Oral history interview with Dr. Stuart Schleien, 2017

Brittany H.: My name is Brittany Hedrick and today is Friday, March 3, 2017. I am in Parish Library with Dr. Stuart Schleien, Professor and Chair of the Department of Community and Therapeutic Recreation to conduct an oral history interview for the UNCG Institutional Memory Collection. Thank you Dr. Schleien for participating in this project and sharing your experiences with me. I'd like to start the interview by asking you about your childhood. Could you tell me when and where you were born?

Stuart Schleien: I sure could Brittney and it's nice to be here with you today for this interview. I was born in the borough of Queens, New York City. I was born specifically in Flushing, Queens, New York in 1956. about five minutes from Shea Stadium where the New York Mets and New York Jets played baseball and football respectively and where the 1964, '65 World's fair was.

Brittany H.: Okay. Could you tell me about your family and your home life?

Stuart Schleien: Sure. I was raised with my mom and dad, two brothers. I was the middle son of three boys. It was a good home life. Parents who were not educated formally at the university level. My dad went into the Navy World War II. My mom was uneducated, but they were smart people. They had street smarts and they had always prioritized learning and education and taking care of those who were needy. It was a nice way to kind of grow up in the streets of New York City among people of all faiths, religions, races. It was really a true melting pot in the 60's in the lower social economic neighborhoods of New York city.

Brittany H.: Okay. So your dad was in the navy, and what did your mother do?

Stuart Schleien: My mom actually worked at Queens College as the Head Administrative Assistant for the Department Chair of Psychology. So she was actually like she considered herself like an academic. Most of the students in the Psychology Department would go see my mom and ask them questions about whatever they needed to do to get through their day or their semester. So she was here. She was surrounded by highly educated people, this uneducated woman who taught us about the value of education.

Brittany H.: Okay. Where did you go to high school?

Stuart Schleien: I went to Flushing High School. Uneventfully skipped eighth grade, was in the two year SP program, which was a special accelerated program in New York City for reasonably smart New Yorkers. And so that was nice to kind of kind of race through it. So I graduated, I was 16 years old from high school 00:03:00and started college at a very early age, which was good because it got me out of the streets of New York at an early age. And then I kind of moved on with my life.

Brittany H.: Yeah, what were your favorite subjects in school?

Stuart Schleien: Well in college my favorite subjects, well, I was always really good in math and in order to skip eighth grade, you had a really be good in math and science, loved math. And I was always really attached to kind of how people think and where they live and how they behave. I knew from the get go that I was going to be a psychologist. That started during my early days in Flushing growing up with kids with disabilities, living in the co-ops in the lower 00:04:00socioeconomic neighborhoods with me. And I always kind of like felt for them. I wanted to kind of be their friends always felt horrible when they got picked on or bullied.

Stuart Schleien: And so I knew from the get go that I was going to be a psychologist or a special educator or something that allowed me to root for and help facilitate a decent quality of life for people who really were marginalized.

Brittany H.: And so what year did you graduate from high school?

Stuart Schleien: I graduated from Flushing High School in 1973 as an aspiring baseball player.

Brittany H.: Okay.

Stuart Schleien: Yeah.

Brittany H.: Could you tell me about your education after high school?

Stuart Schleien: Yeah. So like the best thing that happened to me was that I got out of Flushing a as a young kid, went to Binghamton University at the time it was known as the State University of New York at SUNY Binghamton. Really Wonderful University. I mean, to this day I think it's the number one rated 00:05:00public university in the state of New York. And it was just really a wonderful opportunity. I continued to play baseball in this case collegiately as a freshman, played for four years, college baseball.

Stuart Schleien: I wanted to be a major league baseball player. That was my lifelong aspiration. And I entered into the Psychology Department and a lot of really neat things happened. There was a great psych departments, wonderful faculty and an autistic children's treatment and evaluation clinics. So I spent a lot of my time as a college student, either on the baseball fields or in the autism clinic. So it was really a great way to go to school not too many exams and didn't have to write very many papers. And I spent my time doing things, playing ball, and working with these extraordinary kids with classic autism.

Brittany H.: Okay. So what did you do upon graduation?

