1









Victoria Ingalls

Marist College
Poughkeepsie, NY
Transcribed by Aubrey Giesler
For the Marist College Archives and Special Collections












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Transcript – Dr. Victoria Ingalls
Interviewee:
Dr. Victoria Ingalls
Interviewer:
Gus Nolan
Interview Date:
7/24/14

Location:
Marist Archives and Special Collections Reading Room
Topic:
Marist College History
See Also:
Subject Headings:
Dr. Ingalls, Victoria



Marist College Faculty



Marist College (Poughkeepsie, New York)



Marist College History
Summary:
Dr. Victoria Ingalls talks about her early years and her coming to Marist College to
teach biology courses on the campus. She also discusses her interest in music and joining the
orchestra at the College.













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00:12

Gus Nolan:
Today is Thursday, the 24
th
of July and we are meeting with Dr. Ingalls from
the Biology Department for our oral interview to be put in the Marist College archives.
00:28
Ingalls:
OK, 2014.
00:29

GN:
2014. OK. Well good afternoon, nice to have you with us.
00:35

VI:
It's great to be here.
00:36

GN:
This is part of an ongoing series of interviews that I have the good fortune to have.
I’ll show you the list and the…
00:47

VI:
You’re going to intimidate me.
00:48

GN:
great people that you've interviewed over the years, I've interviewed over the years
and you're joining that assembly which is a very impressive one it will be more impressive after
today. (Laughter) Let me start with little thumbnail background. Where were you born, brought
up early education that kind of thing?
01:09

VI:
OK, I was born in Brooklyn, in 1955 from a child of the 50s and 60s. And my father
was a college professor. He taught at the Brooklyn College of Pharmacy. He taught
pharmacology amongst other topics. (mic problem) So Dad was a college professor. My mother
was a librarian, I have two older sisters who are very accomplished in their own right. And we
moved into the suburbs of New Jersey when I was eight, and I went to public high school. I
mean I went to public school, public high school. I started at the University of Maine in Orono as
a double major in Zoology and Psychology, because I was always interested in animals. And
after being there for two and a half years I was unhappy at being so far away from home, because
it was about a twelve-hour drive from Maine to where I lived in New Jersey. So at that point I
transferred to Vassar College. I did two years at Vassar College because they just had a rule that
all my credits were fine and everything but you have to take half your graduation credits from


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their institutions which made sense. So, I went to Vassar I was a biopsychology major. I
graduated from Vassar. I worked for two and a half years in a research lab at Princeton
University doing neuro-physiology in the visual area of primates. And then I went to graduate
school at UMass and Amherst in the Zoology because I was really interested in the natural
behavior of animals in their environments.
(Mic problem)
03:11

GN:
We can do this again some time if this doesn’t work.
03:14

VI:
Sure. Anyway yeah so, I worked at Princeton and then yes… Then I went to UMass
and I was a full-time grad student for five years. I studied predator-prey relationships between
birds and insects and then I got hired at Marist.
03:32

GN:
Well, do you go to school continuously for twenty-two years now?
03:40

VI:
No, no, no, remember I worked for two and a half years between my undergraduate
degree and starting my graduate degree. So the two and a half years that I worked I graduate
from Vassar and I go work for two and half years. I happened to work at Princeton University.
So I am a lab tech. I am a neuro-histologist at Princeton University in a research lab there. But
then I go from Princeton back to being a student at UMass Amherst.
04:09

GN:
OK, OK. Through your years was there any particular hobby that you develop you
play the piano, do you sing, do you collect stamps?
04:20

VI:
I play the French horn.
04:21

GN:
You do?
04:22

VI:
Yeah, I started when I was ten and I had lessons. Actually they got me a French horn
teacher who happened to be the first chair French horn player of the New Jersey Symphony. And
he was my teacher from the end of sixth grade all the way through the time I graduated high




5

school. And then I was in the band, the marching band at U Maine and other musical groups that
I could get into because I wasn't a music major and was never a music major. But I played and I
played all the way through college. In fact when I got to Vassar I got to be in the orchestra. I
remember getting to play
Dvořák
's
New World Symphony
which is incredible. But then once you
graduate from college, it's really hard to find musical group to be able to play with. So but I still
actually what happened last semester was I got an e-mail from Art Himmelberger, I know as Art,
and saying that they desperately needed a French horn player for the orchestra and so I joined the
Marist College Orchestra last semester.
05:26

GN:
Is that so?
05:27

VI:
Oh yeah, it was so much fun and I am planning to continue to play next year.
05:32

GN:
I am glad we’re having this. I didn’t know these things about you. I didn’t realize you
were a Vassar girl.
05:38

VI:
Oh, yeah. Hey, I'm like Phi Beta Kappa.
05:40

GN:
You know that. Yeah, I just didn't realize that had happened. So I have a silly
question here. When did you learn about Marist, but by God if you're over by Vassar?
05:50
VI:
I knew nothing about Marist when I was at Vassar. I had never heard of Marist until
my brother-in-law got a job here. Remember Richard who's in the Art department. Richard
Lewis is married to my older sister and he and my sister had come to live in the Hudson Valley
after he finishes MFA. He got a job and you’re going to be interviewing him so you’ll get all
this but he actually was an adjunct one semester came in full time as a replacement person the
next year and has been here ever since. So that year he's a replacement person is the year is my
fifth year of graduate school, I knew I wasn't going to be funded again and I was looking around
for a job. So cute, you remember Marist in the old days you really went to all the gatherings.


