Like many of Mount Mercy faculty, staff, students, alumni and friends, I am energized by the progress happening in and around campus. Mount Mercy is having a transformational summer: from the construction on Regina and McAuley halls for what will eventually be the 43,500-square-foot University Center to the release of news that Mount Mercy will officially become Mount Mercy University on August 23, we’ve been busy!

Add to that a summer of personal “new beginnings,” and it’s hard not to take a step back and say, “Whew.”

In our next edition, which will be the 2010 President’s Report, we will recap a very fruitful 2009-2010 academic year on the Hill. Just a few of last year’s highlights include welcoming a Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence from the Czech Republic, initiating a comprehensive Web site rebuilding project, documenting our students’ spring break service trips [in video], celebrating as the first Master’s degree candidates graduated from Mount Mercy, and our institution’s active role in the Conference for Mercy Higher Education. All of the activities, adventures and successes of the past year were geared toward one defining moment: the time at which Mount Mercy College will become Mount Mercy University.

The University transition on August 23 – an historic and institutional milestone – has taken almost four years of diligent planning and research. Mount Mercy’s strategic Plan for Mount Mercy University laid the groundwork for what the institution will become, and our faculty, staff and students have been eagerly anticipating this transition. Why, you ask? There are many reasons and benefits of University status, none greater than the fact that Mount Mercy is already operating as a University – as evidenced by our diverse student populations and varied academic offerings.

We are currently in the stages of interviewing folks and writing about the past year for the President’s Report, with one defining moment yet to come on August 23. We hope that you will join us on that day as we officially launch Mount Mercy University. For details on the events or to RSVP, please visit our University microsite.

I look forward to celebrating Mount Mercy University with you,

Molly

The Pirates, an affable group led by Willie Stargell and Dave Parker, romped to the title with their theme song “We Are Family” blasting away over the speakers at Three Rivers Stadium and inside the team’s clubhouse.

This year’s Mustang runners may want to go back and give that disco hit recorded by Sister Sledge a good listen. A family has been assembled on the Mount Mercy campus. “I wasn’t going to go out for cross country in college because I wasn’t that great in high school, but I liked track a lot so I just did it to stay in shape and meet the people,” said Erin Behan, a junior from Independence, Iowa. “We’re a family, we talk outside of practice, we hang out outside of practice.”

Matt Clarke, a junior from Clarence and North Cedar High School, has also been made to feel like a member of one big, extended family.

“It’s helped us, or it’s helped me anyway, get through school,” Clarke said. “It’s helped a lot just having the guys there for support. We always see each other in the library, and that helps a lot. We hang out with each other on off days, and we’re definitely a family, that’s for sure.”

The family that hangs together is also enjoying a lot of success together. The Mustang women won their fourth straight Midwest Collegiate Conference championship in the fall and qualified for the NAIA national meet for the third time in school history. The men’s team finished second at the league race but was respresented at nationals by Clarke and sophomores Mike Miroux from Spring Valley, Ill., and Keith Terry from Cedar Rapids.

The overseer of the two programs is Coach Ryan Scheckel, a 2001 Mount Mercy graduate who took over the cross country and men’s and women’s track programs a year after graduation. He didn’t inherit disarray by any means, but did set in a motion a building process that has led the cross country teams to new heights.

“When I took over, it was on an interim basis … and I would say the only real difference between now and then is just the size our team,” Scheckel said. “If you talk to alumni, the attitude of the athletes, the feeling and the meaning they get when they come here and participate, I think it’s probably the same.”

The women’s team is led by senior Chelsea Kvidera from Traer, Iowa, a product of the outstanding cross country and track & field programs at North Tama High School. Kvidera immediately bought into Scheckel’s system and has been a dependable mainstay for four years.

“It’s a very structured program. Practices are usually laid out for us for the entire season, so we know where we need to be at what time,” Kvidera said.

“Schedule-wise, it helps us to schedule school easier and we can focus on cross country or track that day at a certain time, and then turn around and go do our studies.”

Behan, junior Kori Yotter from Wapello, Iowa, and freshmen Taylor Helms and Esther Rono joined Kvidera as top finishers most of the season. The women’s team received votes in the NAIA Cross Country Coaches’ Poll at times last season.

