Message from the Dean
January 2021
Dear SOE Billiken Alums,
Once again, I hope that this note finds you healthy and safe. In recent weeks, my
spirits have been lifted and I am optimistic about the possibilities of a New Year.
We at SLU have shown that we can successfully manage to deliver in-person education
in a way that is safe for students and faculty, although it is certainly not optimal
and we look forward to a return to more ‘typical’ operations! Moreover, we have been
reminded how much we all – students, staff, faculty, and alumni – value the opportunities
to gather together as a community. Finally, we have also learned that we can adapt
and develop new strategies; we are certainly thinking about ways that we can continue
to employ some of our new strategies to better serve our community in the future.
For example, Zoom has provided us an opportunity to gather as a community and overcome
barriers of distance. I anticipate that, in addition to our standard fare of in-person
events, we will provide other new events via the power of technology. We have exciting
days ahead!
Lest I get ahead of myself, I don’t want to gloss over the fact that these early months
in Spring will certainly continue to be challenging for all of us. In the School of
Education, and at SLU more broadly, we now know that we are most certainly able to
deliver ‘mask-to-mask’ instruction safely. In fact, there was not a single reported
instance of COVID-19 transmission in classrooms or labs last term! The fact that we
have figured out how to bring students into community on campus and deliver instruction
while keeping our community safe is heartening. But we do realize that all our efforts
focused on health and physical safety did not address needs related to student mental
health. And, during a pandemic, of course these needs are great. In 2021, we will
be very intentional about addressing the stress, anxiety, and mental health needs
of our students and community.
Before I introduce you to our SOE updates in this issue, let me remind you that we
are in the midst of application season for Fall 2021. Please let your friends and
colleagues know that we have several master’s degree programs that are flexible, relevant,
rigorous, and now affordable with a new lower tuition rate! If you are currently a
teacher, you may be interested in our M.A. in Educational Leadership or our new M.A.
in Education Principles and Practices. If you are a career changer thinking about
entering the field of teaching, please check out our MAT, or Master of Arts in Teaching,
which includes a degree and certification. Finally, if you are seeking work in higher
education settings, you should consider our M.A. in Student Personnel Administration.
We are pleased to share several great stories in this newsletter. We are excited to
spread the word about our new SOE Interdisciplinary Center for Autism Services. In
the midst of a pandemic, our Educational Leadership program, serving school leaders
in Catholic and Public schools, continues to thrive. We also share an article highlighting
the work of one of our new faculty members in Educational Leadership, Dr. Jaime Welborn,
and her work related to culturally relevant instruction in the classroom. Finally,
we close with an update from our much-loved Billiken Teacher Corps (BTC) program,
and share the exciting news that the BTC is expanding across the Mississippi River
into Illinois to partner with St. Patrick’s Catholic School in Springfield.
As always, please let us know if there are ways we can support you better or communicate
with you more effectively. We look forward to seeing you on campus – sometime soon!
Best wishes for a great start to 2021,
Gary W. Ritter, Ph.D.
Dean, School of Education