PHOTO BY STEVE HAMBUCHEN
Question: What kind of alumni does the University of Portland fervently wish to produce? Answer: Folks like our man Ramon “RJ” Tagorda, who graduated this summer with a master of arts in teaching through the University’s booming remarkable Pacific Alliance for Catholic Education program. Mister Tagorda, cheerfully called Mister T. or Coach by his giggling students, returns to Holy Cross School in North Portland, where he will be teaching middle school language arts and heading up the technology program. PACE will have a record 44 teachers in the field in 2015-2016, in Oregon, Washington, Utah, Alaska, Hawaii and California; it also welcomed a record 28 new students this summer. All told the program has emitted 137 graduates in 16 years; more than 90% are still teachers, and almost all (85%) are teaching in Catholic schools. Wow. The whole point of the program is to sculpt terrific committed dedicated creative young teachers for Catholic schools in the West that sometimes don’t have eight cents to rub together; students earn their master’s in two years while living in communal houses, actually teaching in Catholic schools, and spending summers in classes on The Bluff. Terrific idea, terrific program, nationally renowned success, and alumni like our man Mister T.? There’s a cool University of Portland verb in action. Could we use gifts large and small to help PACE students, and riveting new ideas like the PACE inclusion initiative for teachers of kids with significant learning differences, and the PACE retreat program by which students, eight times over their two years, get deeper than merely craft, down into tenderness and prayer and witness? Dear yes. Call PACE director Dave Devine ’97 directly if you like – 503.943.7344, devine @up.edu – he’s a good guy and he will know immediately the best target for your gift. And thanks, always, for your generosity.