“I expected us to be good, but I didn’t expect us to get national votes. I think that was kind of an unexpected thing,” Kvidera said. “I knew we were doing really well, but our conference was really competitive this year, so getting national votes just put our expectations higher.”

“It’s great, especially the team chemistry,” Miroux said. “We have a pretty close relationship with each other. That helps a lot to get through some of our training days.”

Training and offseason work is what helps these teams flourish. Miroux said he generally runs 70 to 80 miles a week.

During the course of the regular season, the Mount Mercy runners compete not only against other NAIA schools from the MCC, but also NCAA Division I, II, and III schools. The Iowa Conference and its nine Division III schools offer the Mustangs very good competition right outside their front door.

“These student athletes are, by far, the most solid teams I’ve coached,” Scheckel said. “If you look at these teams and where they’ve placed as a team, we’ve never been this consistent. Obviously, in a couple of the big meets it’s always going to be hard to score well as a team. The competition is so high.

“We’ve just done a very good job of being consistent and I hope that speaks for what they’re doing as far as off-season in the summer, and hopefully that means — as far as recruiting — we’re bringing in some kids who are not only talented but who want to improve and be part of our team.”

Warne, from Lenexa, Kan., was an NAIA honorable mention all-American and NAIA all-
Region VII performer as a senior in 2001. He earned first-team all-Midwest Classic Conference accolades in 2000 and 2001 after garnering second-team all-MCC honors in 1999 and honorable mention in 1998. Warne was also a three-time Co-Most Valuable Player. Warne ended his career in 2001 as the leading scorer in men’s soccer history with 51 goals and 138 points. He now ranks second in school history in both categories, and still holds the record for career assists with 36.

Althoff, from Farmington, Iowa, competed at three NAIA national meets, qualifying individually twice and competing with her teammates at the 2001 national championship. She was also a four-time all-Midwest Classic Conference standout, the MCC Women’s Harrier of the Year in 1998 and 1999, and NAIA all- Region VII in 2000 and 2001. Althoff also competed in track & field and still ranks in the top 10 all-time in the 3,000 and 5,000 meters.

The Hall of Fame induction ceremony followed a day of games held in Hennessey Recreation Center. Approximately 75 alumni athletes participated in co-ed soccer, basketball and volleyball matches before honoring Warne and Althoff.

“I know other people have helped me out in my life without expecting payment, and this is just one way to pay it back,” says DeVilbiss. “It’s always a good feeling to know that someone is doing better because of what the girls on my floor have done.”

The students engaged the entire campus in their endeavors, sponsoring donation buckets at several campus locations until they had accumulated more than $500 in donations, which allowed them to purchase enough fleece to make more than 300 blankets. DeVilbiss and her hallmates assembled the fleece into blankets, cutting and tying ribbons into the edges.

“Service is the underlying theme in just about everything that happens on the Hill, whether a student is actively seeking service projects, participating in a club, or just living in the residence halls,” DeVilbiss says. “Everyone is encouraged to serve in any way he or she can.”

The definition of teamwork took on new meaning for the men's and women's cross country teams as they joined forces to help reshape a community still struggling with flood recovery.

It’s the second year in a row that a Mount Mercy team has earned this prestigious award, which honors coaches and student-athletes who exhibit exceptional character values. Teams that receive this award demonstrate exemplary character values in and out of competition. The Mustang volleyball squad was honored in 2008.

“The Sisters of Mercy and their commitment to service embody the entire Mount Mercy
community,” said Athletic Director Scot Reisinger. “While we are proud of all of our teams that participate in service with the community, we are proud of our cross country teams for receiving this honor.”

The Mustang cross country teams battled adversity on and off the field of competition
throughout the 2009 season, but overcame it with great leadership and commitment from
veterans and newcomers alike. They shared those traits with a Cedar Rapids community still recovering from the floods of 2008. On two separate days, the team worked to repair flood
damaged homes and a small business.

“Character speaks to the core of this team and its athletes,” said Men’s and Women’s Cross Country Coach Ryan Scheckel ’01. “That character is found in our teams’ chemistry and starts with the captains and runs through the freshmen. Along with hard work and focus, character forms a bond that continues with our student-athletes as alumni and allows them to
strive for excellence in all areas of life.”

