Retirement Association of Portland State Portland State University—RAPS Post Office Box 751 Portland OR 97207-0751 Campus Public Safety Building Second Floor, Room 212 SW Montgomery at Broadway Office Manager Samantha McKinlay Telephone: 503-725-3447 Email: rapsmail@pdx.edu Office hours: Suspended Campus mail: RAPS Web: www.pdx.edu/raps Board Members Co-Presidents Steve Brennan Pat Squire Secretary Brian Lewis Treasurer Ansel Johnson Members-at-Large Steven Brenner Nancy Eriksson Pati Sluys RAPS Sheet Editor Doug Swanson Website Editor Larry Sawyer RAPS Representative to Regional & National Retirement Associations Larry Sawyer Committees Awards Steve Brennan, Chair History Preservation Eileen Brennan, Chair Membership/Program Dawn White, Chair Scholarships Joan Shireman, Chair Social Nancy Eriksson, Chair FOR THE SECOND straight year, the President’s Annual Luncheon for Staff and Faculty, originally scheduled to be held on campus Friday, April 23, has been canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. That’s the bad news. The good news is that the star of the event, President Steve Percy, will speak to RAPS through the magic of Zoom, the videoconferencing platform RAPS has been using since last fall to conduct its meetings. Not only has the venue changed but so have the date and time: the meeting will begin at 11:30 a.m. on Friday, April 30. Percy will bring RAPSters up to date on the University’s achievements and challenges as well as respond to questions. Percy joined the PSU faculty in 2014 as dean of the College of Urban and Public Affairs and professor of political science. He was selected as Portland State’s 10th president in May 2020 after being appointed interim president in July 2019. Percy has worked extensively with diverse, urban-serving universities, including the University of WisconsinMilwaukee and the University of Baltimore, where he was founding dean of the college of public affairs. Percy has authored two books about disability rights and civil rights and co-authored four books and the textbook American Government: The Political Game. At PSU, Percy led several campus-wide initiatives, including the planning process that resulted in priorities and goals for PSU from 2016 to 2020. APRIL GENERAL MEETING Percy meets with RAPS April 30 The RAPS Sheet The newsletter of the Retirement Association of Portland State APRIL 2021 President Steve Percy will meet with RAPS members via Zoom on April 30 to discuss the achievements—and challenges—that lie ahead for the University.
2 The RAPS Sheet April 2021 CO-PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE Help make PSU an Age-Friendly University about your perceptions of your campus’s efforts to be age-friendly, as well as to achieve a greater understanding of attitudes in the campus community toward individuals of diverse ages, including those who study and work at your campus. The study uses the newly developed AFU Inventory and Campus Climate Survey (ICCS). Please participate in the online survey portion of the ICCS using this link: https://umassboston.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_0D4WJ gccsAWaYhn. This survey explores perceptions of faculty, students, and staff concerning various age-friendly principles. All survey responses are anonymous, and group summary data will be the focus of the analysis. The survey results will help Portland State University identify its age-friendly assets and gaps and refine what age-friendliness means in higher education and how we can broaden and deepen our efforts. Switching topics to COVID vaccinations, do you need any help scheduling your appointments? I struggled to get my first appointment (doing battle at the end of February with a slow, overwhelmed and cumbersome website). The RAPS office manager, Samantha McKinlay, has been volunteering with the 211 call center. She has offered to help RAPS members needing to make their first vaccination appointment. You may contact Samantha by phone at 503-725-3447 or by email at rapsmail@pdx.edu. —Steve Brennan IN 2018 PORTLAND STATE UNIVERSITY joined the global Age-Friendly University initiative. The Age-Friendly University (AFU) network consists of more than 70 colleges and universities from 10 countries. Eight of the institutions are from Ireland (where AFU was started in 2012). These colleges and universities have endorsed the 10 AFU principles and committed themselves to becoming more age-friendly in their programs and policies. Joining the AFU Academy for Gerontology in Higher Education (AGHE) network of global partners offers institutions the opportunity to learn about emerging age-friendly efforts and to contribute to an educational movement of social, personal, and economic benefit to students of all ages and institutions of higher education alike. PSU has endorsed the Age-Friendly University principles. For RAPS members the most salient AFU principles call for wider access to online educational opportunities for older adults and enhanced access for older adults to the university’s range of health and wellness programs and to its arts and cultural activities. Another principle calls for a university to engage its retired community. The University of Massachusetts Boston (an AFU member) is conducting an online survey to evaluate member campus efforts to uphold the principles of AgeFriendly Universities. The purpose of the study is to learn To learn more about Vikings on the Vine, contact Charlie Hall, assistant director of Alumni Relations, at 503-725-4909, or by email at hallc@psuf.org. To join Vikings on the Vine, go to partners.vinoshipper.com. Celebrate PSU’s 75th with Vikings on the Vine! Join Vikings on the Vine and get a bottle of the limited edition Viking Cuvée to celebrate PSU’s 75th anniversary! Vikings on the Vine is the Alumni Association’s premier wine club, delivering award-winning wines with a Portland State connection to your door twice a year. Wines included in the spring shipment are from alumni-affiliated winery Fullerton Wines and alumni-owned Sokol Blosser Winery: 2019 Three Otters Pinot Gris; 2019 Three Otters Rosé; 2016 Croft Vineyard Pinot Noir; and the Commemorative 75th 2018 Anniversary Wine, Viking Cuvée Pinot Noir.