6

This is very important. I remember George Hooper one of the most wonderful people on the face
of the earth. For those if you've never met George, Jimmy Stewart with a bow tie, was the head
of science and Richard would be in these gatherings with the faculty and he'd say you know
George, I am gonna see my in-laws this week and they’re just gonna ask. So I'm sorry I have to
ask you, but they're going to ask I am just going to have to ask is there any chance you have a job
for my sister-in-law. And it just turned out that they were hiring. So, that's the only way, the
reason I knew anything about Marist. And that's not why I got the job. I don't think but I actually
know it’s not. But no, but I had but I knew all things that were going on before I arrived which is
very helpful.
07:27

GN:
Do you remember who interviewed, George be one?
07:30

VI:
George, Joe, and Bill Perrotte.
07:32

GN:
Perrotte was there?
07:34

VI:
Oh yeah, oh yeah. Oh they were so funny. Yeah, I remember very early on they were
looking at and of course biology the enrollments were very, very small when I arrived. I arrived
in 1985, ‘85. And George would be looking at the enrollment for one of Bill Perrotte’s class and
it had like three people in it. “Really pulling them in, aren’t you Bill?” teasing him away.
08:01

GN:
Well, I on just … I have about the spirit of the Bio Department and how it’s an
outgrowth of those luncheons that used to take place here.
08:11

VI:
I missed those lunches so much. They were great.
08:15

GN:
They were educational things I mean, you had you know the computer science guy
Roger Norton.
08:24

VI:
Roger Norton, Rich McGovern.
08:27

GN:
Be up on the blackboard explaining things. You know how to buy a car or anything.


7

How to cook soup. It was such a…
08:34

VI:
Well the great thing about them for me, not only did I learn a lot because I was
starting out as a teacher. It really was my first full-time teaching. I'd never taught a full course
before I came. I’ve been only a teaching assistant, teaching lab. Not only did I learn a lot but the
faculty because different faculty from different areas would be sitting down together in a very
relaxed way talking. You actually could find out what was going on across campus, what
people's problems were, what work really needed to be done and you could actually make
decisions in a very non-confrontational manner. And I found it very productive. And we don't
have that anymore.
09:09

GN:
And fortunately that's one of those happy experiences that we all profited by. Well
let's go to your first years here. Conditions of that… of the lab itself, let start with that.
09:24

VI:
Well yeah, the conditions of the lab aren’t… I will talk about that in a minute, but
what I really remember about my first year and again, I'm talking about coming straight at a grad
school, I was actually still writing my dissertation. And of course we technically at that point, the
scientists would teach three lecture courses and two labs. And usually labs were different every
semester. So you're talking about five preps because the prep for a lab is completely separate
from the prep for lecture. Labs are harder. They're completely harder than doing a lecture. Much
more time consuming because at least once you have your course down then you're just tweaking
it and going and presenting it. But lab always have to be set up, always has to be cleaned up.
You're there watching them every minute to make sure they don't hurt each other or stuff like
that and you're in now and making sure they're doing what they're supposed to be doing. Has its
own set of assignments, everything. So it was very, very time consuming and I remember I was
basically getting four hours sleep a night every single night. I was lucky that I could make it


8

through the week. And I would described it as you were hanging off a cliff by your fingernails.
And sometimes you would be sort of sliding down. And then other times you might actually get
the tips of your fingers over the edge and that’s…
10:42
GN:
Forget the drama, come on.
10:44

VI:
We had these. Marist was like two buildings. I mean I couldn't believe it. Having
come from you know—
10:53

GN:
Across the street from Vassar.
10:54

VI:
--Vassar, UMass, University of Maine. I had taken course at Rutgers. I had had a job
at Princeton and I'm looking at this map of Marist when I am coming down for the interview and
I'm like where are the buildings. Like the classes were in Donnelly and then as those rooms we
rented across the street, Marist East which had been old publishing company.
11:16

GN:
Western Publishing.
11:17

VI:
Yeah right, and so that's where all the classes were. And so that was another thing you
always meeting all the faculty. but we had labs but the labs also had to be used as classrooms. So
when you were done, you had to completely clean everything up even though of another lab like
that was going to come in later. So that Spanish could come in and teach a class in there.
11:35

GN:
I mean you could always send the students to library if they could find it.
11:40

VI:
We could talk about the library too. I remember that well. but the med techs were very
clever because when they wanted to use their labs for classrooms they would say ok that's all
right but make sure you never put your pen down on the table. You never put anything in your
mouth because we're working with pathogens here and nobody would schedule classes in their
rooms. but it was just very--
12:05

GN:
Talk about the students who took those courses. In the early years how dedicated


9

were they? How prepared were they? How interested were they? how smart were they?
12:17