Stuart Schleien: Well that was really kind of an interesting story because getting back to baseball and psychology I realized at that time that although I was a good ball player playing competitive baseball since I was like six years of age, I probably wasn't going to become a pro, although I did play some semi-pro baseball after graduation in Richmond, Virginia. But I was up against some incredible athletes. As good of a picture that I was, there were always guys who can lace my fast ball to the outfield wall. And I knew that they were just too many people better than I was. So I knew I needed to continue my academics and it was really interesting because I was working in this autistic children's clinic with Dr. Ray Romanczyk, a world renowned autism professional.

Stuart Schleien: I didn't know he was world renowned. He was just a psychology 00:07:00professor to me. But I went into Romanczyk's office as a senior and I said to him, "Ray, I love baseball and athletics and recreation and sports and being outdoors and I've spent four years working with you with these kids with autism, which has also been an integral part of my life. Can I combine the two of them? I want to be a clinical psychologist, but I'm 20 years of age. Going into it four year doctoral program is really not in the cards. Who wants to graduate as a 24 year old with a PhD and not know anything about anything. So I said "Do I have any alternatives?" And Dr. Romanczyk being as brilliant as he is, said you know what?

Stuart Schleien: There were these fields of therapeutic recreation and adapted physical education that would allow you to continue to use your skills and 00:08:00interests in sports and recreation and being outdoors and combine that with serving kids with disabilities. Like those you've been learning a lot about with autism over the last four years. So I did my homework and I went to the library and I learned a lot about these two fields of Therapeutic Recreation and Adapted Physical Education, applied to like 20 programs, Master's programs around the country of course I got into all 20 of them. What was offered some really nice graduate assistantships to continue to work with kids with significant disabilities. And I went ahead and did that. I knew I wanted to continue my education and I ended up at the University of Georgia in lovely Athens doing a dual Master's degree in Therapeutic Recreation and Adapted Physical Education.

Stuart Schleien: And I work as a graduate assistant at the Georgia Retardation Center where I continued to have access to these wonderful kids with significant 00:09:00developmental disabilities. So it was kind of in my blood and bones to continue to give back to these kids and help them develop decent qualities of life. Not easy, these are really challenging kids, some of the lowest functioning kids in society, but it was really good and I got to do, through adapted PE and therapeutic rec., I started learning about facilitation techniques and how to use recreation and physical activity to help these kids better themselves and strengthen their muscles and utilize their free time a little more appropriately. So it was a good fit for me. A great Master's education at UGA.

Brittany H.: Okay. And what did you do after that?

Stuart Schleien: And after that, considering that I had been in school for a while, did my Master's work in a year and a half, so I was still a young kid. I 00:10:00knew that I couldn't continue in school. I needed to go and work full time. While I was working at the Georgia Retardation Center, this extraordinary special educator, Dr. Paul Wayman, had been visiting our center doing some in-service training and he had landed a new grant working with children and adults with significant developmental disabilities in the area of recreation and physical activity.

Stuart Schleien: And he spoke with my supervisor there and said, "Hey, I got this new grant, I need a coordinator at the graduate level." And my coordinator at the retardation center said, "I got just the guy for you, Stuart Schleien, he's going to do really well." And I met with Paul Layman during his visit down there and he recruited me at to Richmond, Virginia to coordinate his federal grant project and to work in the county in the developmental disabilities area. 00:11:00So I kind of had the best of both worlds working with this brilliant special educator on a federal grant. And I got to work in Henrico County working in a adult day program working with adults with significant disabilities.

Brittany H.: Well, I guess I have to ask, how did you find out about UNCG and tell me about that journey.

Stuart Schleien: Well, Worked in Richmond, Virginia for a few years. Ended up going to the University of Maryland, did my doctoral work, loved the Mid-Atlantic area. And with my PhD from Maryland, I ended up at the University of Minnesota for my first academic position. Had a wonderful 15 year run at the University of Minnesota as a gopher and ultimately went assistant associate, became a full professor and a division head and I was a division head for three 00:12:00years basically doing all the work of a department chair, but I didn't have the clout or the pay of a department chair.

Stuart Schleien: So I was doing a lot of work reporting to a dean, responsible for curriculum, having to manage faculty as a division head and a department chair position came around here at UNCG. They were looking for a Chair of the Recreation Parks Department.