3 The RAPS Sheet April 2021 MAY Thursday, May 20 The annual ice cream social has been canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. However, the sched‐ uled meeting will occur via Zoom, with Maryhelen Kincaid, project leader, and Tanya March, project researcher, presenting “The Vanport Placemarking Project: Remembering and Honoring Vanport’s Significant Cultural History.” AUGUST Thursday, August 19 In what will be the first in‐person meeting since the coronavirus pandemic changed everyone’s lives in spring 2020, the RAPS summer picnic is scheduled to occur on August 19 at Willamette Park in southwest Portland. Confirmation of the event plus additional details will be forthcoming in the summer edition of the RAPS Sheet and via email. Upcoming RAPS events RAPS Group Reports Book Group THE POWER OUTAGES imposed by the February ice storm prompted the RAPS Book Group to delay our February meeting by a week. We discussed Have You Seen Luis Velez? by Catherine Ryan Hyde. We thought it a wonderful story, with complex characters drawn with tenderness. We did disagree about whether the villain in the book was racism or the availability of guns. But a bit of disagreement creates a lively discussion. The March meeting was on March 15, and we discussed The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History by Elizabeth Kolbert. We all liked the book very much, finding in it a great deal of information and new insights. The author involves the reader in the life of one species at a time, describing the animal or plant, its surroundings, its lifestyle, and its extinction. The culprit the author identifies are humans, with their tendency to change the environment, moving things from place to place. She introduces the concept of pace—environment changing so rapidly that animals and plants do not have time to adapt. If there is any hope, Kolbert suggests, it is in the adaptability of species, given time. And the unique ability of humans to think abstractly and creatively. For April we have decided to discuss Jojo Moyes’s The Giver of Stars, a novel based on Eleanor Roosevelt’s traveling libraries. Known as the “Pack Horse Librarians of Kentucky,” this team of women steps well beyond the conventional role of women in bringing books to those who have never had any. The RAPS Book Group meets the third Tuesday of each month, traditionally in the homes of various members. Currently we are using Zoom for our meetings. Any RAPS member is welcome to join the group. —Joan Shireman Bridge and Hiking Groups BRIDGE GROUP AND HIKING GROUP activities have been suspended due to the coronavirus pandemic. ARE YOU A Portland State Magazine subscriber? If not, you should be! And the good news is that the magazine is free to retired Portland State faculty and staff. Edited by Scholle McFarland, Portland State Magazine strives to connect the University and the community it encompasses—alumni, faculty, staff, and friends of PSU. It is published two or three times a year, during fall, winter, and spring terms, by the Office of University Communications. Recent articles have investigated the impact of the pandemic on Portland State students, profiled alumni who campaigned for office in the 2020 election, and examined a 15th-century codex and its journey to the PSU Library. Portland State Magazine also features several regular features, including Alumni Life, Research, The Arts, and Park Blocks. The magazine is distributed on campus and by mail, reaching roughly 144,000 readers, including alumni, retired staff and faculty, current parents, donors, board members, and Oregon legislators. To subscribe, simply email your name and mailing address to psumag@pdx.edu. Add your name to ‘Portland State Magazine’ subscription list—it’s free!
4 The RAPS Sheet April 2021 RAPS IS CELEBRATING the 75th anniversary of the founding of the Vanport Extension Center, which grew into Portland State University, by offering RAPS members and friends Portland State: A History in Pictures for only the cost of shipping and handling. The 180-page book, a RAPS publication, begins with the first days of the University as a temporary extension center. It follows the development of Portland State into a four-year college in the 1950s and into today’s urban research university. More than 300 photographs chronicle events and people critical to Portand State’s growth, ranging from classic scenes of life at Vanport College to relatively recent PSU students, classrooms, labs, athletics, events, and leaders. Published in 2009, Portland State: A History in Pictures features commentary by Richard Sanders ’57 and photo editing by PSU photographer Brent Schauer. Charlie White served as lead editor, assisted by Clarence Hein ’65 as co-editor. To order your copy—or copies—please fill out the form below and mail it, with a check for $5 for each book to cover shipping and handling, to: RAPS, Portland State University, Post Office Box 751, Portland OR 97207-0751. Please make your check payable to the PSU Foundation and write “PSU: A History in Pictures” on the memo line. Enclosed is my check in the amount of $__________ for ________ copies of Portland State: A History in Pictures at $5 each. Please make your check payable to: PSU Foundation and write “PSU: A History in Pictures” on the memo line. Mail to: RAPS, Portland State University, PO Box 751, Portland OR 97207-0751. Name____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Address__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ City ________________________________________________________________________ State________ Zip__________________________________ Telephone number ________________________________________ Email ____________________________________________________________ Thank you! RAPS ‘Portland State: A History in Pictures’ RETIREMENT ASSOCIATION OF PORTLAND STATE PORTLAND STATE CELEBRATES ITS 75TH ANNIVERSARY Own a piece of Portland State history!
