunteering and

28%

highest giving rate from a single class (Class of 1995)

networking with local alumni. There are Chapters and Network Cities throughout the United States­—find one close to you! www.trinity.edu/alumni/connect/chapters-and-networks

We extend a sincere thank you to the 2020 committees members who will continue to work this summer to invite their classmates to Alumni Weekend. If you are in a 0/5 or 1/6 reunion class and would like to serve on your reunion committee, please contact reunions@trinity.edu.

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IN MEMORIAM

Carol (Markham)

Art Rilling ’54

Wayne Este ’63

Rosemary

George Bronson ’73

William Garlitz ’82

Holland ’44

Jan. 4, 2021

Sept. 30, 2020

Menconi ’68

Nov. 10, 2020

Sept. 27, 2020

Philip Hudson ’73

Ralph Minas ’82

Aug. 30, 2020

Sept. 29, 2020

Verlyn Knowles ’73

Patrick Sobczak ’82

Dec. 16, 2020

Nov. 12, 2013

Stephen Schultz ’73

Lesley Paulsen ’83

Dec. 21, 2020

Jan. 6, 2021

Nov. 1, 2020

Dec. 31, 2020 Dorothy (Minton)

Mary (Borrer)

Anne (Newberry)

Klaus ’55

Gerza ’63

Richard Pillsbury ’68

Bergman ’45

Jan. 10, 2021

Dec. 13, 2020

Nov. 21, 2020

Lawrence Lane ’55

Fred Krizan ’63

Rebecca (Hancock)

Sept. 30, 2020

Oct. 18, 2020

Sikes ’68

Mary (O’Mealy)

Jane (Kinsey)

Sammons ’55

Johnson ’64

Elise (Bilhartz)

Oct. 25, 2020

Dec. 8, 2020

Townsend ’68

John Speckmiear ’73

Susan (Baker)

Dec. 18, 2020

Oct. 30, 2020

Weddington ’83

Nov. 4, 2020 Marion (Wier) Deford ’47

Aug. 20, 2020

Jan. 2, 2021 Will Jackson ’47 Aug. 22, 2020

Judy (Staples)

Marion (Mast)

Mary (Gauntt)

Aull ’56

Tangum ’64

Samuel Setterlund ’69

Guntis Terauds ’73

Townsend ’47

Sept. 17, 2020

Jan. 12, 2021

Aug. 29, 2020

Nov. 6, 2020

Allen Combs ’56

Bonnie (Williams)

Tony Hall ’70

Scott Trenton ’73

Feb. 16, 2020

Rayborn ’65

Nov. 8, 2020

Nov. 19, 2020

Patricia (Holder)

Jen-Wei Koo ’74

James Hewgley ’66

Knight ’70

March 25, 2020

Nov. 1, 2020

Oct. 11, 2020

Sharon (Melton)

Dan Harrison ’71

McDermott ’66

Sept. 5, 2020

Sept. 1, 2020

Nov. 25, 2020 Caroline (Fox)

Dec. 11, 2020

Keller ’48

Dec. 13, 2020

Oct. 22, 2020

Carroll Grimes ’57 Jan. 2, 2021

Caron Waits ’49 Jan. 2, 2021 Gus Hahn ’50 May 22, 2020

Randall Woods ’57

Oct. 27, 2020

(Tomlinson) Reed ’77

Ingrid (Starr)

Newton ’71

Oct. 13, 2020

Thomas Clegg ’59

Novak ’66

Jan. 8, 2021

Nov. 7, 2020

Oct. 29, 2020

Patsy (Klauer) Sebesta ’51

Delois (Craddock)

Louis Schiavo ’66

Jan. 8, 2021

Nelson ’59

Dec. 27, 2020

July 25, 2020 Gayle (Williams)