Stuart Schleien: But it was an interesting job notice they were looking for a chair who could administer the department, but also kind of not necessarily as a kind of a late career administrator, but they wanted somebody who can bring a level of scholarship to the department. And that sounded like a perfect fit for me to leave the winter wonderland of Minneapolis. I loved the Twin Cities. It 00:13:00was an opportunity to explore being back in the mid-Atlantic area in the beautiful state of North Carolina and be an administrator/scholar. I kind of liked the sound of that. So I interviewed for the position and ultimately got the department chair's job in 1997 and I have been here ever since. I fall in love with North Carolina and with UNCG, raised a family here and I am still the Chair and Director of Graduate Study here at UNCG, the Department of Community in Therapeutic Recreation. So it's been a very, very enjoyable and successful 19 years here in Greensboro.

Brittany H.: Could you tell me about your first days on campus and what was your 00:14:00first impression? Was it what you had expected?

Stuart Schleien: It left a great taste in my mouth. I remember early on meeting most significantly faculty who I was to be working with and for and facilitating their careers and what I had inherited was a wonderful group of teachers. Was really interesting. Because at the University of Minnesota, which is a big 10 major research university. Everybody was interested in their research and their laboratories and their doc students. And all of a sudden I land in a place here at UNCG with a new Master's program, a viable undergraduate program with faculty who were every bit as smart as those at the University of Minnesota, but they 00:15:00cared deeply about their students, their undergraduate students. So it was kind of a new phenomenon for me to be working with and actually directing a group of faculty who had hours and hours of office hours to give to the students and they cared equally about the undergraduate curriculum as the Master's curriculum.

Stuart Schleien: And they care deeply about the education of students rather than viewing them as, well, "You're noise, you're interfering with my research. You're taking too much time away from me." To the contrary. They had lines of students outside their office doors and waiting to meet with them. And reputation of the department from the time I arrived in '97 had been a place where students really have access to faculty and they learn a lot in and outside 00:16:00of the classroom and just a lot of good things. I thought this job was going to be very easy actually, if I could already inherit faculty who care deeply about teaching and students the scholarly pot, I thought we'd come rather easily or I could certainly introduce good research and grant writing to this faculty and reinforce that and help develop maybe a more well-rounded faculty and department.

Stuart Schleien: So it was a great start and very exciting beginnings and welcomed by everybody. A wonderful Dean hired me, Dr. Bob Christina, who still lives in Greensboro, had retired several years ago. This is a wonderful man who from Buffalo, so he related to my Minneapolis work and being in the Great Plains and being cold. So he and I would smile when we would look at the forecasts, the weather forecast in Buffalo, New York, where he was from in Minneapolis, 00:17:00Minnesota. And just a really kind man and a wonderful scholar in his own ride and helped me build the Recreation and Parks Department here to one that got very scholarly in addition to holding on to its roots as being really strong teachers and mentors of students. So great start. And then I worked with other wonderful deans, so we hired to replace Bob Christina when he retired, who I still am in touch with.

Stuart Schleien: We hired Dave Perron from Virginia, a wonderful kinesiologist and leader. So wonderful that we ultimately hired him as our provost. So working with Dave Perron was really a true blessing for me. Another great guy and scholar and helped me further build the department. And then we hired one of our own department chairs, Celia Hooper from Communication Sciences and Disorders, 00:18:00who's our current dean and has always been a dear friend and colleague of mine as we hired her as chair of CSD and I took her under my wings and helped her along a little bit. And had been very, very good friends and colleagues ever since. So it's been really kind of a nice 19 years of three wonderful deans and a strong faculty and a great student body. So I've been a happy person. Maybe that's the reason why you wanted to interview me.

Brittany H.: Well, were there any other faculty members in your department who made an impression on you?

Stuart Schleien: Well, as I said, the faculty have made an impression on me because of their genuine interest in students. Again, not to insult anybody at the great University of Minnesota, and it truly is a great university, but the faculty here have been, I think more well-rounded. They'd been more concerned 00:19:00about teaching, scholarship, and community engagement. You can only hire well-rounded faculty at UNCG to be successful in a department like mine. So yeah, there have been a lot of faculty who had been here over the 19 years. Some have retired now, others are still here and they had been those well-rounded people. Nancy Gladwell who retired a year ago was my chief lieutenant for the 19 years I had been there. She had ended up working for about 23 at UNCG. Nancy was just this extraordinary woman where students came first.

