St. Edward's University Alumni News (Austin, Tex.), Vol. 29, No. 2, Ed. 1 Sunday, June 1, 1986 Page: 4 of 9
nine pages : ill. ; page 18 x 12 in. Scanned from physical pages.View a full description of this newspaper.
- Highlighting
- Highlighting On/Off
- Color:
- Adjust Image
- Rotate Left
- Rotate Right
- Brightness, Contrast, etc. (Experimental)
- Cropping Tool
- Download Sizes
- Preview all sizes/dimensions or...
- Download Thumbnail
- Download Small
- Download Medium
- Download Large
- High Resolution Files
- IIIF Image JSON
- IIIF Image URL
- Accessibility
- View Extracted Text
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
)’S
■
A
Dr. Patricia Hayes
Two SEU Faculty Celebrate 40th Jubilees
Continued from page 2
"=
-
A
i
E,
I*
;z
Brother Louis Coe congratulates Brother Gerald Muller and Brother Eagan Hunter at their
40th jubilee celebration. (Photo by Jim Gonzalez)
PRESIDENT’S
CORNER
• J
England as a student of William
Mathias, the composer famous for the
Royal Wedding music.
Looking back on a career of 40
years, Brother Muller laughs at how it
all began with his purchase of a piano,
“I had been begging for a piano and
finally found one when, at age 12, I
accompanied an aunt to a furniture
sale. I bought the thing and got busy
at the keyboard. The people who
tuned it told me my $15 purchase was
a steal, that the piano was really a very
valuable item!”
Brother Muller isn’t interested in
talking about retirement and says he
never will. “The Holy Cross Brothers
Summer at St. Edward’s University
is a time to evaluate what has been
accomplished during the past aca-
demic year and to refocus our goals
for the future. It is a satisfying time,
particularly in terms of what we can
measure, and a very important time,
particularly in relation to what is more
difficult to measure. Many of my
summer reflections have focused on
three very important topics: enroll-
ment, the quality of our faculty, and
our educational vision as a university.
ENROLLMENT. When we mea-
sure progress at St. Edward’s, perhaps
the most affirming statistic is our
enrollment. Spring, 1986, enrollment
was ten percent higher than Spring,
1985. Freshman applications for Fall,
1986, are running fifty percent higher
than applications for Fall, 1985.
Why is this happening and what
does it mean? I think it is happening
for three basic reasons. First, Austin
has grown and become more con-
scious of its educational diversity.
Second, the Austin community and
/8/
E
alumnae and friends.”
Also as of June 1, the SEU admis-
sions office is under new leadership.
John L. Lambert has been appointed
Director of Admissions. He comes to
Austin from Shreveport, Louisiana,
where he served as Director of Admis-
sions and Enrollment Planning at
Centenary College. Prior to that, Mr.
Lambert was Director of Financial
Aid and Assistant Director of Admis-
sions. He holds an M.A. in guidance
and counseling from Louisiana Tech
University, a B.A. in religion from
Centenary College and an A.S. in bus-
iness administration from J. Sargeant
Reynolds College in Richmond, Virgi-
nia. Mr. Lambert served in the U.S.
Air Force from 1970 to 1973.
Mr. Lambert says, “St. Edward’s
has a very bright future in terms of the
enrollment picture, not just this fall,
but in the years to come as well. Par-
ents and students tell me it’s the peo-
ple who make St. Ed’s so attractive.”
decided the only way to change it was
to get busy and help educate them.
Now I see that teachers are being
trained with more of the necessary
emphasis on quality, and being inter-
ested in the student as an individual.”
Commenting on the controversial
TECAT issue, Brother Hunter says he
has two feelings, “On one hand I’m
sympathetic to the proven, expe-
rienced teachers who feel it’s a slap in
the face. On the other hand, we do
need some way to measure compet-
ency in young, inexperienced teachers
just getting started.”
particularly the community of pros-
pective students and parents in Central
Texas has become more aware of the
enormous educational value of a small
university where persons are treated as
individuals. And finally, St. Edward’s
has become better known as an insti-
tution over the past few years.
This increased visibility and popu-
larity does not mean that St. Edward’s
will grow larger and larger and even
larger. Our goal is to communicate
effectively with and attract students
who have the academic ability to suc-
ceed in a strong four-year college pro-
gram and who want to become
involved in and benefit from a small
university environment. The optimum
size of the University and of each aca-
demic program within the University
will ultimately be a function of qualit-
ative issues. We want to be “large
enough” for quality in each of our
academic programs, important student
activities and support services, and a
healthy diversity within our student
body. We want to be “small enough”
to maintain the educational distinc-
tiveness of a personalized educational
environment.
FACULTY. Whenever I speak of
academic quality at St. Edward’s Uni-
versity, I am speaking primarily about
the St. Edward’s University faculty.
Yes, there are important issues of stu-
dent quality, facilities, and other
resources, and St. Edward’s is address-
ing all of these, but the primary, long-
term, dynamic source of educational
quality is the faculty.
