Thank you for your dedication to our students!
Three of Rosemont’s esteemed professors retired at the end of the fall 2021 semester after many decades of service to our community. We wish them well as they start the latest chapters of their lives!
Tina Waldeier Bizzarro Dr. Tina Waldeier Bizzarro retired as full professor in the Department of History of Art and served as Discipline Coordinator and Major and Minor Advisor for History of Art for over 30 years. Her full-time teaching career began at Rosemont after she completed her PhD in History of Art at Bryn Mawr College, where she was the Howard Lehman Goodhart Fellow in Medieval Studies from 1978 through 1982. An undergraduate Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Pittsburgh and Hamilton College, she earned her BA in French and Italian Language and Literature, with a minor in History of Art. Her love of art, language, and people was the combination of interests that led her to travel widely with Rosemont and Villanova students in travel/study courses she developed over the last 20 years—to France, Italy, Mexico, Scotland, Spain, England, Holland, and Ireland. Dr. Waldeier Bizzarro was awarded over 20 Pew Grants, Connelly Grants, and other professional development grants for scholarly research and conference presentations and received the Lindback Award for Distinguished Teaching in 2007. Dr. Bizzarro was selected as a Fulbright Scholar in Sicily in 2006 and traveled to Italy where she photographed
“The students of Rosemont College have been at the center of my life and consciousness for the last three and one-half decades; you are part of me, and I hope to continue my association with all of you.”
and researched the roadside shrines, or edicole, which dot the countryside of southern Italy. Her Fulbright grant topic formed the title of one the numerous publications on these roadside shrines, “Wayside Warriors: The Roadside Shrines of Sicily.” Dr. Waldeier Bizzarro is a prolific scholar. Over the last three years, she has published three more articles about the roadside shrines in English and Italian publications. During the pandemic, she published two articles (and delivered papers at three major conferences) on Santa Rosalia, the plague saint. One
Richard Leiby Professor Richard Leiby began teaching at Rosemont in 1988. Dr. Leiby taught many history courses, including: Foundations of Western Culture, Mediterranean World, History of Russia, Emergence of Modern Europe, Europe Since Napoleon, 19th and 20th Century Seminars, Europe Since 1945, twosemester History of Germany sequence, Nazi Germany, and Methodology. While at Rosemont, he received the Lindback Award for Distinguished Teaching in 2000, the Connelly
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resulting publication was, “Plague in Palermo: Santa Rosalia Halts the Pathogen.” Dr. Bizzarro’s specialty and passion is architectural history—especially the medieval! Her first ground-breaking book, published by Cambridge University Press, is entitled Romanesque Architectural Criticism: A Prehistory and is a history of the reception of medieval architecture from the 17th through the early 19th century. She has presented over 70 papers and chaired sessions at professional venues in her discipline in the last 35 years at many different venues.
Foundation Grant for research abroad (in former East Germany) in 1997, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) Scholarship for Summer Seminar at the University of Pennsylvania in 1990, and the Pew Memorial Trust Fund Grant for research in 1989. Prior to his teaching career at Rosemont, he was assistant professor at Eastern Michigan University, a visiting assistant professor at Kutztown University, and a visiting instructor at Franklin and Marshall College. Dr. Leiby received his PhD in History from the University of Delaware in 1984.