Stuart Schleien: She was a good scholar. She published, but when it came to curriculum and accreditation and our self-studies and kind of taking the charge as our Director of Undergraduate Studies. I mean you couldn't beat somebody like 00:20:00her, could have never done this work without Nancy Gladwell around. Dr. Leandra Bedini is still working with us. A cracker jack recreational therapist, knows facilitation techniques. These students come out of her classes with your eyes wide open. Really can't wait to get out into the field to be serving individuals with disabilities. I mean we've got folks like that, but I've also been lucky enough to have new lines. Hired new faculty who in parks and recreation who are phenomenal recreation managers, they're great scholars. I have one faculty member who's an expert in park design and a park that's designed well, attracts lots and lots of different types of people who are able to use those parks in green spaces and in healthy ways.

Stuart Schleien: Ben Hickerson, I recently hired Justin Harmon who has a 00:21:00wonderful new project with cancer survivors in the outdoors. People who are going to have a new lease on life and are going to... The quality of life is going to improve greatly through the efforts of this work as people go out and walk trails and use the park systems and go out and camp and make new friends. So just a lot of really wonderful people out there who are previous faculty members as well as new hires that have really strengthened this department, our school of Health and Human Sciences. And I think the entire university.

Brittany H.: Well, what are your areas of focus and teaching, practice and scholarship?

Stuart Schleien: Well, I'm a pretty myopic person. I've kind of been thinking about the same things all of my life. Ever since working with those cute little kids with classic autism in that autistic children's clinic in Binghamton, New York. I've continued that line of work. In fact, I have friends and colleagues 00:22:00around the country who ask me every now and then "How could you study the same thing all of your life? You're such a boring guy." And I find that to be a compliment actually. In my academic career, I've never done things to build my resume or to put feathers in my cap, including being a department chair here. I think that's why I've been an effective chair because I haven't really worried about building my own career.

Stuart Schleien: I've been in a position where I could facilitate other faculty members careers. Hold faculty who want to become full professors as well as new faculty who are going to get tenured and promoted. I'd been in that kind of position, but I don't know. I've been lucky to study the very area that has been of interest to me for my entire life. I've been working with kids with autism spectrum disorder and adults with significant intellectual disabilities forever. 00:23:00And although I'm a department chair and director of grad studies and I'm quite busy as an administrator, I always make time for my work in the intellectual developmental disability arena. And my area of specialty has always been the inclusion of folks into the community.

Stuart Schleien: It's one thing to teach people skills and to help them with their quality of life and to make choices and to socialize. But my work has always been an extension of that to help people, to help agencies actually in the community welcome and accommodate people with significant disabilities. So my laboratories have been Boys and Girls Clubs and summer camps and recreation centers and YMCAs and Jewish community centers and developing technology so that 00:24:00these agencies can accommodate and effectively serve people with significant disabilities so that those people can have access to recreation and sports.

Stuart Schleien: And more importantly friends and to use their free time in quality ways as you and I expect to use our own free time in those ways. So I'm an inclusion specialist and I like to consider myself an environmental engineer. Makes it sound pretty impressive. And in fact that's really what I do. I engineer environments so that they are they are accommodating, welcoming, warm places for people of varying abilities.

Brittany H.: Wow. What about any social or academic events that stand out in 00:25:00your mind? I guess that could be off campus or on campus?

Stuart Schleien: Well, something that my students have done within the Department of Community and Therapeutic Rec for as long as I've been here, they run this spring fling. They design it, they implement it, they evaluate it. It's a spring fling for our student body. And we have a large student body. We serve nearly 300 students across the undergraduate and Master's program. So we have students from a class in event planning. So they're learning to deep professional event planners. They design this event for our entire student body and friends of the department, including individuals with disabilities who get invited into the program, so it's an inclusive event and every year we run this spring fling and it's full of wonderful food and activities and the students challenge the faculty to kickball games and volleyball games.

