A Real-World Schooling By Rebecca Dixon ’08
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ydnee Dickson ’80, Utah State’s Superintendent of Public Instruction, began her education in a two-room schoolhouse in rural Utah where her grandmother was her teacher. “My grandmother took ordinary things and made them into magic,” she recalls. “We went from watching trees in the schoolyard to creating beautiful art with crayons, paper, leaves, and an iron.” A young Dickson was mesmerized by the way her grandmother inspired children to read using Shakespeare. And she adopted the values of the farm community where she grew up. “Not many people around me were college graduates,” she says. “People worked hard and shared and helped each other. I carried the desire to make a difference by helping others, and that value of hard work, into my college career and far beyond.” Dickson went on to earn a doctorate in education leadership and policy at the University of Utah and several additional advanced degrees. But it was an introductory education course at Utah State University’s Emma Eccles Jones College of Education and Human Services where she found her calling, she says. “That was the beginning of my entire career in education.” 34
UTAHSTATE I FALL 2020
Dickson benefited from learning early on to use her voice to confront issues of fairness. “I was in junior high in the ’70s, when boys could wear blue jeans, but girls could not,” she recalls. “I worked hard to earn money for school clothes; several of my friends and I bought corduroy pants, but we were told that corduroy was too much like denim and we were not allowed to wear the pants. Everyone else gave up, but I went to the principal, found out who the school board members were, and presented my case. The policy was overturned, and we were then allowed to wear the clothes we had carefully saved our money to buy.” Her experiences as a woman have informed her belief in equity and fairness. “I often step into all-male arenas to engage with thought partners who share common interests and common goals,” says Dickson. “Sometimes there is a space in between your vision and the vision of the group you interact with. That space in between is fertile ground for learning, relationship building, and negotiation.” She has served the children of Utah as a proud educator for the past 39 years, first in roles including teaching, school counseling, school administration, and district