Mount Mercy Professor of Art Jane Gilmor’s work can, and it has. She has impacted students and the community through art for more than 36 years — with her own special flair for challenging conventional wisdom with a sense of compassion and wit.

It would be tempting to place Gilmor’s work in the “raises eyebrows” category and dismiss her as yet another nameless, faceless contemporary artist. Her artwork expresses her trademark tongue-in-cheek humor, but also addresses deeper subject matter about belonging, fear, and one’s sense of home. Gilmor carefully crafts into each piece beautiful layers of meaning — conveying depth and perspectives from their subjects that far outweigh the material.

“I remember once hearing a gentleman walk past one of my exhibits and he said, ‘Just a minute, I have to check this out,’” says Gilmor. “I could tell from his voice that he was thinking, ‘Look, another piece of modern art that doesn’t mean anything.’” The exhibit he stumbled upon, however, was no ordinary piece. Gilmor was commissioned to create a special exhibit at the University of Iowa Children’s Hospital as a way for terminally ill children to express themselves through art.

The exhibit consisted of small buildings that the children could crawl into, and where they were able to draw what they see through their “window” on a small square of malleable metal. The exhibit allowed the children to create a representation of their experiences as a patient, with the window serving as a physical porthole and as a way to visualize their hopes and fears. “It allowed them to see outside themselves for a moment,” says Gilmor. “It asked them an open-ended question and invited them to explore.” The metal squares were then attached to the outside of the building structures, allowing visitors to glimpse the world of a terminally ill child. Inside each structure were additional notebooks where visitors could record their own experiences of illness. The exhibit was eventually purchased by the Des Moines Art Center.

Gilmor later had the opportunity to speak to the gentleman. As she explained the meaning to him, she sensed him understand its purpose. “It really opened his eyes,” she says. “People are so afraid of what they don’t understand. I’ve always thought it’s a good policy to investigate.”

Art for the voiceless

Giving a voice to traditionally voiceless demographics has always been a strong element of Gilmor’s work. She is passionate about empowering people who are powerless — especially children and the homeless.

In collaboration with the Catherine McAuley Center and the YWCA’s Madge Phillips Center, Gilmor created installations and workshops tailored to benefit those individuals walking in off the street — rather than the typical museum audiences and gallery visitors. “I requested the exhibit be free for the people staying at the shelters,” she says. “Museum visitors could come right across the street to the YWCA and experience another part of the exhibit in a non-traditional venue — visible to everyone.”

The exhibit consisted of notes and writings from the homeless, which Gilmor gathered from workshops held in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. Visitors could read reflections on what “home” means to those who are homeless.

“Jane reaches out to a variety of demographics in her work to make art something that is accessible to everyone,” says Meghan Bean ’08, who took classes with Gilmor. “She always taught us that art should not only be available to museum- and gallery-goers, but for public consumption to inspire creative thinking.”

Engaging community members to explore new perspectives is important to Gilmor. “It’s about going beyond investigating your own connections and images to giving others a voice,” she says. “Community based art projects can help give a voice to the disenfranchised and marginalized.”

“Jane’s interest in including the community in her work demonstrates the power of visual art,” says Bean. “Occasionally people think of artists as individual geniuses working in an isolated studio disconnected from their audience. Jane’s work contrasts this idea by engaging with her audience and opening up a dialogue within the community to address social issues.”

Exploring the art-science connection

The duality of Gilmor’s roles as professional artist and faculty member illustrate a common characteristic of her work — the existence of layers. Her knack of uncovering layers can be traced back to an early academic interest: science.

“The investigative nature in science is similar to the arts,” says Gilmor. “I’ve always had an interest in natural things, in human things; in seeing what things look like and how they work.” It’s a marriage that people might separate in their minds, but Gilmor views the juxtaposition as natural. “Investigation in the natural sciences can be similar to the artistic process; you are looking for new visual and intellectual questions and connections that expand and bring meaning to our lives, sometimes in the smallest of ways.”

