After 30 years as a member of the TC faculty, Margaret Jo Shepherd, Professor of Education and Coordinator of the Program on Learning Disabilities, will be retiring. On March 28, nearly 200 people attended a retirement party in the TC cafeteria, sponsored by the Department of Curriculum and Teaching. President Arthur Levine, Dean Karen Zumwalt, and James Borland, the Chair of C&T, were among the more than 25 faculty, friends, students and colleagues who spoke lovingly of her dedication and accomplishments.

Levine said he'd miss Shepherd's "wise counsel" and called her three decades of service to TC unique for its "qualities of compassion, knowledge, truth, and love." Zumwalt thanked her for helping to reshape teacher education at TC and for "shepherding" TC's professional development school. Borland said she "is remembered by so many, not just as an outstanding teacher but as a profound influence on their lives."

One of the many individuals who was touched by her "specialness" is David Schnitzler. Now 31, he was misdiagnosed as a brain-injured two-and-half year old. Through her thorough testing, Shepherd realized that Schnitzler was learning disabled and not brain-injured. Schnitzler, hugging and caressing Professor Shepherd, said that "Dr. Shepherd believed in me and she believed I could succeed."

Alice Goldsmith Elgart, a former member of the Alumni Council with two master's degrees, M.A. '88 and M.Ed. '90, in Reading and Learning Disabilities, pledged a six figure gift from the Barbara Lubin Goldsmith Foundation toward a scholarship in honor of Dr. Shepherd and for the restoration of a seminar room in honor of Dr. Fleischner.

Published Sunday, Apr. 7, 2002