VI:
Well we're dealing with a very, very small group. Okay. So I had everything I mean
we always had some truly outstanding students. They were usually the commuters. You know
the kids who for one reason or another financially couldn't afford to go away and they would
come to Marist. They were usually quite amazing students. Then we had students… Well we still
do who probably shouldn't be in that major. I did have a few students not usually in the science
majors, but I had some students who I felt like didn't belong at college, couldn't write their way
out of a paper bag, but we still have those students unfortunately. But it was such a small group. I
mean I think then it was more like they were the first members of their family to go to college.
Now we're getting it's the second or third generation going to college but they were characters. I
had an Animal Behavior class. It had seven students in it, which was not unusual back then we
didn't have these big classes. And each one of them was a character and they would make me
laugh so hard. I would have to put my head down on the podium. They were just so funny. They
would be… “I watched a show last night about whales having sex” something like that. And then
there is another kid in the class who had made a bet with his friends that he could get a B or
higher in any class on campus and in those days, it was before the computers, they would have
you know all the courses listed out … Well, the computer would list out the course. But you
weren’t on computers… [the computer] would list out all the courses in front of the registrar's
office and he went there with a dart with his friends, blindfolded himself and threw it and it hit
Animal Behavior. So I had this kid with no prerequisites in my Animal Behavior class. He was
not a stupid kid. He would have done well if he hadn't got sick. And you know but just they
were… It was very small classes so you had you really, really knew the students. You know I
still actually… I visited one of them last week in New York City is a high school teacher here.


10

14:20

GN:
Yeah. And some of them have gone on. I mean consider those early years. Some have
proceeded on to become professors or doctors, whatever.
14:29

VI:
Well I mean, I always think about the one I visited couple weeks ago was a graduate
in 1988 that would be my thirty years here. I have another student who was sort of like the
generation after that student. I almost see them as generations who's now a full professor of
Economics at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. So yeah and these are students I stay in touch
with, but.
14:53

GN:
Are the students today better prepared? Mixed bag?
14:59

VI:
I think it's always been a mixed bag. I think it's always a mixed bag that there are
some students there are a few students who are really, really good. And there are a few students
who probably are… I actually think our country should be offering them something other than a
classical liberal arts degree. But there’s a status symbol to having liberal arts degree so it might
not really be suiting their needs and their skill sets.
15:28

GN:
You should talk to Lynne Doty because she was here the other day saying the same
thing. Not everybody belongs in college.
15:34

VI:
Or liberal arts college.
15:35

GN:
Two years would be enough and then they could take more practical things.

15:39

VI:
Or you integrate in… actually practical with the basic academics. Which actually
tends to draw students that weren’t academically-oriented into the courses a little bit better. But I
think you know to me I think the students have on average got much better. I will say that but I
also think that as you go on, students and I'm talking about all students in all colleges now read
less. And so when you read less, your writing skills aren't as good. Your vocabulary isn't as
good. So they actually are not in some ways… They're intellectually just as stronger you know.


11

But I think academically there, they're not as strong as they should be based on their intellect.
16:30

GN:
Are the biology majors more driven then?
16:34

VI:
Yes, yes, I think if you talk to, I will say the science majors. If you talk to people in
the humanities who have to teach everybody, they love having the science students because the
science students have to work really hard and they understand that you have to work really hard.
So they don't complain about working really hard. To them usually humanities courses are a little
bit easier. Sometimes they're not. It depends if it's really good humanities course… It shouldn't
be easier because it's different. But generally the science students, one of our goals is I always
say with GenBio I say, “Please, please make sure it's a challenging course.” And we all agree the
course should be. “Please make sure it's challenging. Please make sure it's representative of the
difficulty that's going to continue on.” Because you don't want to lie to them. You know if this is
not going to be the right major for them they need to know fast so that they can switch to a
different major that's going to serve them better. We still get delusional students, totally
delusional students coming in and saying, “I'm going to be a doctor.” And their skills are just not
there.
17:44

GN:
But the science students seem to learn together more than other students.
17:47

VI:
Well there in lab so they're already put. They have Chem lab when they have bio lab.
They're already usually working in teams of two three or four and then they meet each other and
then they tend to study together. We do have the advantage that they can come into the labs
when a class isn't in session and they can work together there. So they have that good
collaborative work ability.
18:12

GN:
Strange statement I am going to make Marist has changed.
18:17

VI:
Yes, a little.



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18:18

GN:
In what way?
18:19

VI:
Marist has changed. Well when in 1985 it was really the College of the Brothers and
many of us really did appreciate that. You know that it was people who were devoting
themselves not only to education but to the school. I’ve always said this is the problem when you
weren't part of the religious order is that it was my employment and I cared greatly about it as
you know, but it was not my … I wasn't exactly my vocation. In other words, I also had to buy a
house and take care of myself and you know I wasn't part of the Brotherhood. They were not
taking care of me in that regard. I had to take care of myself financially. But yeah, I was like
really. Marist was important and now it's much more like more of a typical school where people
you know come in they're trying to do their research because they have to their told that. And
there are a lot of people who I think are a little too clueless about the personality of the school
how the school runs the school really runs an interesting way and I think we have faculty
members who get tenured who have been here long enough to have a better idea of how things
run and don't know how things run right.
19:38
GN:
OK. It's changed a number of ways. I don't know how to explain the change? I might
say that Dennis Murray had a lot to do it, yes.
19:49
VI:
Well it got bigger, it bigger. And that change is a lot right there.
19:55

GN:
Right and there’s more money into the pot right now.
19:58

VI:
Well of course we use to all know each other, we were smaller faculty. As I said we
were all in two buildings. Now each area has its own building. You may not need anybody from
another. I mean mostly I stay in Donnelly, so unless somebody is coming into Donnelly I hardly
ever see them.
20:16

GN:
We use to all lived there.