Ben Sifuentes ’71

Bode ’78

Peter Stinner ’88

Dec. 24, 2020

Nov. 22, 2020

Aug. 17, 2020

Richardene

Deborah Gibson ’90

Austin-Comar ’72

(Sapenter) Keys ’78

July 24, 2020

Dec. 12, 2020

Sept. 28, 2020

Nov. 4, 2020

Patricia (Parrent)

Mark Bing ’72

Mary Rucas ’78

Nan (Emmerich)

Cortez ’67

Jan. 9, 2021

Sept. 11, 2020

Scrivener ’62

Sept. 15, 2020 Robert Shaw ’72

Lauren Bensi ’79

Nov. 9, 2020

Oct. 19, 2020

William Smith ’72

Donald Flanagan ’79

March 5, 2020

Aug. 5, 2020

Anita (Bearden)

Betty Gavora ’81

Weibel ’72

Jan. 3, 2020

Maxine McLean ’62

Thomas Feldman ’95

Sept. 26, 2020

Angel Leon Sonny

Dec. 2, 2020

Stath ’52

Mary Ann

Feb. 26, 2021

Frank Valdez ’62

Neidhardt ’67

Nov. 17, 2020

Oct. 1, 2020

Delmar Wurzbach ’52 Dec. 17, 2020 Earl Fowler ’54

Patricia (Garwood)

Marcia Hulen ’68

Dullye ’63

Nov. 11, 2020

Jan. 2, 2021

Sept. 13, 2020

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Vaughn DeVos ’88

Beverly (Austin)

Ina Schlobohm ’52 Aug. 7, 2020

Dec. 7, 2020

John Carssow ’67

Sept. 20, 2020 Annie Loftin ’52 Dec. 13, 2020

Steven Shepherd ’86

Mary (Chester)

Marion Conditt ’51

Oct. 29, 2020

Dec. 19, 2020 Jessamy

Dec. 9, 2020

Margaret (Mellor) Hanna ’86

Barry Flynn ’76

Oct. 23, 2020

Glenn Vance ’85 Dec. 11, 2020

Riley Smith ’57

Oct. 5, 2020

Charles Jordan ’84

TRINITY Spring 2021

Nov. 4, 2020 Chris Martin ’97 Dec. 26, 2020 Caitlin Howell ’06

Nov. 24, 2020

No. 20, 2020

Remembering Angel Leon Sonny Stath 1926-2021 Angel Leon Sonny Stath (a.k.a. Skeeter Flanagan Stath), of Kerrville, Texas, died

Feb. 26, 2021, just days prior to his 95th birthday.

“Skeeter,” as he was known at Trinity, served as a torpedoman on the USS Requin and other submarines in the World War II Pacific Theatre. Honorably discharged in 1946, Skeeter operated a deep water salvage company in southern California but soon followed the love of his life, Mary, into the circus.

Skeeter eventually became Mary's catcher in an award-winning act, "The Flying Marilees," which enjoyed top billing all over the world.

An excerpt from Skeeter’s own farewell message is reprinted with permission from his family and is trimmed for length. Read the full message— we promise it’s worth the read!—at legcy.co/2Pp4TWC.

… Back home to San Antone, they put

me through Trinity University, where I was awarded a Bachelor of [Arts] degree [in speech and drama]. So, with diploma in hand I joined the circus.

And then Mary happened!

It was 1952, and I had taught English and coached at a tiny high school just long enough to realize that this could not be my chosen profession. A college friend enticed me to a vacant lot on the South Side where a flying trapeze act, The Flying Romas, was laying off for the winter and practicing. It was love at first sight, not only for the fascination of real show business but for the extraordinary beauty of the blonde aerialist. That was Mary. She didn't know I existed and when her husband (The plot thickens!) accepted me as a donkey laborer, we motored north to Chicago. Undeterred, I plugged away as a ring boy and clamored up on the trapeze at every free opportunity. Mary saw I was serious (in more ways than one) and began to help me.

That was the beginning of a beautiful love affair.

