Estate gift to support two areas of college

Impact

Estate gift to support two areas of college

The Penn State College of Education has played a large role in Nancy Shemick’s life from the time she was a child, and now she is giving back by playing a large role in the life of the college.

Shemick, a 1977 Penn State alumna with a degree in health policy and administration who is an active, involved member of the College of Education Dean’s Development Council, has created a $1.5 million estate gift that will simultaneously honor both of her parents and bolster faculty recruitment efforts in two areas of the college.

The first $1 million of her gift will be used to establish an endowed professorship to be known as the Dr. John M. Shemick Workforce Education Professorship in the College of Education.

“My father joined the College of Education faculty in 1960 in Industrial Arts Education,” Shemick said. “During his 27 years here, he participated in the evolution of the program to what is now named Workforce Education and Development. My dad found a home at the College of Education preparing secondary technical and vocational educators, among others.”

The next $500,000 will be used to establish an endowed career development professorship to be known as the Dorothy D. Shemick Early Childhood Education Career Development Professorship in the College of Education.

“My mother returned to Penn State as a graduate student to get a teaching certificate, which prepared her to teach at the local vocationaltechnical school that is now the Central Pennsylvania Institute of Science and Technology,” Shemick said.

The education Dorothy Shemick got at Penn State prepared her to develop a new curriculum in early childhood education for the school. “She knew we need to have people understand how to take care of young children. Research tells us that early childhood education in a childcare setting helps better prepare children for lifelong learning,” said Shemick, and that was the focus of the program Shemick’s mother developed. Later, Dorothy Shemick started her own day care center and hired people who graduated from her program.

“We are grateful for Nancy Shemick’s longstanding support of the College of Education, both in terms of her time and her financial resources,” said Dean Kim Lawless. “Her most recent gift to create these professorships will give the college resources to recruit stellar faculty, so both programs can be as robust as possible.”

Shemick has fond memories of roaming the halls of Chambers Building as a young child on Saturday mornings while her father was grading papers. She also values the opportunities afforded her entire family through the college. Her father was part of a team involved in a United States Agency for International Development (USAID) partnership to create an education plan for the Republic of Panama in the late 1960s. “We spent two years in Panama, and it made me bilingual. That was a great experience for me as a child,” she said. for people, especially alumni, to remain involved and stay abreast of changes in the ecosystem.

“It also helps you identify ways you might be able to become more engaged in some of the work that’s done, because not all of it is done on campus. There are many outreach activities and summer programs creating avenues for participation,” she said.

“I always get a positive boost, a shot of positivity and optimism collaborating with the College of Education because you’re working with the future. You’re connecting with enthusiastic people. For me it’s the antidote to the negativity in the world. It creates this little ray of sunshine,” Shemick said. “Giving for me, whether it’s time or money or other kinds of resources, is definitely a way of contributing to a positive future.”

By Annemarie Mountz

Photo provided Nancy Shemick, top left, with her parents, John and Dorothy, and her sister, Laura, at the Nittany Lion Shrine, in an old family photo.