13

20:17

VI:
We use to all live there absolute. so I used to be housed next to the math people and
the social sciences people. I mean my first office, I loved my first office. I mean in a bad way.
You know Donnelly's around building and those exterior rooms are sort of odd.
20:35

GN:
Windows open and step right out.
20:37

VI:
That happened in my first class I ever taught. The student came up and they were
chatting with me and they said I have to go catch the bus they open up the window jumped out
the window. Sort an astonishing. Can quite do that anymore because the windows are these
lower window. But I had an office were they had taken one of the rooms that's now classroom
and they had these sort of half glass frosted glass partition things with medal. And ten or twelve
of us were in this area where my office could fit a filing cabinet, my desk, and a chair. That's
how wide it was there and if I pushed my chair back I hit the bookcase that was against the wall
and that how big it was that rectangle. And the walls didn't go all the way down to the floor, or
up to the ceiling, they were just frosted. So when the phone rang everybody picked up because
you couldn't tell whose phone it was. And of course you can hear everybody else's conversation.
So I remember and then when anybody was writing on the chalkboard on the on the joint I could
hear that. I was in there I think a couple years and then I got moved to the office with no heat,
but it was bigger. And then I got moved to the office with no windows and people come in and
say there's no windows in here, its ok it's warm in the winter and its cool summer.
21:58

GN:
In the changes, number of changes the faculty has changes as well.
22:02

VI:
I think the faculty is more and I think this is good, I do think this is good that the
faculty is a more traditional liberal arts college faculty, they have doctorates, they do research,
they know what's expected in a in a setting where your faculty should be engaged in the research
of their field.


14

22:28

GN:
The classroom has changed. Do you have a small classroom?
22:32

VI:
No I don’t.
22:33

GN:
Do you have a computer?
22:35

VI:
I use the computer. What I would really, my problem is I still think writing is really
important. Which probably smart class would help me with. So I have to have a classroom where
I can pull the screen down and show something and then pull the screen up and write and pull the
screen down and show something because I think the writing on the board is really important and
I think it does a couple of things. It's slows me down if you can't tell I am a pretty fast talker so if
I want them to be following along with my thought process it helps to write and draw on the
board. So they're going with you in that thought process. However science you have all these
figures and things. So now I pop this up it will be this is figure thirteen point one in your
textbook and they could just write in there book figures thirteen point one, we can talk about the
figure. You know they’re not an expecting them to write it down and what does this mean, look
over here you know that sort of thing. But and then I used, they complain about this because I
use the power point to sort of organize the lecture but it doesn't have all the information because
they are going to be listening taking notes. They are incredibly bad at, and they've always been
bad at, it and they're still bad at it. They don't know how to take notes and its weird, no one ever
taught me how to take notes, I just took notes and I got better at it. But it's sort of like these
students really need lessons on taking notes. Because they have this thing where they don't write
down unless, they always been like this they don't write down unless you write it on the board
but you're talking and they should be listening to you and thinking about what point you're
making in and making themselves little notations, but it's either nothing or transcription and yeah
that's not they're not processing when there doing that.


15

24:20
GN:
So obviously your teaching has changed from the first days I mean to have more
instruments in terms of well the primitive labs we have, a primitive classrooms.
24:31

VI:
The labs have not changed that much. Well I mean you have to understand that we are
very careful and have been very good at hiring new people. So we do have people who know
how to do molecular genetics and they're doing molecular genetics lab. So we bring in a new
developmental biologist and we say to her in Gen-Bio one we need a new hot lab that will do this
this and this. So we do that but the labs that I teach have not really changed that much I mean I
change from using the physio graphs to computers that did what the physio graphs did but they're
still doing the same thing because we're studying how the heart works. How the heart works has
not change.
25:13

GN:
You’re leaving me here because I am not familiar with the terminology.
25:15

VI:
Yeah, I just saying had a great big piece of equipment. You ever see somebody who
did like an E.K.G. Right well these are great machines that did E.K.G. and stuff like that. And
then that got replaced with a computer that did the E.K.G. But it's still an E.K.G. And what the
E.K.G tells you is still the same thing.
25:36

GN:
What's the typical size of your class now?
25:40

VI:
Twenty-four. Although certainly we this is a big battle we have but you know like in
upper level labs will have the lab be smaller than twenty-four because you need to be able to
work with them and there's a lot of equipment things some labs are maxed that sixteen, some
labs are maxed twenty-four.
26:00

GN:
Have there been changes in the biology major, in terms of the requirements that you
would expect of a major and is that due to the advance in science or advance in. Too what?
26:12

VI:
Well we I think the biggest change was. We go back and forth with what should we


16

should require but the core requirements actually fairly quite similar, but we added a major and
the major we added was biomedical sciences. Because most of the kids who come into Marist
they're very pragmatically oriented, they understand who doctors are and they want to be a
doctor. So the biomedical science major was just a repackaging of stuff we already had. But if
you want to be go to medical school you must have this you must have this you must have year
of physics you must have a year of organic and so we packaged it so it had as a requirement.
Everything you need to qualify to go to medical school. But you could still do a bio major and do
all those things you know but bio majors don't have to. They could opt for a one semester
organic chemistry class instead of the two-semester organic chemistry class. They could opt to
not take physics where is biomedical sciences you must take physics that sort of thing.
27:15

GN:
Distinguish med Tec from biology.
27:18

VI:
Well med tech is really a very pragmatic program it's almost it's the combination of
the practical with the liberal arts. So they get a liberal arts degree but they are trained to be a
certified medical technology which means they have to take specific courses they have to take
boards you know national boards to qualify be certified and they have these hospital rotations
they must have and are integrated into their program. So but it's a great program I mean you can
still go to medical school and stuff like that.
27:55