Mary, Eddie (another famous performer), and I headed for California where Mary had contacted her old friend, Roy Rogers, who said we were welcome to come out and use his ranch for a place to stay and practice.

Only now, it was agreed I would never be a capable flyer, so I must learn to catch, and learn I did. True it cost my

flyers many a bruised body and scraped undercarriage, but before the summer was out we had obtained a contract with the Clyde Beatty Circus 1954. It was barely a living with one day stands and long jumps between. Life grew tedious and the Flying Mary-Eddies called it quits after six months, but I had developed into a capable catcher. Unlike the normal catcher of 200 pounds and enormous arms, I was 150 pounds of gristle with long arms, huge hands and slender wrists. Most flyers commented what a pleasure it was to be able to wrap their hands around the catcher's arms.

It did save many a bad trick.

To my credit, some time ago I was in the 1973 Guinness Book of Records as the first flying trapeze artist to catch a three-and-a-half somersault. It was in Durango, Mexico, in 1962. The record lasted for some years until some smart, skinny kid caught a quadruple.

But I digress, and the lamp is low.

Mary, my flyer and mentor, and I married in Tijuana in the year of 1953.

Twenty-five pesetas and we were no longer living in sin. But just to make Mother and Dad more comfortable, we had a justice of peace do it again in 1954.

Mary was still uneasy, so we were made man and wife in the massive Catholic cathedral in Vienna, Austria. From beginning to end we had 60 terrific, tumultuous years together. I loved her, I miss her, and I love her still.

Skeeter spent decades in the circus after graduation.

While at Trinity, Skeeter formed an Acrobatic Club that performed on various occasions. He also played the role of court jester leading the campus queens to their coronation events.

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CLASS NOTES

Jay F. Gamel, 1927 Mirage

Lost and Found 1927 Trinity class ring reunited with owner’s family Sonoma County treasure hunter Woodrow Engle was metal detecting when he found a mystery ring. Here is his story: Back in June, I was metal detecting a local Petaluma, California, park when I found a 10K gold class ring, Class of 1927. It was extremely worn, but “Trinity” was visible, and on the inside of the band were the initials ‘JFG.’ I initially thought it was Trinity College in Connecticut and hunted down a lead I found regarding a student with ‘JG’ initials, but a family member got back to me and said that the middle name didn’t match, and he didn’t think the ring was from Trinity College.

So, with my new digital microscope, I decided to have a closer look, and I found “University” on the bottom portion of the ring face. This led me to discovering a Trinity University in Texas from that era, and luckily they kept a digitized library of yearbooks running all the way back to the 1800s.

I found the 1927 yearbook and started going through the seniors, and sure enough, there was a Jay F. Gamel who graduated that year. Now we were getting somewhere!

I Googled the name and found that he had passed away in 1969. (He was both a World War II and Korean War veteran.) I was able to find an image of his gravestone in San Antonio. I then began browsing Facebook for that last name and found someone who lived 25 miles away in Kenwood. I checked out his page, and wouldn’t you know it, he had a memorial post for his father with the same gravestone pictured. We’d found our man!

I finally was able to get in touch with him, and it turns out some burglars had robbed his house about 10 years ago, and the class ring was among one of the objects stolen. How it made it into the park is anyone’s guess. He was obviously shocked and super happy—he was not expecting to see it again.

We made arrangements, and soon the ring was back in his hands after being missing for over a decade.

Special thanks to fellow Sonoma County resident Amy Malaise ’97 for sharing this story.

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TRINITY Spring 2021

COMMENTARY

Undercover Dean

As David Tuttle, Dean of Students, retires after more than three decades at Trinity, we asked him to reflect on the lessons he’s learned about leadership during his tenure at the University.

In the television show Undercover Boss, a CEO wears a

poor disguise and then works various jobs among his or her employees. The boss ultimately finds their staff is working in poor and easily correctable conditions, reveals their identity, and then rewards the hardworking people they met with perks and announces that company problems will be fixed pronto. It’s like Gilligan’s Island. After an episode or two, the pattern repeats.

