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State Teachers College Class of 1958
Reunion Slide Shows |
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The Art of Remembrance:
The Class of 1958 Visits the Past
by Nanette Cormier
“The art of remembrance,” a long-popular notion, took on fresh meaning recently for a reunion gathering of the State Teachers College at Boston Class of 1958. Undergraduate memories and contemporary art merged when they took a Trolley from UMass Boston’s Columbia Point through the South End and into lower Roxbury before arriving at their former campus at 625 Huntington Avenue.
The precursor to State Teachers College, the Boston Normal School, was built in 1907. The “Education for Service” motto still adorns the building’s gate and its classical architecture has changed little since the 1950s. But today the facility is home to MassArt -- the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, the nation’s only public college of its type.
MassArt’s alumni director Jim Smith welcomed the gathering of UMass Boston alumni and shared with the retired educators the unique mission of his institution, from its origins as a school to train textile artists in the 1860s to its preparation of graphic designers, painters, and sculptors today. But even the Class of 1958’s fascination with history and appreciation for art couldn’t suppress their palpable anticipation of touring their old school.
Hallowed halls and memories
“This view is great,” said one alumna during the opening wine and hors d’oeuvres reception in the 11th-floor president’s gallery. “But we want to see ‘our buildings’!” Present morphed into past as their tour commenced and the Class of 1958 followed serpentine hallways from MassArt’s contemporary buildings to the halls, classrooms, and laboratories where they learned and laughed in the mid-1950s.
Oftentimes new inhabitants, with an urge to renovate, can wreak havoc on the integrity and graceful lines of older architecture. Not the case with MassArt. The college has reverently embraced the original structure of 625 Huntington Avenue, with its dark woodwork, Greek-revival friezes, and tiled flooring.
When the group entered the great hall, their friendly reminiscences trickled to silence as they gazed upward at its immense windows and delicate friezes of horses and warriors. A sense of awe filled this elegant but familiar space. Soon the memories flowed, through animated conversations about convocations, midterms, and theater performances.
Proceeding into the outdoor courtyard, the classmates found themselves back at the location of their commencement a half century ago, then and now a popular spot for socializing. Connecting with the past steadily reminded them of their admiration for the teaching profession, and stories emerged about the group’s remarkable contributions to the education of children.
Making a difference through teaching
Dorothy Greenbaum, a 35-year veteran of the Boston Public Schools, recalled the traumas of teaching during desegregation. One fall she had half a class of first-graders who didn’t know the alphabet and the other half eager to read Dr. Suess. “I just learned to accept them where they were, and took lots of deep breaths,” she said.
Dick Carbone shared two sets of memories. As an undergraduate student-athlete, he contributed to powerhouse teams, and later as a professor in the 1960s and 70s taught and witnessed history. “When King was assassinated we were walled up in that great hall for hours,” he recalled. Carbone, who taught in California and Wayland, then spent 22 years as an educational specialist in the Massachusetts Department of Education, taking on challenges such as Title I. “State Teachers College gave me a wonderful education,” he said. “We were taught to fit in with all kinds of people, and this made us tough, talented teachers in the civil rights era.”
Betty Doherty remembered the $3,500 annual salary she made as a newly minted graduate. She also recalled the stringent obligation the college placed on its students to learn to swim at the local YMCA. “I’ll never forget those woolen bathing suits they made us wear,” she said. She taught elementary school and then operated a family daycare program needed by the growing number of women in the workforce.
A tour of MassArt’s gallery space spurred Paul Collins, a longtime New Hampshire middle-school principal, to mention that his school had received the prestigious Federal Department of Education Blue Ribbon of Excellence award, in part because of the school’s dynamic programs in arts education. His classmate and wife, the former Patricia Kalistian, also contributed years of service as an elementary teacher.
Cecelia Hodges McCall, a Roxbury native, studied biology as an undergraduate but went on to pursue a PhD in English and communications at the City University of New York. She spent her career as a professor and activist, and now is working on novels. “Even though I was number one in my high school, I wasn’t encouraged to attend college,” she said, and went on to speak of her gratitude to State Teachers College, which, long after application deadlines, took one look at her transcript and accepted her on the spot.
Widely recognized in Texas for her contributions to educating the gifted and talented, Joanne Papahagis Jeffers is one of the few State Teachers College alumnae who left Massachusetts. She believes her teaching skills were best honed through her student-teaching in the inner city. She learned the basics, like “be animated, but don’t smile ’til Christmas.’”
Following Teacher’s College, Rose Turco pursued a master’s degree in math education funded by the Ford Foundation in response to Sputnik. While she deepened her content knowledge throughout her career, she said that the teaching skills and methodology she learned at State Teachers College were “the foundation of her success.” She added, “Teaching is more than chalk and a blackboard. State Teachers College, with its intensity and depth, gave us confidence to handle all those dimensions of education that make or break kids’ ability to learn.”
Extending a legacy of learning
Turco, who chaired the reunion committee, helped her class to establish the first endowed scholarship for master’s-degree students at the UMass Boston Graduate College of Education. More than $30,000 has been raised to date. “While we are thrilled about the scholarship,” she said, “we are as excited by our new connections to UMass Boston, which will continue the legacy of State Teachers College. It’s wonderful to know that our love for the profession will continue through the future teachers the scholarship supports.” It is not lost on Turco that she and her classmates would never have made their wide contributions to education had it not been for the affordability of studying at State Teachers College.
She also had had the privilege of representing the reunion class at the university’s 2008 commencement a day earlier, and was especially moved when Chancellor Motley asked the graduates who were the first in their families to receive a college diploma to stand. “I knew exactly what they were feeling,” she said. “Just like us 50 years ago, these graduates fully appreciate the opportunities they’ve been given.”
Chancellor J. Keith Motley, PhD stands with Graduate College of
Education Associate Dean Felicia Wilczenski who just received the
Class of 1958's gift of $30,579 from alumna Rose Turco. The gift
has endowed a scholarship for a graduate student who
aspires to a teaching career.
Support the Class of 1958 50th Reunion Scholarship
send your gift to:
Kelly Westerhouse
Director
UMass Boston Fund
University Advancement
University of Massachusetts Boston
100 Morrissey Boulevard
Boston, MA 02125-3393
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