As an undergraduate at Iowa State University, Gilmor majored in medical technology before changing to textile design, receiving her Bachelor of Science degree in 1969. She studied at The School of Art Institute of Chicago, and earned a Master of Fine Arts degree and a Master of Arts degree from The University of Iowa School of Art. Since then she has continued her artmaking while living in New York, Italy, London, and Lisbon during sabbaticals or summer breaks.

More telling of Gilmor’s artistic prowess are the ideals she infuses in her students; a “no boundaries” attitude which enables students to exceed their own expectations.

“When students arrive here they often don’t see themselves as going to New York and turning into great artists or designers,” says Gilmor. “But they do.” Gilmor credits the close connections with faculty as the reason students thrive in an artistic environment, and later succeed in whatever field they pursue.

“She does a good job of pushing her students to go farther,” says Cody Schmitz ’10, a graphic design major from Central City, Iowa. “I think the most important thing she’s taught me as an artist is that I can always push things farther and that my work is rarely ever done.”

As a current graduate student at Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts Washington University in St. Louis, Bean recognizes that Gilmor’s tutelage has fostered in her an ability to excel. “When brainstorming ideas for projects, Jane would encourage us to imagine that there weren’t any restrictions,” says Bean. “This always gave us a sense of freedom and Jane
would say, ‘Where there’s a will, there’s a way.’ I have her to thank for giving me the confidence to advance myself in a career field that I am incredibly passionate about.”

“Everyone’s an artist,” Gilmor says. “Everyone is born creative, but education in the arts will take you to a level that is beyond the average person.” Gilmor notes that Mount Mercy students can take advantage of the strength of the art program while also reaping the benefits of the small class sizes — a combination that does not exist at other colleges. “We have a strong gallery, theatre, and music program at Mount Mercy,” says Gilmor. “There are a lot of public projects, we are constantly doing things in the community, and our faculty present their work all over the country — that’s important to a small school.”

But it’s student feedback that really impacts Gilmor. “There are cumulative effects here you don’t see until later,” she says. “It’s most gratifying when they come back and say, ‘I wouldn’t be where I am if not for you and Mount Mercy’s Art Program.’”

As she looks back on her career and ponders the future, Gilmor is confident that she will have new avenues to explore and new questions to raise. “I don’t answer my own questions very often,” she says, “or I wouldn’t have anything to do.” She will continue to create pieces that require people to search for an explanation. “There will always be people who aren’t interested in that search,” she says. “If everyone loved my work I’d be worried.”

Retrospective of a successful career

Gilmor recently completed her latest exhibit, The Architecture of Migration: I’ll be back for the cat, which premiered at the Humanities Gallery at Long Island University (LIU) in Brooklyn, New York. The exhibit was a unique display of wearable, readable containers that invited members of the LIU and Mount Mercy communities to connect through sharing and describing a remembered place. Contributions to the exhibit can be viewed by visiting
www.backforthecat.com.

Other recent exhibits include Blind, a one-person exhibit at A.I.R Gallery in New York’s Chelsea art district in 2005, and A Semester at Sea, displayed at Maharishi International University, in Fairfield, Iowa. Gilmor’s work has been exhibited throughout the country and the world, including exhibits in Portugal, Washington, D.C., France, New Orleans, Minneapolis, Mexico, and Chicago. Gilmor has been awarded residency fellowships in Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and the United Kingdom. Two films have been made regarding her work, one by Iowa Public Television in 2007, the other by the McKnight Foundation in Minneapolis in 1996.

Gilmor is the recipient of a 2004 Fulbright Senior Scholar/ Research Fellowship at Evora University in Portugal. Other notable grants and fellowships include two National Endowment for the Arts Artist’s Fellowship grants, a Banff International Center Artist Residency Fellowship from Banff, Canada in 2000, and a McKnight Foundation/Intermedia Arts Interdisciplinary Fellowship in 1997.

Gilmor’s work is a celebration of the art of raising questions — questions seeking answers best sought by listening to another person’s perspective and learning their story. Her wearable artwork lends itself perfectly to the art of “seeing” the outside world through someone else’s eyes.

