Walgamuth Is Ivy Tech Dean

After a year with no dean, Ivy Tech State College, Warsaw, has a new one.

Pierceton resident Joann H. Walgamuth, 62, was named dean July 1 and is working as an assistant professor of business administration as well as at her new position of dean.

Walgamuth also is in charge of the accounting and paralegal departments and Phi Theta Kappa, the international honors society for two-year campuses.

Ivy Tech took applications both outside and inside the college for the position of dean and Walgamuth was on the search committee. It was a four-month search but eventually she was chosen for the job.

Walgamuth said not only does the Warsaw branch of Ivy Tech have a new dean, but the other two branches of the three-campus region, South Bend and Elkhart, also received a new chancellor and dean respectively. Both are women.

"We're the only totally woman region for Ivy Tech," she said.

Walgamuth is interviewing applicants for her teaching position. She said she was disappointed to give up teaching.

But, since she has enjoyed teaching so much, some may question why she would take a job as dean and give up teaching.

"I guess I just evolved into the position as we were interviewing," she said.

Walgamuth started at Ivy Tech part time in 1993 and was moved to full time in 1997. She has conducted more than 300 training sessions through the business and industry training division.

She also recently used a summer technology grant to help develop a two-way video course in human resource management and has developed a leadership class. The class will be offered in next year's curriculum.

Two-way video is new virtual classroom technology that is set up with a satellite. The new technology uses a television that depicts an instructor from another city, who teaches the class, and the students are able to communicate back to the instructor through a microphone.

Walgamuth said the Phi Theta Kappa program also is very special to her. But she will have to step down as head when her replacement is found. Meanwhile, she still plans to be largely involved with the program.

Walgamuth has been the adviser since the program began three years ago.

"It's a visible unit on campus," Walgamuth said of Phi Theta Kappa.

She also said Phi Theta Kappa has been mistaken as a sorority. Members must be asked to join and must hold at least a 3.5 grade point average.

Some of Phi Theta Kappa's causes include nursing homes and developing a database and Web site for Just Peachey Foundation, a breast cancer research organization.

"Ivy Tech is the center of this community," Walgamuth said. "We take it very seriously."

Walgamuth said she is focusing on the needs of the college and the community.

Although she won't be in the classroom, she will be doing other things that will improve the campus and help students. She said her door will always be open to students.

One of her jobs will include finding a new location for the campus. Ivy Tech leases space from Edgewood Middle School, and the student body consists of approximately 500 to 600 students. Walgamuth will eventually have to find a location for a bigger campus.

She also plans to attend public meetings and become more involved in the community.

"I need to know what's going on out there," she said.

Before joining the Ivy Tech staff, Walgamuth lived and worked all around the United States and has traveled to places like France, Austria and Switzerland. She has lived in Iowa; Houston, Texas; and Memphis, Tenn. In Houston, she worked as a human resource manager for four years with Johnson Space Center at NASA.

Walgamuth lives with her husband and two sons on her husband's family's farm. The farm has been owned by his family for 60 years but Walgamuth and her husband don't farm. They are allowing their land to go back to its natural state.

"We're tree-huggers," she laughed.

Walgamuth is looking forward to the future.

"I can start where I am now and only move forward," she said.