GN:
Do science majors intermingled you know them one from another whether you in
biology med Tec or?
28:00

VI:
I can't tell who's who really unless they tell me I mean I'll get all different kinds of
first of all Gen-Bio you have everybody Gen-Bio expect chemist because the chemist don’t have
to take it and then as soon as you get into work but you go into organic there taking organic
except I'm not sure I don't think the med Tec have to take it and some of the environmental


17

sciences students don't have to take it. But yeah If I teach animal behavior I could have I can tell
bio from Biomedical Science from bio ed excepted I happen to know all the bio ed because I'm
there I have to be their advisor I am the advisor for all the bio ed majors which is a separate
major we actually have. Three bio majors now where we only had one so we have the bio
education major constructed specifically for them they have a biology major in the biomedical
science
28:43

GN:
Where would teacher Ed go?
28:44

VI:
Well teacher Ed Is that's Ed.
28:49

GN:
But I mean for a biologist to be a teacher Ed.
28:52

VI:
No they would be a biology education major there a biology major with all the
education classes integrated into their major so we tock the bio we just packaged it again. We
just took the entire bio major we stuck and all the education requirements. The only thing we
change from the bio major was a bio major needed six or eight credits related field and we took
that out and replaced it with student teaching so they could get it into one hundred twenty credits
otherwise it was possible. So I'm not sure I answered your question. Well I actually biology is
pretty consistent I think what gets taught like for example probably the courses that have
changed the most of things like genetics.
29:38

GN:
Yeah were all in the same corridor down you know like.
29:41

VI:
well were kind of split some people are downstairs and some people are upstairs. Yeah
but when I'm around with each other
29:48

GN:
I think of Cathy Newkirk and you know just physically present and Joe Bettencourt
not that far apart
29:55

VI:
Oh yeah, they're all together.


18

29:56

GN:
So that kind of do you need statistics in your business.
30:02

VI:
Yes that's, that's required. It's required of all the biology majors they all have to take a
semester of calculus and they have to take a semester of statistics.
30:14

GN:
Talk about the teachers now you what's required of you have Committee work you
have teaching you have evaluation you have student advisement.
30:28

VI:
Research put research on top of that we all have to do that.
30:30

GN:
You have to do research.
30:33

VI:
Yeah if you’re tenure or tenure track.
30:36

GN:
If you have tenure what’s still required all for a positive evaluation I suppose.
30:41

VI:
Yeah or hypothetically you don't get your raise. Well the only exception is if you been
work here a certain amount of time. I forget what the rule is you can right now they changed us
we used to be on what was called four-four load. And they changed us whole campus to the four
three load but if you said listen just keep me on the four-four load then your professional
development expectations were pretty minimal right so if you weren't do like when they first
converted us over I stayed on the four-four load for a little while because I was switching from
one area research to a different area of research and then once I switched and I started publishing
papers and I went on four three load.
31:32

GN:
Of the committee work what is the most awesome?
31:41

VI:
Awesome in wonderful or horrible?
31:44

GN:
Well horrible.
31:46

VI:
Be cheering the faculty. I didn't want to be chair of the faculty I mean it was you know
how it is it's like it's if nominee you must run if elected you must serve. And so it was a time
when I mean I was constantly because first of all the faculty wasn't that big and I have a big


19

mouth. You know nominated for things and elected things so we ended up we had restructured
faculty governance and we had a whole bunch of people who actually never been on a major
committee before and then some people who should have actually been running for chair or
would have been good teachers the faculty refused for one reason or another. So it ended up just
me and one other person and, and I won. So I didn't want to I really didn't want to but it was like
OK it's your turn but I remember running the faculty meetings and I would spend a day or two
prepping to make sure they were gonna run the way they should and I would be running this
meeting and I felt like I was burning up from the inside I felt like I must have been absolutely
fiery red and I said something to Joe Bettencourt and he said no you look fine I said you know I
feel like I'm on fire and he said you having a histamine reaction like internal allergy. So that's not
fun being on grievances certainly not fun I mean and then there are some other communities
could be doing good work but I feel like people are not really great at focusing on what can we
do as opposed to what do I want you know like people have I have had these people ideas of
these grandiose ideas that we're going to make these huge changes when and we just that I just
know that not going to happen.
33:42

GN:
Overall picture compensation is fare some people get treated better than others.
33:54

GN:
I think that's a big social question I mean, why should someone in computer science
be earning three times as much as someone in English I guess is a question it's never been fair
will it ever be fair I don't know? I just think it's really funny that I was I had worked at Marist for
ten years I was tenured I was an associate professor and I qualified for a low-income mortgage.
But I'm doing better now. I'm doing better now and I will say the thing that has saved me
throughout this has been something called salary adjustment. Salary adjustment is what's make
the difference for me.