Mount Mercy coordinated its service efforts with AmeriCorps Vista volunteers, a partnership that has led to renewed outreach and more concentrated efforts to assist the community with flood recovery and other volunteer endeavors.

Seniors Matt Hakeman, Bob Jameson, Ashley Helle, and Meghan Stannard show off the progress they've made while tearing out floorboard in a flood-damaged house in northwest Cedar Rapids.

It’s a collaboration that has multiple benefits. “There are many partnerships that Mount Mercy has with organizations in the community,” says senior Matt Hakeman, from Williamsburg, Iowa, who helped volunteer in the flood zone. “They are also a great resource for career recommendations as we leave our undergrad schooling in search of our new lives.”

In addition to providing volunteers, Mount Mercy also served as host for the annual Martin Luther King, Jr. celebration ceremony. This year, the campus welcomed Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett and local NAACP chapter president Dedric Doolin as keynote speakers.

The day provided students with the perfect opportunity to live the College’s mission of service. “I am always looking for ways to serve, so the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of service was another opportunity for me to get involved,” says senior Ashley Helle, from Hiawatha, Iowa, who helped rip out floorboard in a flood-damaged house. “Mount Mercy is known for its dedication to service and leadership, and the students know that.” Junior Chantel LaPlante, from Chatfield, Minn., agrees. “Service is a core value of Mount Mercy, and the College does an excellent job of upholding that value.”

The Master of Science in Nursing program features emphases in health promotion and disease prevention focus and is a 36 credit hour program that can be completed in 18 months. The Master of Arts in Marriage and Family Therapy is a 60 credit hour program that can be completed in two years.

Dean of Graduate Studies Melody Graham, Ph.D., notes that both programs build on Mount Mercy’s reputation for quality, faithinspired liberal arts and professional education. “The addition of a graduate program in nursing is a natural evolution for our highly competitive and recognized undergraduate nursing program,” says Graham. “We look forward to offering local nurses the opportunity to meet the challenges of an ever-changing, complex health care system by continuing their education with our talented faculty.”

Master of Arts in Marriage and Family Therapy leads students to Iowa state licensure in Marriage Family Therapy — one of only two programs in the state of Iowa. The program offers students a unique systems perspective that is reinforced by the program’s mandated 300 counseling hours, which ensures that students learn successful counseling techniques to help individuals, couples and families. “The Master of Arts in Marriage and Family Therapy is a perfect program for adults interested in exploring and beginning a second career,” says Graham. “Students will benefit from Mount Mercy’s solid liberal arts curriculum while learning practical and successful counseling skills.” The Master of Arts in Marriage and Family Therapy does not require students to have a previous degree in social work, psychology or a related field.

“The positive feedback about our graduate programs in business and education is overwhelming,” says Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs John P. Marsden, Ph.D. “Our alumni, current students and community members approached us about starting additional programs to help fill gaps in local workforce development. We are pleased to offer resources that will positively contribute to the community.” For more information about Mount Mercy’s graduate programs, contact Melody Graham at gradprograms@mtmercy.edu.

Freshmen chosen to be inducted into S.T.E.P.S. Program showed enthusiasm, integrity, and a commitment to personal growth and professional leadership.

Striving Toward Engaged and Purposeful Servant Leadership (S.T.E.P.S.) is a four-year leadership program that provides students with the opportunity to utilize their strengths and abilities in order to contribute to the communities in which they live and work. In January, 20 freshmen were inducted into the program, beginning their journey to develop leadership traits that will carry them through college and beyond. Individuals were selected to join the program based on their passion and commitment to servant-leadership.

Mindy Chrisman ’05, coordinator of leadership programs, has high expectations of the success of the S.T.E.P.S. Class of 2013. “Our students within the program have committed to not only learning more about leadership, but also to serving others around them,” she says. “By the time they leave Mount Mercy, if they embody that, we will have done our job.”

But it is also common for members of the campus community to come face-to-face with an officer they know personally. This personal connection is a direct result of Mount Mercy’s
thriving criminal justice program, which marks its 35th anniversary this year. In more than three decades, the criminal justice program has gained in reputation throughout the state and is credited with educating many of the area’s corrections officers and law enforcement
personnel and leadership.

