Education

Fall 2022 message from the Dean’s Development Council chair

Linda Verba, chair of the Dean’s Development Council in the College of Education at Penn State. Credit: Photo provided. All Rights Reserved.

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Much has been said about change. It’s the only constant. It’s necessary for growth. It drives innovation.

Penn State has experienced a host of exciting changes over the past few months. We started this semester with a new University president, a new athletic director and thousands of new students, faculty and staff launching their Penn State careers at University Park and our campuses across the commonwealth. In the coming months, we’ll see the hiring of a new provost.

In summarizing the College of Education’s mission, Dean Kimberly Lawless has championed the motto: Changing Education by Educating for Change. Truer words were never spoken.

It’s also been said that we, as individuals and collectively, have the power to make change happen. For proof, look no further than the impact donors to the College of Education made during the Greater Penn State Campaign.

From July 1, 2016, through June 30, 2022, our alumni and friends endowed 71 new scholarship funds and increased the average amount awarded to scholarship-eligible students by 42% — that’s a fabulous change!

We created or named four exciting new learning and outreach spaces, including the Gay and William Krause Learning Space, the Leonhard Language and Literacies Studio, the Dr. Edwin Herr Clinic and the John H. Martinson STEM Education Laboratory. Our annual GivingTuesday campaigns raised $28,638 in support of the Office of Education and Social Equity. Overall, passionate philanthropists contributed over $38.2 million to the College of Education — the most impactful campaign performance in our history.

These gifts — YOUR gifts — to the College of Education impact not just the beneficiaries of your generosity, but the thousands of others with whom those educators, counselors and policymakers, current and future, will engage over the course of their careers. That is changing the world.

This GivingTuesday (Nov. 29), I hope you’ll join the DDC in supporting the life-changing work taking place in OESE. See the feature on Page 19 for more information. Thank you.

As for me, I am proud to serve as the new chair of the Dean’s Development Council. WE ARE committed to supporting the College’s strategic plan, its fundraising goals and objectives and the dedicated staff in the Office of Development.

While we embrace the opportunity to facilitate change, we remain steadfast in our belief in the transformational power of education and educators, of philanthropy and of the diverse, ever-expanding community of donors we represent.

And that will never change. All the best. BE WELL.

Linda Verba
(Elementary and Kindergarten Education, Class of 1971)

Last Updated November 15, 2022

Contact