FALL 2018 FEELS LIKE HOME DEDICATED SPACE FOR MILITARY-AFFILIATED STUDENTS CULTIVATES CAMARADERIE Entrepreneurs Put White Boards and Faith, Family, People First Glass Walls and Football Fall 2018 Feels Like Home From Mars to Cars 8 Military-Affiliated Student 26 Entrepreneurs Put Faith ETSU President Resource Center and People First in Sharing Brian Noland Blessings from Innovative White Boards and Technology Company Executive Editor Glass Walls Fred Sauceman 16 ETSU Opens New Faith, Family, Managing Editor Interprofessional Education 28 and Football Joe Smith and Research Center Randy Sanders Reflects on Coaching and Life Advancement/Alumni Editors Pamela Ritter Bob Plummer 1 The President’s 24 ETSU Day of Giving Perspective Contributing Writers 25 Five Questions about Kevin Brown 2 Who’s Going to ETSU? Planned Giving Karen Crigger Lee Ann Davis 6 Dateline: ETSU 32 How Kingsport and Jennifer Hill Amanda Mowell Hawkins County Helped 11 Making Service Brian Noland Win World War II Cyndi Ramsey a Lifetime Priority Fred Sauceman 34 ETSU Naturalization Joe Smith 12 A Return to ETSU Ceremony Welcomes 97 Amy Steadman Nicole Collins New Citizens Kristen Swing 14 Going Full Circle 37 Treasures Art Direction Sharon James McGee Stephen Russell 38 Basketball schedules 20 Celebrating Four Graphic Designer Decades of Educating 40 Class Notes Jeanette Henry Physicians 43 Obituaries Photographic Services Ron Campbell Dakota Hamilton East Tennessee State University is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges to Larry Smith award baccalaureate, master’s, education specialist, and doctoral degrees. Contact the Commission on Colleges at 1866 Southern Lane, Decatur, Georgia 30033-4097, telephone 404-679-4500, or http://www.sacscoc.org, for questions about the accreditation of Charlie Warden East Tennessee State University. ETSU is an AA/EEO employer. ETSU-UR-0049-18 93000 PRESIDENT’S PERSPECTIVE Since the founding of East Tennessee State University in 1911, the stories of our students, faculty, staff, and alumni have built upon each other to tell an even bigger story, of an institution focused on improving the quality of life for the people of the region. Today, nearly 95,000 ETSU alumni live and work in 50 states and 68 countries. Each of you represents a part of our story as a university—from the chapters you helped write as students conducting important service, research, and educational missions to the chapters yet to be written, with compelling stories of our alumni making a difference here and across the globe. You are leaders, guiding important workforce agendas in business, health, education, and other fields. You are innovators, researching the best and newest ways to address world problems and needs. You are masters of your craft, improving the quality of life through arts such as storytelling, music, theater, and dance. No matter what major you pursued while attending ETSU or how you now choose to make a positive difference in the world, all of you have something in common: You are Buccaneers. You graduated from a university whose mission and values emphasize that people come first and are treated with dignity and respect. In an era when dignity and respect sometimes can be hard to find in the world, I encourage you always to remember and embrace your ETSU roots. As Mahatma Gandhi once said, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” Thank you for all you do to make our world a more pleasant and productive place. Through your efforts, along with the work of our faculty, staff, and students, we continue to tell our ETSU story and to leave a lasting reminder of why this university is so important not only to the region but to our nation and world. Godspeed and Go Bucs! Brian Noland President FALL 2018 x 1 WHO’S GOING TO ETSU? CARA CARTER’S CULMINATING DREAM Cara Carter grew up on the south side of “I want to do a residency in pediatric Kansas City, Missouri. While she lived in a pharmacy after I leave Gatton,” she says. decidedly urban environment, Carter says “I have always wanted to do a little more the health care experiences in her hometown world travel, so I’d like to do Doctors are not that different than those found in Without Borders for a while, too.” rural settings. This fall, Carter will complete a rotation “It is definitely a health care desert so I know in Uganda, spending an entire month there what it is like for there not to be a doctor for to prepare for applying to Doctors Without miles,” says Carter, a fourth-year student Borders. pharmacist attending East Tennessee State University’s Gatton College of Pharmacy. At Gatton, she has been instrumental in “There are veterinarian offices and some creating a mentorship program within the clinics that take place for back-to-school national Pediatric Pharmacy Advocacy physicals, but there