The St. Edward’s University faculty
is recognized for quality in two prim-
I
[ a
KJ
YV
. (
""
1
‘85599
Two members of the St. Edward’s
University faculty are celebrating their
40th anniversaries as Holy Cross
Brothers. Brother Eagan Hunter, an
Associate Professor of Teaching and
Learning, and Brother Gerald Midler,
an Associate Professor of Music, have
jointly commemorated their 40th jubi-
lees with a liturgy and dinner on April
26. Nearly 200 invited guests were on
hand to help the two brothers
celebrate.
Brother Muller came to St.
Edward’s eight years ago with more
than three decades of teaching expe-
rience in his background. Brother
Muller plays almost every musical
instrument except the guitar and is
director of the St. Edward’s Hilltopper
Chorale and Omni Singers, “I’ve
always loved music, I knew at a very
early age that I wanted to be a brother
and that I wanted to make a career
out of teaching music, a subject 1
dearly loved.” Most recently he
directed the Hilltopper Chorale in the
very difficult Rossini work “Petite
Messe Solennelle". Brother Muller
studied the work with Sir. David Wil-
cocks, former director of London’s
Royal College of Music.
“One of the things I enjoy most
about my position at St. Edward’s is
that every summer I’m free to travel
and study and bring back to the stu-
dents what I’ve learned in their
absence,” says Muller, who’s taught in
Mississippi, Louisiana and California.
In the past he’s studied under Eric
Erickson, considered the greatest
choral conductor in Northern Europe,
and Robert Shaw, one of America’s
finest choral directors, who is now
directing the Atlanta Symphony. This
summer Brother Muller will go to
I
' ■
gSfc 69
h
2 •
MBT
provided me with a superb education
at Notre Dame and I hope I can pass
on some of their insight to my stu-
dents. The secret to St. Ed’s is the
challenge! I’ll teach as long as I’m
able.”
Brother Eagan Hunter is on the
faculty of St. Edward’s Center for
Teaching and Learning. He’s spent a
total of seven years at the University
after 29 years as an administrator in
secondary schools. It’s this experience,
says Brother Hunter, “That allows me
to pass on more than just textbook
learning to my students. I wasn’t
happy with the quality of teachers I
saw in the schools where I worked and
ary ways. One is the testimony of
those outside the University, and the
most exciting instance of that testim-
ony during this past year was the
designation of Brother William Dunn
as one often university professors in
the state of Texas to be named an out-
standing teacher by the Piper Founda-
tion. Beyond this singular recognition,
however, are the many invitations to
present papers, the artistic exhibitions,
and the recognition in professional
societies which showcase the St.
Edward’s faculty throughout Central
Texas and beyond. But perhaps the
most significant testimony to the qual-
ity of the St. Edward’s University
faculty come from within the Univer-
sity. It is the testimony of students and
graduates. The main topic of conver-
sation with graduating seniors and
their parents is the dedication, rigor,
creativity, and personal concern which
students experience from the St.
Edward’s University faculty.
The University has taken key steps
during the past year to affirm the
enormous value of our faculty and we
need to do more. We have made a
commitment to a forty percent
increase in faculty salaries over the
next three years and with the help of a
generous benefactor have begun a
modest professional development fund
for faculty. This funding needs to be
expanded to provide professional
renewal opportunities for senior
faculty, professional growth opportun-
ities for all, and special orientation
activities for the new faculty who will
be the heart of St. Edward’s University
in decades to come.
EDUCATIONAL VISION. I have
spoken about the ideal students for St.
Edward’s those who are academi-
cally qualified and interested in the
kind of educational opportunity we
have. I have spoken of the quality
faculty that we have at St. Edward’s
and that we need to maintain in order
to serve the students. The third key to
the uniqueness of St. Edward’s is the
educational vision in which the dia-
logue between faculty and students
takes place. I would just like to com-
ment on one aspect of that vision
which has been the focal point of
many of my reflections this summer.
That focus has been on the unity of
truth. The search for truth joins
together those who use the scientific
method, those who pursue aethestic
inquiry, those who ponder metaphysi-
cal questions, those who explore the
behavioral sciences into what we
call a university. The liberal arts
requirement at St. Edward’s is structur-
al explicitly to open these doors to
truth, but there are other important
ways in which the unity of truth per-
meates the St. Edward’s educational
vision. We speak of the liberal arts
and professional preparation because
we believe the search for truth extends
logically beyond our reflection into
our work and our lives. We place great
value on activities outside the class-
room, both extracurricular activities
on campus and involvement in the
broader community, because we see
the University as a place and time to
develop the whole person.
Of course, the unity of truth is not a
new notion, but it is an extraordinarily
powerful notion and one that is very
important to any measure of quality
or success at St. Edward’s. It is a
commitment to the whole student that
goes well beyond a major or even a
degree. It is the bond of mutual
respect within our community that
focuses our diverse perspectives for the
good of our students. And, ultimately,
the search for truth in a community of
learners and teachers who know and
respect one another is what makes a
small university a distinctive learning
environment.
"029
use.
St. EDWARDS “
UNIVERSITY
-==-*
w,
)
se "
’V
y a
’" oft
" &
w,V “a
2
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Matching Search Results
View nine places within this issue that match your search.Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
St. Edward's University Alumni News (Austin, Tex.), Vol. 29, No. 2, Ed. 1 Sunday, June 1, 1986, newspaper, June 1, 1986; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1528681/m1/4/?q=Lamar+University: accessed June 5, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting St. Edward’s University.