As a staff member who often interacts with law enforcement personnel in the event of an emergency on campus, Assistant Dean of Studentsand Director of Residence Life Jenifer Hanson appreciates the attention that the campus and its students receive from law enforcement personnel who are also Mount Mercy alumni. “It is comforting that so many local police officers are Mount Mercy graduates,” she says. “They know the campus and they care deeply about the welfare of our students.” She notes that oftentimes law enforcement will make patrols on campus when it is not typically their route because they are familiar with the location of the residential campus and wish to maintain a connection to the College.

Cody Estling ’98 is one such local law enforcement officer who makes an extra effort. “When I worked on patrol in that area of Cedar Rapids I always tried to be visible in areas where there is a higher concentration of people, and that obviously includes Mount Mercy,” he says. “It’s important for people to know that the police are out there and available if they need something.” Estling is now a sergeant assigned to the narcotics unit with the Cedar Rapids Police Department.

Preparing graduates to be leaders

Estling is one of a large group of local law enforcement personnel who are graduates of Mount Mercy’s criminal justice program. Linn County Sheriff Brian Gardner ’96 “was attracted to Mount Mercy’s criminal justice program because of the convenience of the classes and the overall strength of the program.” Like many of Mount Mercy’s criminal justice students, Gardner obtained his degree while working full time. He describes the strengths of the program as “knowledgeable instructors, the varied class schedule, highly relevant course content, and a convenient local campus.”

Cedar Rapids Police Department Officer Doug Doyle '09 meets with Mount Mercy juniors Seth Ray and Ryan Phillips, both criminal justice majors, to answer questions about the law enforcement field and to serve as a resource and mentor.

A benefit of having a large number of alumni working in the field in the local area — and serving in leadership positions — is the opportunity for interaction with current students and members of the criminal justice faculty. The alumni connections “make our classes richer because we have so many alumni we can call upon to teach, help with mock interviews or offer their expertise,” says Amanda Humphrey, Ph.D., assistant professor of criminal justice. “I can’t be in the community without running into a Mount Mercy graduate from the criminal justice program — they are literally everywhere!” she says.

Mount Mercy criminal justice graduates have not only made their mark in Cedar Rapids but across the United States as well. In November 2009, police officer Vernon Ferguson ’06 received a meritorious service award from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department for his on-duty efforts in February 2009 to save a 16-year-old boy suffering from a gunshot wound. Ferguson attended to the teen, performing CPR and stopping further bleeding from the wound. Ferguson continued CPR for several minutes until medical personnel arrived. His efforts, while they did not save the victim’s life, ensured that the teen’s organs were able to be donated to five gravely ill patients. The victim’s mother said of Ferguson, “He [Ferguson] didn’t stop for a second. And with all the blood that must have been everywhere, he still performed CPR.”

Ferguson is not the only Mount Mercy graduate working with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. He is joined by Jason Connell ’99, a search and rescue officer. Together, the two Mount Mercy alumni have offered their connections and assistance to current Mount Mercy students interested in pursuing law enforcement in the Las Vegas area. They have hosted students who are in town for interviews and training, and view this as a way of giving back to current students the opportunities that were afforded to them.

First of its kind in Iowa

The Mount Mercy criminal justice program was initiated in 1974. It was developed on the heels of the civil disobedience and disruption rampant in the 1960s and a later push that decade for federal legislation urging police officers to embrace community policing and increase positive interaction with the public. As a result, the federal government offered funding for colleges and universities that would create programs to teach current and future law enforcement personnel strategies for professionalizing policing.

In 1974, Mount Mercy’s criminal justice program was the first four-year program of its kind in Iowa. College officials determined that the criminal justice program dovetailed nicely with the College’s mission of service to those in need. In later years, the program expanded to include emphases in corrections, community corrections, victims and women’s issues, legal and ethical issues in law enforcement and, more recently, courses that focus on research methodology.

Early on, nearly all of Mount Mercy’s criminal justice students were already in the workplace, serving various police departments or correctional facilities. Students who work while earning their bachelor’s degree continue to be a large segment of the program’s population, but as the criminal justice discipline has gained in reputation and popularity, more traditional-age students have chosen to pursue the field. As a result, criminal justice has jumped to the fourth most popular major at Mount Mercy.