is no real health care Group and attended the PPAG conference in facility there.” Utah. The mentorship program, which was established at her suggestion, brings together In fact, it is ETSU’s focus on serving the individuals at varying levels of practice to underserved that attracted Carter to the interact and learn from one another. She also Gatton College of Pharmacy. She says she recently took part in an event at ETSU called immediately saw the potential such an STEMposium, which invited girls ages 12-18 education could have on health care deserts. to the campus to explore opportunities and interests in science, technology, engineering, “Since the doctor is so far away, the only and mathematics. health care provider patients see may be their pharmacist,” said Carter about For Carter, becoming a successful health care residents in her hometown. “So I wanted to provider is not just her dream; it is a dream learn more about the role of pharmacists in that stretches back generations. primary care, in doing things like diabetic foot exams and hypertension management.” “Earlier this year, I went home and visited our family graveyard to see my Carter, who earned a dual undergraduate grandmother’s grave and the grave of degree in math and chemical engineering, my uncle who recently passed away from always knew she wanted a career in health cancer,” Carter says. “While I was standing care, but pharmacy became her specific path there, it was such an amazing feeling to look after she worked as a Hospice volunteer at around and see the graves of my ancestors the age of 14. and realize I am really and truly living their wildest dreams and going places they never Carter recently landed a prestigious could have. internship with the FDA—the first student from Gatton selected for the federal position. “It’s just remembering that you are doing this Through the internship, she will spend part for yourself but also for the culture, for the of next year learning from individuals in little black girl who looks up to you and for the Office of Clinical Pharmacology at the all these people who just never thought they FDA headquarters just outside the nation’s could do it. You are doing it for everyone.” capital. She says her ultimate goal is one day to become commissioner of the agency. PHOTO BY CHARLIE WARDEN 2 x ETSU TODAY FALL 2018 x 3 WHO’S GOING TO ETSU? STUART SHELTON: DEFINED BY A SENSE OF THE PAST Stuart Shelton has always been a “history discussed and demonstrated many aspects buff.” The Newport News, Virginia, native of the daily lives of settlers at Fort Watauga, says that throughout his life, he has enjoyed including common occupations, fighting everything from his own family history to techniques and weaponry, fur trading, games world history. That lifelong passion now and diversions, and more. In addition, he fuels his goal to become an interpretive was one of several students who developed ranger within a state park system. a campus tour focusing on the history of student life at ETSU. “I love talking about history, so I really would love to have a full-time job as an interpretive Shelton, who now lives in Flag Pond, ranger,” he said. “This is something I can do Tennessee, earned his undergraduate degree very well, and my heart is in it.” in history with a minor in Appalachian studies at ETSU in 2017 and plans to Shelton got his first experience toward that graduate with his master’s degree in history goal as a volunteer at the Virginia Living within the next year. He is also working Museum in Newport News, where he talked toward a certificate in archival studies. about the animals that were on the trail outside, the animals in the touch tank, and “Archival certification is the next best thing those inside the exhibit. to actually getting a master’s in archival studies,” he says. “It will allow me to work in He has also enjoyed participating in Civil an archive while focusing at the same time War re-enacting. “Most of the time, it just on history. Archival work goes hand-in-hand involved me with other groups portraying with history and interpretive work, because a battle,” he said, “but we also did living if you don’t handle documents or preserve history events, like ‘The Military Through them or treat them properly, they will the Ages’ at Jamestown. My group also deteriorate until they’re unrecognizable. If portrayed Union marines and sailors at a that happens, there are gaps in the historical local museum. We’ve done a mixture of record. Losses can be the result of an interpretive and re-enactor work.” accident or fire, or just improper handling.” Most recently, Shelton gained valuable In his spare time, Shelton enjoys playing on experience at Sycamore Shoals State Historic the computer and helping out in his mother’s Park in Elizabethton, where he spent his garden.