Portland State College Development Planning, 1955-1966 Originally a single building in a residential neighborhood along Portland’s South Park Blocks, PSU’s campus has expanded into nearly 60 structures, routinely serving upwards of 30,000 students across more than 40 acres of downtown Portland. Each time the University is presented with the possibility of more property, a study is conducted to determine the best ways to occupy it. Periodically this comes as a comprehensive facility development plan projecting years into the future and providing the University guidance and direction going forward. Ultimately these ambitious efforts often get more wrong than right, but they provide a fascinating look into the thinking of the time as well as a glimpse into what campus facilities could have been had circumstances been different. The following is a brief history of the earliest efforts of Portland State College’s (PSC) efforts at physical plant planning. Shortly after Portland State Extension Center moved into Lincoln High School (initially renamed Old Main and now known as Lincoln Hall) in 1952, it was discovered that a building inadequate for 1,600 high schoolers was somehow equally inadequate for 2,500 college students. In 1955 the Oregon Legislature elevated Portland State into a four-year, degree-granting college at Lincoln Hall “and any areas in the vicinity of such property.” Consequently, a linear expansion plan for the three blocks south of the school was created, and in September 1955 ground was broken for the northwest quarter of Cramer Hall (originally State Hall). As academic programming expanded into majors (1957) and professional schools (1959), it became clear the plan was already inadequate. In 1961 the first long-range study for physical expansion was developed with Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), which was tasked with determining how to accommodate 20,000 FTE undergraduates (15,000 more the number of students then on campus). SOM planned for a vertical campus with State Hall rising 14 levels and all the other buildings on the Park Blocks growing to seven levels, followed by a mostly westward expansion. Based on this plan the State Board of Higher Education approved expanding west of SW Sixth Avenue and south of SW Market Street to the future I-405. Growth continued as graduate degrees became available, and in 1964 when a $13-million urban renewal project to create a College District was presented by the Portland Development Commission (PDC), Portland State seized the opportunity. Following criticism from the PDC chair, Ira Keller, that the buildings’ designs were becoming too “piecemeal,” Campbell Michael Yost’s 1966 Master Development Plan presented a new, singularly Brutalist vision for PSC’s future. This ambitious plan featured city street closures, nearly a mile of elevated walkways, including a 35foot wide Park Blocks overpass, an almost absurd amount of off-street parking, and a sports facility straddling the freeway. While the plan set the style for campus construction for many years, it failed to anticipate a mounting resistance to elevated walkways, the unexpected addition of repurposed housing buildings in 1969, and never-quite-enough state funding. These developments contributed to the campus gradually abandoning the unified Brutalist look while also helping usher in its modern embrace of diverse architectural styles. —Bryce Henry Bryce Henry is PSU’s archivist for Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Archives. PAST TENSE: Looking back at PSU’s early history The 1966 Campbell Michael Yost plan called for a 35-foot wide overpass through the Park Blocks. 5 The RAPS Sheet April 2021
This year, your RAPS Scholarship gift means more! RAPS Scholarship Donation Form N a m e __________________________________________________________________________ A d d r e s s ______________________________________________________________________ C i t y __________________________________________________________________________ State ________ Zip __________________________________ P h o n e __________________________________________________________________________ Email __________________________________________ Donation amount: q $500 q $250 q $100 q $50 Other: ____ Donation made in memory of: ______________________________________ Donation made in honor of: ______________________________________ Make checks payable to: PSU Foundation and noted for RAPS Scholarship Please mail to: RAPS, Portland State University, PO Box 751, Portland, OR 97207-0751 To use a credit card, go to the PSU Foundation website: https://www.psuf.org Since 2011-12, RAPS has awarded a scholarship every year to a student whose interest is focused on some aspect of gerontology. This year’s recipient is Ingrid Hannan; you met her in the December RAPS Sheet. Ingrid is now in the final term of her program in the School of Social Work. With a field placement at OHSU working with stroke patients, she writes that “the need to provide support to those who are aging is apparent.” She plans to continue to work in the medical field “to help bring healing and the warmth of authentic connection to folks who are struggling to navigate loss, change, dying, and aging.” Meanwhile, she reports that she is continuing to “soak up” learning in her final term. She plans to join our April general meeting, giving us a chance to meet our scholarship recipient in person. More than ever we need your help to continue to offer this scholarship. Please consider a sustaining gift to help us “stay in business.” —Joan Shireman Leona Campbell Photography 6 The RAPS Sheet April 2021
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