20

34:35

GN:
Yeah OK well that brings up another question why did you stay here.
34:40
VI:
I love it here, I love it here.
30:46

GN:
How can you love here when they treat you with all of these bombs you know you
have to?
34:50

VI:
Well I'll tell you I think it's really important and I was very fortunate like you have a
micro group and there's the macro group and the micro group was science like that was my Dean
you know George Hooper and he was always supportive of me and I think that was incredibly
valuable to me so I remember early in my career I was getting the student evaluations and I guess
I shouldn't say that but I will honestly Marist students are kind of whiners. You know they don't
really, I don't think they're very consumerist about their education. I think it might actually be
less so than they used to be. So they want to be as easy as possible. They don't realize that you
know they're investing all this time and money they need to learn something.
35:33

GN:
But I work so hard for my A.
35:35

VI:
I work so hard in your class I were three times harder in your class and got a B- then I
worked in that other class where I got the A, but even my Mike Tannenbaum who was are dean
for years and years he would just he would just giggle when he would look at my course
evaluation say you know it's like they're complaining about the workload and yet at the end they
said they say I learned far more in this class I learned in other classes I you not make the
connection a I actually think there are a whole bunch of classes at Marist that are hard enough
that need to be harder and need to be more demanding but why do I stay here well I went into
George very early on and I said well they're complaining that I'm too hard and I believe that
other deans might have said students are unhappy you need to make them happy and I was never
told that I was told and he looked at me and said you know if change doesn't come from the


21

junior faculty we're is it going to come from. It's like you know you're supporting me and I think
I was always in my micro group very supported and I really liked teaching, I wanted to be a
teacher. And after about three or four years I ended up teaching exactly the classes that I would
want to teach which is unbelievable. So I teach animal behavior and people don't hire animal
behaviorist. I got hired as a physiologist right. I get to teach animal behavior. I get to teach
evolution right. These are my babies I teach the vertebrate physiology.
37:13

GN:
You believe in evolution?
37:15

VI:
Do I believe? Yes absolutely I feel it is do you believe in atoms. Because evolution is
more concrete than atoms. You know it's like yeah, I mean evolution is just the notion that there
have been large changes in life forms over a long period of time. So the only way you can deny
evolution is to deny the entire fossil record.
37:43

GN:
I am being facetious am with a group that Bill Edle.
37:48

VI:
That was the great thing about the lunches actually if you want to go back to the
lunches and when I picked up teaching evolution from George because George had been
evolution teacher and I didn't want to take it away from him. And they hadn't offered it and then
one day sit in a department meeting going well let's get rid of course I am like no I want so and
actually we require it of the biology education majors it is a requirement if you're going to
biology education major because it is unifying for all biology just like and I would go to my
students I say what would chemistry be like if there was no theory of the atom. And it something
were and half of them think that this would be great and I like no cause you'd have to learn every
single reaction completely separately and just memorize it and knowing one reaction would
never tell you what another reaction could do.
38:39
GN:
Role of the dice.


22

38:41

VI:
Right, right but evolution explain so much and you can use it to project useful
hypotheses in medicine and epidemiology. I mean it's you know in agriculture it's incredibly
important. So we would be sitting around chatting you know Richard J. LaPietra.
39:00

GN:
We use to have this group meeting.
39:03

VI:
You know people from outside would say they let you teach evolution and sure why
not. Never heard never occurred to me. Anybody would have a problem with it. Honestly, I was
so naive and of course the official position of the Catholic Church is no problem. You know if it
and I actually make my students read this now because they don't know they think the Catholic
Church is fundamentalist and it's not. Not officially anyway rate. And Richard like it was like he
would be just scaving like how can people not believe this they were always totally supportive of
that animal behavior evolution verbal phycology and GenBio.
39:45

GN:
Yeah. Different question. Marist again changed. You must be happy to be part of this
growth thing you know that from where we were to where we to where we are now go and surely
have played a part just of what it would say now by keeping certain course in being doctoring or
monitoring others.
40:06

VI:
Well I think the most important role because I am a senior faculty now is to make sure
you get high quality junior faculty and you let them develop, and be good faculty, and engage
student in research, and protect them so they can do their job well.
40:29

GN:
Has Marist I get confused images about what the outside world would say of us were
a bigger college now but are we better know because of Lee Meringue and public opinion, or
because of the girls basketball team, or because of the summer programs here.
40:56

VI:
I have on insight. None at all. I mean I didn’t know anything about Marist until Richer
started working here now I am inside. I mean the thing the really disturbs me the most is students


23

you say to them why you pick Marist the say oh, the campus is so beautiful and I am like the
programs, the teacher, the education, the library but no it was pretty. As an academic, I do see
myself as an academic that so disappointing to me. I want them to pick it because they think
there gonna get a good education here.
41:33
GN:
But they do, the Smart kids come.
41:36

VI:
Well, my biggest disappointment is actually I think this is a problem with the way
some classes are taught is that many of us wish the students were more rebellious intellectually.
You know that they would question you more, why doesn’t it work this way? I think there are a
lot of classes where soon as the student becomes rebellious the teacher just slams them down or
just gives them a bad grade that should not be happening.
42:11

GN:
What are the happiest moments?
42:13

VI:
Happiest moments when I got the teaching. Well, ya one of the happiest and proudest
moments of my life was when I got the Board of Trustees distinguished teaching.
42:21

GN:
Say it again.
42:22

VI:
The Board of Trustees distinguished teaching award. Right, I got that in nineteen
ninety-five and I was the first woman to get it and I was the first young person to get it. Yeah,
and of course teaching is what cared about. Yeah that was a primary thing is why I came here
because I was gonna be a teacher here and I really cared about the teaching. So to be recognized
in that way it was it was an incredibly proud moment for me. Yeah, and then getting tenure I
really loved getting tenure. So thought it was better than getting a Ph. D. Tenure was wonderful.
Cause I felt like well you know I would just say what I thought and I was say thing I thought and
I think Oh God I can't really get in trouble for this. And then I thought well now I got tenure I
can keep saying stupid things and not be so scared a I like getting tenured and I liked getting the