Mount Mercy faculty attribute some of the popularity of criminal justice programs nationally to the rise in the number of “CSI”-type television shows that feature forensics work and glamorize the criminal justice field. Despite the development of courses that focus on “hot” issues such as research methods, victims and women’s issues, and drug-related crime, Mount Mercy’s curriculum remains focused on teaching students to understand the fundamental tenets of criminal justice: the power that comes with responsibility, respect for the law and people, and the use of power for good.

Program renaissance driven by faculty, curriculum

In the last 10 years, the criminal justice program has experienced a renaissance, due in large part to Deb Brydon, J.D., associate professor of criminal justice and chair of the Department of History, Politics and Justice. Before coming to Mount Mercy, Brydon was a practicing attorney whose niche was criminal law, but she had also previously worked as a probation officer. With this unique background, Brydon arrived at Mount Mercy 11 years ago and has since assembled a talented group of faculty with varied backgrounds and increased the rigor and reputation of the program.

“As criminal justice faculty, we stress to our students the importance of writing and documentation, and place an emphasis on community feedback,” says Brydon. “Our students are in strong demand because they are good thinkers and communicators. Local agencies contact us and ask us to recommend talented candidates for their positions.”

Officer Chris Carton joins a host of other Mount Mercy alumni in the criminal justice field, including several attorneys and a U.S. Marshall.

The quality education and background Mount Mercy students receive from their professors is noticed by those in the profession. “Mount Mercy’s criminal justice program is able to provide its graduates with the education they need in order to be successful in their field,” says Sheriff Gardner. “They do this by providing students with a quality education that fits the needs of criminal justice employers and prepares the students for employment in the real world.”

“As one of the Criminal Justice instructors at Mount Mercy stated, ‘You learn how to learn,’” says Brad Feickert ’08, an officer who has served with the Marion Police Department for five years. “I learned how to research various topics — which is a skill I use every day on the job. I learned speaking skills, and how to form arguments and to support my opinions and decisions with facts.”

Feickert echoes Professor Humphrey’s goal for her students. “I hope our students take with them the ability to see issues from multiple perspectives,” she says. “I want them to realize that issues are more complicated than they seem, and to know that you can’t come to a quick answer. You must evaluate the problem from a broader and deeper understanding of justice
and law in our society.”

Brydon, Humphrey and associate professor of criminal justice Chad Loes ’99 each have varied backgrounds in the criminal justice field, which allows students to learn different facets of the discipline. Brydon utilizes her legal background to teach legal and ethical issues in the discipline; Loes specializes in cognitive development, research methodology, and diversity issues; and Humphrey’s expertise is corrections and victim and women’s issues.

The trio’s connections in the local community — through volunteer work and professional networking — enables them to leverage their contacts for the benefit of Mount Mercy students. Local law enforcement personnel, including George O’Donnell ’89, former captain of the division of Motor Vehicle Enforcement, Bruce Vander Sanden, division manager of the Sixth Judicial District Department of Correctional Services, and Joe Cerruto ’03, sergeant with the Cedar Rapids Police Department, also serve as adjunct instructors, offering students a well-rounded education and the opportunity to connect with professionals working in the field.

Vander Sanden is quick to point out that Mount Mercy’s distinctive curriculum prepares students for careers in the criminal justice field. “Mount Mercy’s criminal justice students are exposed to all aspects of the criminal justice system and achieve an understanding of how they all work together,” he says. “Upon graduation they have an understanding of all career possibilities, which enables them to make informed decisions about their career of choice.”

Brydon and her colleagues have lofty goals for the continuing development of the criminal justice program. She notes that the curriculum and instruction will continue to “focus on helping students be good thinkers and communicators,” but also points to the possibility of exploration of a graduate program blending criminal justice and public affairs, and the development of opportunities for international student exchanges with partner universities in England and the Czech Republic. Until then, Brydon remains content “knowing that our students have difficult, serious jobs” and that Mount Mercy’s criminal justice program has prepared them to “handle the responsibility” that comes with protecting, serving and leading others.

Check out Who’s Who in Mount Mercy Criminal Justice Graduates >>