PRESIDENT'S CORNER - April 8, 2016 | School of Public Health

A New Director! I am pleased to be able to announce that we have appointed a new Director for OLLI at WVU. Her name is Jascenna Haislet, currently the Director of MOLLI, the OLLI at the University of Montana in Missoula. Her background includes a BA in Theater Arts from Wright State, and MFA in Theater Management from Wayne State, and a MA in Aging Services Management from the University of Southern California. She spent about 15 years at the University of Northern Iowa serving as publicity and marketing director and/or production manager for the Theater School. As a Theater rat myself, my ears perked right up when I read the words “production manager” on her resume. The production manager in a theater company is the one person who makes sure that all departments—design, directing, acting, crewing, marketing, etc. get their work done on time and under budget. They generally create and control a production calendar for an entire season and chair weekly production meetings where all department heads report on their progress and solve problems. I bit my tongue until we had our final selection discussion of the candidates, and am happy to report that Jascenna was the enthusiastic first choice of our entire committee.

Thanks, one last time to our search committee: Jane Martin, Ann Davidson, Linda Rudy (for SPH), Tom Rogers, Bob Craig and me.

Osher Re-entry Scholarship: Your Board voted to accept administration of this very worthwile scholarship. WVU is one of only 20 universities to host both the OLLI and Re-entry programs, so it is a nice feather in our cap. It will not require too much work but the benefits to come from it with Osher and the students is well worth the effort. Stay tuned…

A Taste of OLLI: If you missed our pre-term event yesterday, it was fun and we got to have brief intros for 9 classes and listing of all others, entertainment by our lap dulcimer group (thank you!), and goodies and punch from Judy Kelly Minor and her committee. We also had quite a few volunteers from Nancy Wasson’s membership committee (and others) stationed at laptops to help those who wished to register for classes or sign up as new members. A special thanks to Chris Kelley for standing in for wife Sonja and getting us all wired up for registration. I hear at least 20 people joined our ranks! And we had about 40 first time visitors. The Dominion-Post was here taking photos (as was our ever-ready Roger Dalton), so watch for further coverage in the press, especially after Jascenna arrives, probably by May 1.

Spring Term: We are just about 10 days from the start of the spring term (April 18) so now’s the time to register for the classes you want to take, get a new friend to come with you and become a member, or try something way outside your comfort zone. We’re seniors, so who cares what anyone else thinks…right? We no longer have to suffer fools…period!

Spring poem: By now you know I love poetry, and this one is one of my all-time favorites from the pen of William Wordsworth…”I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud…” Enjoy!

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

We do still have daffodils blooming in the cold. Aren’t we thankful?

Jim Held, President