Stuart Schleien: And it's just an extraordinary opportunity to really celebrate a department and family. That sticks in my mind more than anything as a social activity that the students design themselves and it's done because we like each other and students feel very warm and welcomed within our department. We're like all inclusion facilitators.

Brittany H.: Well, I'm really jealous now, I want to come to the spring fling.

Stuart Schleien: We may just invite you to that.

Brittany H.: That sound awesome. Okay, well, so how has your department changed over the time that you've been here? I know you said it definitely became more scholarly and things like that, but yeah.

Stuart Schleien: Well that really has been the change. What has not changed is the priority to serve our students well and to make sure they're educated. And when they get out, they get certified professionally, licensed as recreational therapist. The faculty we continue to hire. We recently hired Dr. Judy Kinney, 00:27:00who is extraordinary recreational therapists now already starting to do great work with Wake Forest Baptist Health. Just really an incredible therapist and she's very concerned about teaching those skills to our rec therapy students. I'm delighted when she comes and complains to me that her rec therapy classes are too big because we have a large major and a lot of students who are attracted to this field, but I'm delighted that she complains to me that the class was too big big.

Stuart Schleien: She's teaching clinical skills to future rec therapists and you can't do that with 75 students in the class. So I know that she's thinking the right way and she has the student's best interests in mind. That's just the way our faculty have always been. Those are the types of faculty like Dr. Kinney we hire. And so that has not changed. What has changed is as UNCG has kind of grown 00:28:00up in the 19 years I've been here and had become more scholarly we'll never be Chapel Hill, I guess. Or NC State as far as the amount of grants development and scholarship and Nobel prize winners that come out of the place. But I will tell you, we do some really good scholarship here. Even in small departments like mine with six faculty there's a terrific amount of research.

Stuart Schleien: Much of it is community based, participatory research where our partners are community organizations, nonprofits typically. The research questions emanate in the community, not in our ivory tower offices. And we have a lot of community partners. In fact, many are our former students who are directing these recreation agencies and non-profits today. But I think that's been the greatest change. And I think that was my charge upon hiring as chair to 00:29:00bring that level of scholarship. So over the 19 years we brought in federal grants in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and wonderful contracts with agencies and the community. And a lot of good research gets done. And in fact, our Master's program has really become more sophisticated where our graduate students are graduating with professional presentations at the state and national levels under their belts. They're doing research and co-publishing with faculty and we really are well rounded more so than I think 19 years ago.

Stuart Schleien: So a lot of good teachers scholars within the department as there are across the school of HHS and as I've observed across the University, those have been the biggest changes.

Brittany H.: Do you think that your department will ever have a doctoral program?

Stuart Schleien: Oh, that's a very good question actually coming from a Master's student. We were invited to develop a doctoral program under a different 00:30:00leadership and chancellor and provost in years past because they recognized us as a strong department with a good Master's program and good scholars as faculty. And we I would have been excited to develop that doc program because I came out of the University of Minnesota where I had worked with 15 years and trained many a doctoral student. And I was very proud of that facet of my career. But being the participatory leader that I am, I was not going to force a doctoral program on this faculty and they didn't want it.

Stuart Schleien: We didn't necessarily believe that the resources would follow as far as tuition waivers for doc students and grad assistantship and new faculty lines. And our faculty were very happy as undergraduate and Master's level faculty members. And I respected that and we turn down that opportunity. 00:31:00Based on the new faculty that I have been hiring, couple in community rec management, doctors, Hickerson and Harmon and Dr. Kinney in rec therapy and Kimberly Miller in community rec and event planning.

Stuart Schleien: These folks are extraordinary teacher scholars, they're researchers. Excellent. And with that as a foundation we can certainly go after a doctoral program down the road. It just may be within our repertoire in the next few years because the foundation is there. The scholarship is there. I think we ... the resources would need to follow. And that's always the big question. Being at UNC Greensboro as kind of like a second tier university within the UNC system.

Brittany H.: Could you tell me about the types of students that you've had in your department over the years?

