{"id":1435,"date":"2018-04-23T12:27:05","date_gmt":"2018-04-23T16:27:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/?p=1435"},"modified":"2018-04-23T12:27:05","modified_gmt":"2018-04-23T16:27:05","slug":"monday-missive-april-23-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/blog\/2018\/04\/23\/monday-missive-april-23-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Monday Missive – April 23, 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Remembering Stan Patten<\/b>\u00a0— Dr. Stanley Ray Patten died on April 18, 2018, but for those of us who had the pleasure of knowing Stan, our memories of him will always be with us. \u00a0Here is the link to his obituary:\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.legacy.com\/obituaries\/charlotte\/obituary.aspx?n=stan-ray-patten&pid=188789665<\/a><\/p>\n

Stan taught in our English Department from 1982 to 1999.\u00a0 During his career at UNC Charlotte, he played a key role in developing and leading our Writing Resources Center (WRC).\u00a0 One of the first faculty members in the department to appreciate the value of computers in the teaching of writing, Stan obtained grant funding to equip the WRC with computers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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He was also an early supporter of the Women’s Studies Program, and he was the first male to teach a Women’s Studies course at UNC Charlotte.\u00a0 Stan thought that the Women’s Studies Program should broaden its scope to include gender studies, and I am sure he would be pleased that the program is now called the Women’s and Gender Studies Program.<\/p>\n

When Stan taught in the English Department, the acronym LGBTQ was not yet in use.\u00a0 However, Stan was already at the forefront of the movement to support all of our students no matter what their sexual orientation or gender identification might be.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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When I first moved to Charlotte in 1984, Stan and I would occasionally have beers together at various bars in Dilworth, where he lived at the time.\u00a0 I loved hearing his stories about the two years he spent in Ethiopia when he was in the Peace Corps.\u00a0 He also told riveting stories about his involvement with the Martin Luther King Center in Atlanta.\u00a0 He liked to talk about his childhood and youth in a small town in Indiana, and he seemed to be pleased when I told him that my mother also grew up in a small town in Indiana.\u00a0 Sometimes Stan would talk about his years at Purdue University, where he earned his PhD, but he talked more about his experiences as a high school English teacher.<\/p>\n

Stan liked to talk about computers, and he was pleased when my wife and I finally purchased our first Mac computer.\u00a0 We had trouble setting it up, so I called Stan.\u00a0 In no time, he came over to our house and set up the computer for us.\u00a0 That is the kind of person he was.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Stan’s teaching career at the UNC Charlotte came to an end in 1999 when he was diagnosed with Myasthenia Gravis, but he remained in Charlotte for the rest of his life.\u00a0 Stan’s final years were difficult because of his serious health problems.\u00a0 However, he still took pleasure in interacting with his friends and neighbors in Plaza Midwood, where he bought a house on a street called Mimosa.\u00a0 One of his other sources of pleasure was writing poetry.\u00a0 In 2013, he published some of his poems in a chapbook titled\u00a0Betrayals.\u00a0\u00a0<\/i>Stan sometimes felt betrayed by his body, but not by his friends.\u00a0 He gave me a signed copy of this chapbook a couple of years ago.\u00a0 I will always treasure it, just as I will always treasure my memories of Stan.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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I am organizing an open house for Stan’s friends and colleagues to gather and share memories and stories about Stan.\u00a0 This event will take place\u00a0next Sunday<\/span><\/span>\u00a0(April 29<\/span><\/span>) in the English Department Lounge (Fretwell 248C) from\u00a01:00 to 3:00 pm.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0 Everyone is invited.\u00a0 I will bring some homemade food, but everyone should feel free to bring something to share.\u00a0 I hope to see you on Sunday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Our Students’ Winning Ways<\/b>\u00a0—\u00a0 Last Friday was an award-winning day for a n\"\"<\/a>umber of our students.\u00a0 At three separate events, our students received various awards.\u00a0 During a ceremony sponsored by the Center for Graduate Life, Kevin Chauncey received the Graduate Teaching Assistant Award in recognition of his work as a teaching assistant in lecture classes offered by Ralf Thiede and Alan Rauch.\u00a0 The Undergraduate Research Conference also took place\u00a0on Friday<\/span><\/span>, and our students were well represented.\u00a0 Kelly Brabec, Jenna Hainlen, and Jordan Costanza all won awards for their presentations.\u00a0 Late\u00a0Friday<\/span><\/span>\u00a0afternoon, the Honors College Awards Ceremony took place, during which Kellyanna Atwell received a Delbridge E. Narron Scholarship and Travel Award.<\/p>\n

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Upcoming Events and Deadlines<\/b>\u00a0\u2014 Here is information about upcoming events:<\/p>\n

April 23 — The CLAS Outstanding Teaching Awards Ceremony will take place today at\u00a03:00 p.m.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0in the Halton Reading Room at Atkins Library.\u00a0 Our own Valerie Bright is a finalist for the Award for Outstanding Teaching by a Part-Time Faculty Member.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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April 27<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>\u00a0— The English Department meeting will take place on\u00a0April 21 from 11:00 to 12:30<\/span><\/span>\u00a0in Atkins 125.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

April 27<\/span><\/span>\u00a0— The English Department’s Student Award Ceremony will take place on\u00a0April 27 from 12:30<\/span><\/span>\u00a0to\u00a02:00<\/span><\/span>\u00a0in the Dale Halton Reading Room in the Atkins Library.<\/p>\n

Quirky Quiz Question<\/b>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0 Stan Patten received his PhD from Purdue University, but he is not the only member of our department who has a PhD from Purdue.\u00a0 Two of our current faculty members and at least one of our emeritus faculty members earned their PhD’s from Purdue.\u00a0 Can you name them?<\/div>\n

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Last week’s answer: Indiana University<\/strong><\/div>\n
Anita Moss’s Ph.D. dissertation is titled “Children and Fairy Tales:\u00a0 A Study of Nineteenth-Century British Fantasy,” which she wrote under the direction of Donald Gray.\u00a0 Do you know the name of the university where she earned her doctoral degree?<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Remembering Stan Patten\u00a0— Dr. Stanley Ray Patten died on April 18, 2018, but for those of us who had the pleasure of knowing Stan, our memories of him will always be with us. \u00a0Here is the link to his obituary:\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.legacy.com\/obituaries\/charlotte\/obituary.aspx?n=stan-ray-patten&pid=188789665 Stan taught in our English Department from 1982 to 1999.\u00a0 During his career at UNC […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":202,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-monday-missive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/202"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1435"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1435\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1440,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1435\/revisions\/1440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}