Archived Alumni Notes (April 2001-November 2002)

December 16, 2002

Robert O'Brien ‘72, ‘75, ‘82, superintendent of the Huron Valley school district (Milford area), was recently named Michigan "Superintendent of the Year" by the Michigan Association of School Administrators. O'Brien is now a finalist for the national award and a student from his district will receive a $1,000 scholarship.

This is his fourth year as superintendent in the district and his first superintendency. He resolved a $9.2 million district deficit in two years and led a successful $104 million bond proposal to pay for building additions and upgrades. O'Brien was also cited for his extensive efforts to gain community involvement with the schools.

Within the past decade, at least two other COE alums have received the same honor--James Doyle in 1993 and J. Michael Washburn in 1996.

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Clarence Partin ‘61, ‘74, age 64, died recently. He taught industrial arts in the Livonia schools. He developed the building trades program in the Wayne-Westland school district, teaching high school students to build houses that the school district then sold to support the costs of the next year's program.

December 8, 2002

Walter Burt ‘72, superintendent of the Pontiac schools, is in the first class of the Broad Center's 2002 Urban Superintendents' Academy.

Andrew Lindsay ‘94, ‘97, ‘02, a teacher at South Middle School in the Van Buren district, was featured recently on National Public Radio's "Morning Edition" show.

Amy Gohs ‘98 is now on the staff of EMU's Academic Advising Center. She was formerly the assistant director of career services at Hope College.

Jewell McClendon, a recent graduate of the counseling program, is the new Teen Health Center Director at the Stone School in Ann Arbor. This new center was developed through a $75,000 grant that McClendon was awarded from the MI Department of Education and the MI Department of Community Health.
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Katherine Alla (Truax) McClure ‘35, ‘70, age 95, died recently. She was a longtime teacher in the Ann Arbor schools.

Jeanette E. Rank, age 84, holder of two degrees from what is now EMU, died recently in Ann Arbor. She was a longtime special education teacher in the Livonia school system.

Ernest Dascola ‘42, age 84, died recently. He grew up in the Upper Peninsula, where he started barbering in his father's general store at age 10. He moved to Ypsilanti in 1939 to attend "The Normal," and he earned part of his tuition by cutting hair. He served in World War II and cut hair as part of his Army medic duty in Italy. After the war, he returned to the Ann Arbor area and went into partnership with his brothers. At one time, Dascola and his brothers owned four Ann Arbor barber shops. He retired from barbering just a short while ago, but returned to his trade, on a part-time basis, just two weeks before his death.

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