Stuart Schleien: I am delighted to say that our students have been really a pleasant surprise when... I have this tendency to compare not only faculty but students to that great big ten university that I spent 15 years at the University of Minnesota where most were Scandinavian, where they all grew up with moms and dads working for fortune 500 companies, living in the Twin Cities. And so these are already second and third generation college kids. The big difference here at UNCG, a lot of first generation college kids. I meet their moms and dads as a Department Chair when they first enter into our program. And I know that their parents, oftentimes may not have been to college, they're 00:33:00working in the textile industry.

Stuart Schleien: They work in for RF Micro. And they're very proud of their first generation college kids. So they have to learn to appreciate how to learn. And that learning is a wonderful thing. And a college education is a true blessing. They don't grow up with necessarily with those priorities or values. So that's been different. But I tell you, the smartest kids at UNCG are every bit as bright as the smartest kids at the University of Minnesota. And we've had Master's level students here who have gone on for their PhDs who are now working at those big 10 major research universities. And we've had undergrad students who have gone on to become directors of large recreation and parks systems. 00:34:00We've had students go on to be great researchers and most importantly, really wonderful practitioners in the recreation and parks systems throughout the United States. These kids have been fantastic.

Stuart Schleien: We have many honors, Lloyd Honors College students studying within our department. And just it's really been a pleasant surprise for me. Never expecting these kids to be as smart and as sincere and genuinely wanting to be great practitioners, working with people of varying abilities. It's been great.

Brittany H.: Well, how have you served beyond UNCG and professional organizations or in the community?

Stuart Schleien: Well, being a disability specialist in my own right I've always been connected with the community. In fact, I used to chuckle when UNCG would 00:35:00invite professionals to come and speak with faculty about what it's like to be community engaged. And how do you design partnerships with the community? I mean, that's just in our blood and that's what we do.

Stuart Schleien: In fact, not only myself, but my entire faculty we're always engaged with the community. So that's where our work gets done when we're not in the classroom doing pre-service education of students. So there's been a lot of access and work in the community throughout my run here at UNCG. I've been very involved with the North Carolina Recreation and Park Association. I've been involved with the ARC formerly known as the Association for Retarded Citizens. We no longer use that language. I've been very involved with TASH, formerly known as The Association for Persons with Severe Handicaps. I'm now spending an 00:36:00awful lot of time with the American Camp Association helping them develop technology to include campers with disabilities into summer camps around the United States.

Stuart Schleien: Some of the work locally that I'm most proud of is my work with the ARC of Greensboro as well as beyond academics, which is a program that's housed here on the UNCG campus. Beyond academics is a post-secondary education program for young college age, young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, providing them with an opportunity to go to college. So I am sure that thousands of students here at UNCG come across individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities now. Sometimes in their classes and certainly at Elliott University Center and in the library and at sporting events and social events. It's been a wonderful program. And the Beyond Academics 00:37:00Program here is one of the state of the art, one of the models across the country when we started it, there were only a handful. Now, of course there are dozens and dozens because it's such a great idea to provide college opportunities to people who deserve that beyond high school.

Stuart Schleien: And if I may, when The Beyond Academics Program was merely an idea and to potentially bring it to UNCG, I was the sole faculty member representing that idea in partnership with some wonderful people who had this idea from beyond academics. And I spent, I remember hours and meetings with doctors, Terry Shelton, with Provost Perrin, with the Chancellor, with the university attorneys, all who had questions about should we even do this, why 00:38:00would we want lots and lots of folks with intellectual developmental disabilities as students on our campus. And due to the vision of administration and particularly provost parent who got it and he knew this would be a great thing. And Dr. Terry Shelton, who had always been a supporter and pioneer of the Beyond Academics Program.

Stuart Schleien: And then faculty members like myself who could say you know what? This is not only a good thing for the individual that we will serve, but it will be a great opportunity for faculty to be part of this, to learn how to serve students in our classrooms who have greater variance. And we could be writing grants around beyond academics and it will be valuable for our student body to be in classes with people who are very different than they are. So I was giving the kind of the faculty sale and we were successful and beyond academics 00:39:00now is in like its ninth year, ninth or 10th year on this campus. And we have wonderful graduations every year that Dr. Shelton, sometimes our chancellor or provost attend. It's really been a beautiful component of UNCG and that I think was worth sharing.

Brittany H.: Well that really leads me into my next question. I was going to ask you about your proudest accomplishments or contributions and any worker or project or research you've done of which you are particularly proud. So on top of that, which is, that is amazing.