24

distinguished teacher award that that was great.
43:14

GN:
OK a big philosophical question like this now is college worth the investment?
43:20

VI:
Yes
43:20

GN:
In terms of you know the money that goes into it that time that goes into it the
relationships giving up with a parochial staying home and coming to the colleges. Why would
you say yes to the financial you don't get your money back?
43:37
VI:
I think I think the data shows that you do in terms of your what happens in your later
career I think that's what the data shows is that people with a college education get better jobs
and do better finally. yeah, down the road. Yeah but we're looking at is a lifetime investment.
OK this is not a car.
43:57

GN:
Well I thought after four years and getting out I could get a good job. And paid a lot
more than my friends who never went to college is a mechanic.
44:07

VI:
Well I think here's the problem we were talking before about how probably everybody
should not be going to a liberal arts college and we need different kinds of schools to service
different kinds of people with different kinds of intellectual skills and personality needs. So but I
think that you know what I believe in a liberal arts education. I think that and I feel about this
strongly that with a liberal arts education to be doing is helping this person become a self-
learner, a critical thinker, and an effective communicator so that they can write. So somebody
understands what they have to say. They can speak and somebody will respect what they have to
say and pay attention to them. Right and it's all about what I call the academic skills reading,
thinking, writing but writing community but the sort a go hand in hand. So I think that people
who can sit down in an interview and really present themselves well are much more likely to get
the job you do have to have certain skill sets in order to get certain jobs. Marist, I think one of


25

things Marist does well is trying to say what kind of skills are you going to pick up at college
while you're getting this liberal arts education. But you can't become a lawyer without becoming
a liberal art large education you can become a doctor you can you know become a college
professor you can even become a schoolteacher without a liberal arts education. So there's a lot
of careers out there that require this liberal arts education. So, yeah, I do think it’s worth wild.
45:38

GN:
So that out. Well what about the social development the individual. You have to give
up your hometown parochial you have to go meat up new friends is what a little scary and
especially this day and age when they bring their phones with them and they're not giving up the
little parochial.
45:56

VI:
Well that's a whole different conversation I would get rid of all their media. I really, I
really hate this whole I guess it's just shows how old I am, I mean do have a smartphone what do
I do with a smart phone I check my e-mail because in case a student like a student says all I need
my syllabus I'm here in Australia. I'm trying to get into this course you know ok I can deal with
that right yeah.
46:19

GN:
That world has changed the way you put that. I mean oh yeah twenty years ago.
46:23

VI:
E-mail the best thing about the electronic age honestly e-mail, e-mail has a lot going
for it I mean I have ilearn to so you talking about the difference in teaching. It's great that I have
ilearn is the digital on the computers you have an area for your course all the kids can go there I
can post the syllabus there I can post study questions there. I can post handouts there people do
all kinds of stuff that I don't do like chat rooms and things and I find chat was this chat about
things they share wrong knowledge with each other.
47:57

GN:
Well hold if you can do that why are the bother coming here? Why don't we have
online education wasn't just stay home?


26

47:06

VI:
Right. So how come we always had before on-line communication we had
correspondence courses right why didn’t people do that?
47:15

GN:
Well I don't know but this this situation.
47:19

VI:
I have an answer I am interested in your answer.
47:21

GN:
I'm being facetious here.
47:24

VI:
Yeah, I'm going to come back with my answer in a minute.
47:26

GN:
Yeah well, I was wondering you know what. Because I mean I heard the president of
the college talk about the importance of online education for the graduate student.
47:36

VI:
I think that's I think that's what makes sense. Yeah I think online is great for highly
motivated people who have full time employment and or families and need to work around a
family but I think the four year undergraduate degree where the student goes from home on
campus and is here from eighteen to twenty one is the typical age range you get I mean my
mother believed in this I believe in this it's like you're it helps you to grow up that you start
becoming more independent but you still get somebody kind of watching you a little bit. So it's a
transition. The friends you make college I actually think are really important and can be quite
different from the friends you make high school and again and then even that progresses in
graduate school where you're more and more meeting people in your own field who are going to
go on and you're making connections that becomes quite important to study groups of people.
You're getting more people of common goals together more so than in high school. But I we
always thought even if you had a child I want them to go away to school. You know to help them
become, get out of the house become an adult you know.
49:00

GN:
But there is a lot of wasted time going to courses all way going to the library writing
papers.


27

49:06

VI:
Going to a course is not a waste of time if the teacher's good writing papers is not a
waste of time in any way shape or form because they're not good writers the more they write the
more they're going to get better at their writing and they need to I think all the assignment work
is valuable I think what we do. I mean this is what science kids learn right off the bat now let's
face it you could open up that books that four, five inches thick and you couldn't read it and you
could learn all that stuff and get an A but they can't and the teacher explains it to them edits for
them. Puts it in a bigger this is the teacher right. Puts it in a bigger context engages them makes a
connection helps them make the connection right. And really what we're trying to do and we
need to try this harder is that the freshman level courses are more like high school where you're
holding your hand and bring them along. And by the time you get senior level courses it should
be like I'm your guide you're going to teach yourself now and I'm here to help you still have a
crutch. But once you leave that door you don't have the crutches anymore. I mean look at my I
often look at my classes and say about eighty to ninety percent of what I teach in GenBio one
sorry GenBio two which is what I teach which in my classes had teach myself it's not stuff I
knew but I was able by that point to open it up read it understand reorganize it put it in a context
and make it hopefully accessible to the class. So the teacher of course is an artist. And you're
hoping to get really good artists right. And kids who are consumerist about their education go
after great teachers and kids who just want to buy a degree which is what that's not worth buying
a degree right. That's stuff is not worth anything and they're just trying to find the easiest
teachers possible where and they don't admit this they're not really hardly learning anything.
51:05
GN:
OK down the road where is Marist going to be in ten or twenty years?
51:08
VI:
Marist? It's going to be bigger.
51:15