Here is the sad part: Many organizations operate like those on Undercover Boss. I have spent countless hours in campus meetings (time I obviously could have spent watching TV) strategizing around aspirational vision—only to be disappointed when that vision isn’t executed across the broader campus. On the whole, though, we implement vision and strategy pretty well through the strength of leadership and the hard work of the faculty and staff.

I recall seeing a prominent ex-general as a distinguished speaker on campus. I don’t remember his canned remarks on leadership. I’m therefore well aware that my words may land like the tremendous sleeper show Patriot—you can ignore them, but you might be missing out.

LEADERSHIP, TUTTLE-FIED The qualities of the best leaders are pretty simple, and they’re ones I try to follow and have observed from countless people at any level on campus.

Leaders, undercover or otherwise, have creative vision, they are implementers, they make difficult decisions, and they are good supervisors.

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ERS 3. BE COMFORTABLE MAKING THE TOUGH DECISIONS 4. BE A SUPPORTIVE SUPER

Have creative vision. I have a couple mantras. The first is to look at what others are doing, and do the opposite. It doesn’t always work, but watching leaders who don’t follow a formula can be enlightening. Second, look at what can be, rather than what is. This requires asking the question: What if we could build it from scratch?

Execution matters. Leaders who can also execute, usual-

ly with a strong support team, are invaluable. I am not a patient person, and I operate a lot off of intuition. Once I have an idea, I know how I want the finished product to look, even if the details are murky. My deficiencies usually involve things in the intellectual realm. Because of that, I surround myself with people whose strengths are in technology, finances, and eye-rolling. Implementers have to be relentless—and bosses need to let them be that way.

Be comfortable making the tough decisions. Being a leader means making difficult decisions and having support from above. It never feels good to push back against others. But part of being a leader is accepting some people will really, really not like you. Have the courage to determine what is best for the greater good versus the individual.

Be a supportive supervisor. Employees want to be

appropriately paid, to have their work recognized, and to not be micromanaged. Now, I know some of my former Residential Life employees may do a spit-take on the last one. Is it too much to ask that the wood grain on the tables in the study lounges all run the same direction? I think not, and I stand by that. But the best way to be a good leader is often to get out of the way while mentoring, coaching, and holding people to standards of excellence.

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TRINITY Spring 2021

“Make the workplace more like Ted Lasso and less like C-SPAN.” Make meetings efficient and fun. And this might seem as

minor as Chuck on Happy Days (you’ll have to Google it), but running effective meetings is really important. Be prepared, do advance work, have a charge, have a goal, and summarize progress. And if I don’t leave a meeting without having some fun, then I see it as a failure. Make the workplace more like Ted Lasso and less like C-SPAN. Finally, I like to reference Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (the claymation version). A lot. Many of the characters are flawed: Sam the Snowman is a self-serving gossip; Yukon Cornelius is incompetent; and the Head Elf (he doesn’t even have a name!) is a horrible boss. You get the idea, and we haven’t even addressed Rudolph’s dad, Donner. On the other hand, Rudolph is selfless, forgiving, and ready to lead; his mom is warm and assertive; Clarice is brave and compassionate; Hermey is true to himself; Mrs. Claus, though a tad crabby, is the engine that makes things run; and the Doll on the Island of Misfit Toys is a total team player (and why is she there, anyway?). If Santa had the chance to go Undercover, he would see the obvious: He’s got work to do, but he’s in good company because leaders are everywhere—good ones and bad ones. Finding leaders is easy. They are out in the open. You just need to know what you are looking for.

– David Tuttle

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Trinitonian, 1962

A Moment in Time From polio in the ’60s and swine flu in the ’70s to coronavirus in 2021, vaccinations for pandemiclevel diseases have been distributed at Trinity for decades. This spring, the University began administering the COVID-19 vaccine to eligible faculty, staff, and students—flip to page 33 to read more.

Trinitonian, 1976