Stuart Schleien: Oh, thank you.

Brittany H.: Any anything else?

Stuart Schleien: Yeah, well the sides the Beyond Academics Program, which really is a jewel at UNCG, as a teacher because I do try to find time to teach undergraduate students. I thought that was always an important thing to do as a department chair. So I do teach a required course at this University, Recreation 00:40:00Services with Underrepresented Groups. As chair, I get to choose what I teach. So I'm teaching something that is dear to me and it's a course on how to include and accommodate people of who are marginalized in society, in our afterschool and community programs. So our students get through that class and they learn about how to welcome and accommodate people who are homeless, people with mental illnesses, kids with autism, spectrum disorder and others who are marginalized in society. Within that course, I have been running for about 15 years, a pure companion program, which peers the students, and it's a big class, about 75 students.

Stuart Schleien: Every student in class has to partner with an individual who is marginalized in some way and not in a hierarchical way where they are like this 00:41:00God like figure or teacher or mentor, but in a heterogeneous way, in an equal way, not vertical but horizontal if I may. It's a partnership. It's a friendship and for 12 weeks they developed potentially a friendship with somebody who is very different than he or she is and they have to reflect on a weekly basis on their experiences and friendship have developed. People have been invited to weddings. Friendships have maintained over 10 years' time.

Stuart Schleien: People continue to ask me when they see me on campus or in the streets or in the community, when am I getting my new buddy, my new partner. It has been a really incredible program and has filled a void. Unfortunately, there are a lot of lonely people out there in our communities who need friends who 00:42:00want access to really cool, enjoyable age appropriate peers. And there's just not enough of that out there. But that's something that I've been proud of that has gone swimmingly over the last decade and a half.

Brittany H.: Well, did you have any interactions with any of our chancellors that you'd like to mention?

Stuart Schleien: I did actually, Chancellor Sullivan was this extraordinary woman who, again, not to mention names, but at the previous university that I worked at for 15 years the place was so big like 55,000 students or whatever and that you would barely know the Dean of the Graduate School by name. I come to UNCG, I get to meet Patricia Sullivan. We develop a relationship and when I 00:43:00would see her on campus, which was be a few times over the year, she would say, "Stuart, how your daughters doing? How are Jenna and Alexa?" She knew them as babies because when I arrived here, my oldest was five and my youngest was two, good time to move to Greensboro.

Stuart Schleien: She got to know my kids. So here I came from a giant university where I barely knew the names of upper administration and I'm now at UNCG with a chancellor who's asking me about my children by name and would wonder about our quality of life and what we were doing during our free time.

Stuart Schleien: She was an extraordinary woman and really brought that element of genuineness and getting to know people and know faculty. For all I know she knew thousands of students by name as well. And I must say that although I don't know Chancellor Gilliam very well although I've met him a few times as a 00:44:00department chair. I met him at a community event. I don't know him very well yet, but I've been reading a lot about him. I've been following his actions. I ran into him at a wonderful music event a few months ago. He's just an extraordinary man. I mean, you know that he's genuine, you know that he cares deeply about students. And that's what I love. It's why I've been so impressed with my own faculty. Well, here's a chancellor who is continuously speaking about students and what's in it for them and are they being educated well, and he's just in the trenches and just he's accessible.

Stuart Schleien: And for all I know it's Chancellor Gilliam who is instigated this project right here about faculty telling stories. I'm just putting two and 00:45:00two together and that's just kind of who he is. To have somebody leading the university who was so hands on and care so deeply about the education of young people and those who are marginalized, by the way, for all I know he could have been a special educator. I mean, I really liked this man a lot and I trust him and respect him. And I know that just even being within a School of Health and Human Sciences, that's an important area for him. He cares about Health and Human Sciences. So here I'm in a high priority school and it's a very exciting time under Chancellor Gilliam's leadership. A lot of good things ahead of us.

Brittany H.: Yeah. Well tell me about how working at UNCG has impacted and affected your life. What does the UNCG mean to you?