GN:
It's going to have schools in other countries then just Florence Italy will have them


28

Australia, China, and.
51:20

VI:
It don’t know about that that I have on inside on that will have more programs on
campus the campuses will be bigger.
51:32

GN:
More student.
51:33

VI:
I think we will I think we just keep growing.
51:37

GN:
Yeah there putting up a new dormitory apparently just to take the room of these
people down.
51:43
VI:
Here's the story we heard from point zero. We don't have enough dorm rooms for
these kids or housing them in a hotel. We're going to build these dorms room today. We build a
door we move the kids we accept more kids oh we have kids living on campus they want to live
on campus we're going to build more housing we build more housing put the kids there. We take
in more kids. We're always taking in more.
52:06

GN:
Well if they want to come build it they'll come.
52:10

VI:
I mean I love the changes on the campus. I have to say I think the campus is so
beautiful now. I think the decisions that were made were good decisions. I think they were made
over the complaints of a few strange people and you know you cannot nock that tree down it's
the library.
52:28

GN:
Joe Bell wanted that tree left up there.
52:35

VI:
But you know I mean we have beautiful laws we look out on the river it is a great
location.
52:41
GN:
What is it they need to?
52:44

VI:
It needs a science building. What respectable four-year liberal arts College or better in
our classification or less does not have a science building? Besides the fact that I think biology is


29

maybe the fourth biggest major on campus it's grown dramatically.
53:08

GN:
So we need a science building we need a parking lot too.
53:12

VI:
Well you know yes sure but I think you know if I have to choose between a building
and a parking lot I am going choose a building we need more classrooms absolutely. We need
more classrooms we always need more classrooms, absolutely. It's ridiculous.
53:26

GN:
OK. I thought the Hancock Building I remember when the Hancock was going up I
was told that not no one student will be admitted because of that. So it's not really.
53:39

VI:
But how many class rooms does it have?
53:41

GN:
Few generate computer science and advanced Tec.
53:47

VI:
Which is helpful you know they build a building I don't want to talk about that
because I know I'm not that familiar with the Hancock.
53:56

GN:
Well you have a view. While you've a wild you've seen things happen.
54:02

VI:
I've always felt we needed more you know multiple the multi-purpose classrooms it
would be nice if all the classrooms were you know temperature regulated so the kids are freezing
or baking because that doesn't help educations it would be great I think I think smart classrooms
you can write and project at same time that would be nice you know. But you know it's at the
bottom it's what's going on in the head of the teacher. What's going on in the head of the students
and what's the connection between those two things you know I mean so you can have a teacher
who never uses multimedia and it's great.
54:42

GN:
Well we've gone almost an hour with this and I guess we've only just began to see the
top of the iceberg and there is more the nine tenths below it.
54:48

VI:
You can tell I am a really chatty person.
54:54

GN:
Is there something I didn't ask you wanted to say for all this time it hard to think


30

54:59

VI:
I like you had all these questions because I like what I am going to talk about.
55:05

GN:
So, well had no difficulty that you would be able to answer them and I wouldn't know
that because early statements it took away a lot of my previous questions about growing up and
going to school and how to find Marist so was that one sentence and it happens Richard is on my
list.
55:24

VI:
Yes, you're going to get a whole wive from him.
55:28

GN:
Yeah, I'm probably different he won’t deny it but would be different you know terms
of what he will say
55:34

VI:
no and his experiences have been very different his you know of course he's an art so
needs and viewpoints are different but mostly. If I could have my way. We have a lot more full-
time faculty and tenure track cause that’s how you get good people.
55:53

GN:
OK but you got to pay the money.
55:54

VI:
I know I don't I'm realistic I realize that I'm not there are people out there who are
crazy. OK. I am like you can't do that but you know but you know really you start looking at
where money goes and you're like is that where I want the money to go and the other thing I
would change in this would be for all colleges everywhere are student athletes have a very
limited amount of hours per week that they have that they are allowed to be forced to work on
their on their sport because that's way too many hours that way. They're basically professionals
and they're supposed to be students who do athletics. They're not athletes who try to squeeze
their classes.
56:38

GN:
And build their schedules around there athletic program.
56:40

VI:
Well it's not so much even that it's like if you have a science major when they missed
the lecture. This gets back to what it is lecturing important. The science majors know that their


31

life will be much easier if they can go to a lecture because it makes much more sense than having
read it out of the book. Ok, so the kid can't come to lecture because they have to go to the meat
and then they have to make that up and it's heredus or they underclass exhausted they get about
five o'clock in the morning they crew for three hours they go they take a shower they have their
breakfast they come in the class of eleven o'clock and drop dead asleep. And that's not to be
unexpected you know so.
57:23

GN:
Well thank you.
57:26

VI:
It’s a pleasure.