Stuart Schleien: Well I've been on track to become a dean. I am asked monthly to apply for dean's jobs. It's been going on now for probably 10 years. I continue to turn them down. I've really enjoyed my life here in Greensboro. I raised two beautiful daughters who are now at other universities, one a doc student at Fairleigh Dickinson University in clinical psychology. And my baby is a junior at UNC Chapel Hill, sorry. And having a good receiving a great education and cares and works comprehensively with immigrants and refugees. So they're both very concerned about those who are marginalized and I'm very proud of both of them. But these kids are as grounded and as intelligent and as focused as they 00:47:00are because they grew up in Greensboro and they grew up as part of a UNCG family, and they've been surrounded by college students and wonderful colleagues and a place that is community engaged and cares a lot about society and building a strong community.

Stuart Schleien: And what these kids are going to do, it's because of UNCG. It's been a really wonderful 19 years here. I couldn't have asked for anything more and to be honest with you, I think I made a decision now as a 60 year old man, although I think I have a lot of years left in me. I'm knocking on wood. I'm reasonably healthy and feel committed to continuing to facilitate faculty members careers and continue to design inclusive communities for people. 00:48:00Hopefully I'll continue to do that. And it's been UNCG and this wonderful community that has gotten me to this point and has allowed me to be a reasonably successful father and husband and inclusion facilitator and department chair.

Stuart Schleien: I think I'll retire here unless somebody offered me a contract to play with the New York Mets. Shy of that I think I'll just continue to work here and do these wonderful things with some great colleagues under the leadership of this what I consider that a world-class chancellor and really excited about the future of UNCG.

Brittany H.: Well, speaking of the future we're doing these interviews as part 00:49:00of the 125th anniversary of the university, which is an excellent opportunity for reflection but it also helps us to think about where we are heading in the future. So what do you think the future is for UNCG, and where do you see UNCG going as an institution in the next 25 to 50 years? And I know you've spoke a little bit about this, but maybe could you elaborate a little more?

Stuart Schleien: Yeah, I think if I could be somewhat succinct here the future for UNCG is in our community engagement, our community based, participatory research. All the wonderful relationships that faculty across this campus have with the community. Those are the types of faculty we seem to hire, certainly within the School of Health and Human Sciences. And I know across this University, there are some really great faculty here who not only work well with 00:50:00students because they're well rounded faculty members, but they really are great scholars and their scholarship is in the area of how do we build stronger communities and a healthier society. I work with faculty in the School of Education and in Arts and Sciences and of course in HHS my home school. But there are a lot of faculty here who are asking the same questions about access, how to accommodate people, what we can do with families.

Stuart Schleien: How do we work with people who are marginalized in society, don't have access to health care, don't have access to medicine or good services. The best practices that we're designing through our research are 00:51:00practices that get implemented in the community almost immediately. No offense to the bench scientists and the folks doing great research in laboratories, but UNCG's strength really is in our community engaged scholarship. And I know we already have some accolades coming this way and we have some markers that identify us as an community engaged campus, but that's going to be what we're known for down the road. And by all means, we need to be bragging about that great work because to this day, living in Greensboro now for 19 years, people are still talking about Duke and Chapel Hill and NC State right here in the Piedmont Triad.

Stuart Schleien: And but it's changing. And I think between Chancellor Gilliam and Provost Dunn and the wonderful work of the faculty there are more and more 00:52:00people out there in the community who are identifying UNCG as a pretty campus, a nice place to go for theater or sports. And you guys do great work in the community because I have now had access to whatever nonprofit or hospital or recreation agency and they know that there's been a UNCG stamp placed upon it. That's what we do best and that's what we're going to be known for in the years ahead.

Brittany H.: Well, I don't think I have any more formal questions for you. But did you have anything you'd like to add about your time here at UNCG or any other experiences you would like to mention?

Stuart Schleien: No, I think this has been a thorough interview Brittney. I think you did a great job identifying a series of questions and it makes me very happy to be able to speak about my 19 year run at this wonderful University and 00:53:00helping move our department forward and putting UNCG on the map in Greensboro and the state of North Carolina and beyond. And so anyway I'm proud to be a spartan and I'm happy to have had this interview, Brittney, and thank you very much for the opportunity.

Brittany H.: Thank you. It was a pleasure to interview you. I'm glad that you're here. Very inspirational person.

Stuart Schleien: Thank you, I appreciate that.