Deaths |
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July 14, 2015, Volume 62, No. 01 |
Morton Botel, GSE
Morton Botel, Ed’46, GEd’48, Gr’53, emeritus professor of education and child development in Penn’s Graduate School of Education (GSE) and founder of GSE’s Penn Literacy Network, died on July 6 in Ireland. He was 90 years old.
Dr. Botel was born in Philadelphia, where he attended John Bartram High School. He briefly studied naval air communications at Harvard University, then attended Penn, where he earned his undergraduate degree in education in 1946. He earned his master’s degree in education from Penn’s evening program while teaching high school math, then returned to Penn for his doctorate, which he completed in 1953 following just two years of study.
In 1955, he became the supervisor of reading and English in the Bucks County, Pennsylvania school system, where he instituted a five-year plan called “Reading and Writing Across the Curriculum.” He also taught at Penn and in 1966 was invited to overhaul GSE’s program in remedial reading, soon renamed the Reading and Language Arts program.
In 1976, Dr. Botel and several of his colleagues at Penn GSE established the Center for Research in Literacy Communication (Almanac February 3, 1976). In 1978, he received the Lindback Award for Distinguished Teaching (Almanac October 13, 1987).
From 1980 until becoming emeritus in 2004 he held the William T. Carter Research Chair as Professor of Education and Child Development at GSE.
In 1981, he founded the Penn Literacy Network (PLN), which offers long-term professional development and continuing education seminars to help teachers of all subjects and grade levels make literacy an integral part of their instruction. By 2015, more than 35,000 educators throughout the country had enrolled in one or more of these courses.
In 1992, Dr. Botel left PLN to focus on other projects, while his daughter, Bonnie Botel-Sheppard, CGS’74, GEd’76, GrEd’81, GEd’99, assumed leadership. At the time of his death, the elder Dr. Botel was serving as PLN’s senior advisor.
He authored more than 200 publications for children, teachers, literacy professionals, school leaders and parents in the areas of literacy education, English, reading, math, spelling, study skills and assessment. He was presented with honorary doctorates at Rider University in New Jersey and Holy Family University in Philadelphia.
Dr. Botel is survived by his wife, Penny; his children, Neil Botel, Bonnie (Bob) Botel-Sheppard, Mikel (Beverly Landstrom) Botel, Abby (Ian) Wynne, Mark (Niamh) Feldman and Gail Weston; two brothers, Gene (Julie) and Max (Nina) Botel; one sister, Kathy (Ed) Musarra-Hertzoff; his grandchildren, Lara, GEd’06 (Todd) Paparo, Adam (Maureen) Sheppard, Anna Botel-Sheppard and Gavin Botel, Megan, Joshua, Mya and Sian Wynne and Brooke Feldman; and three great-grandchildren, Gianna, Blake and Callum.
Contributions in his memory may be made to Doctors Without Borders, 333 Seventh Avenue, New York, NY 10001-5004 or to American Friends Of Magen David Adom, 352 Seventh Avenue, Suite 400, New York, NY 10001.
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Timothy Hamlett, Penn Junior
The body of Timothy Hamlett, a junior and track athlete at the University of Pennsylvania, was found on May 29 in New York’s Hudson River. He was 20 years old.
Mr. Hamlett was born in New York City. He attended Don Bosco Preparatory High School in Ramsey, New Jersey, where he was a member of the varsity basketball and track & field teams. He then attended the University of Pennsylvania, where he majored in philosophy and was a member of the track & field and mid-distance teams.
Mr. Hamlett had been missing since December 26, 2014, when he left his family’s Teaneck, New Jersey home and said he had plans to visit a friend in New York City.
He is survived by his parents, Archibald and Katherine; his grandmother, Irene; his aunts, Charlotte Frink-Paynes and Veronica Hamlett; his uncles, Aaron Frink, Jr. and John Paynes; his cousins, Nakia Benjamin, Michelle Paynes, and Paul and Aaron Frink; and Christopher, Ayanni and Akinde Hanna.
Donations in Mr. Hamlett’s memory may be made to the Timothy Akil Hamlett Fund (http://legaloutreach.org/?page_id=119#donatenow) in support of the Summer Law Institute at the New York University School of Law.
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Anastasia Lyalenko, Psychology
Anastasia Lyalenko, C’14, a research specialist in the department of psychology at Penn, died on June 15 after a brief illness; she was 22.
Ms. Lyalenko grew up in Wexford, Pennsylvania. She attended Penn, where she majored in the biological basis of behavior and graduated summa cum laude. Upon earning her degree, she joined the department of psychology as a research specialist with the Restoring Active Memory (RAM) team. In this position, she traveled the country to train many of the team members at RAM clinical sites and was a key player in conducting patient testing at Penn and Jefferson Hospitals. According to Michael J. Kahana and Daniel S. Rizzuto, directors of the Computational Memory Lab, Ms. Lyalenko dreamed of becoming a physician and planned to attend medical school.
She is survived by her mother, Victoria Rennison; her sister, Jamie Walker; her stepfather, Robert Rennison; her grandmother, Inna Liashenko; her uncle, Alex Liashenko; cousins, Alexander and Daniel Liashenko; her aunt, Nadezhda Liashenko; her significant other, Colleen Kase and many friends.
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Irving Mondschein, Track & Field
Irving “Moon” Mondschein, an Olympian and legendary former Penn track coach of more than two decades, died on June 5 at an assisted-living facility in Hershey, Pennsylvania. He was 91 years old.
Mr. Mondschein attended NYU, where he was a track and football star. After his freshman year, he served in the US Army, then returned to NYU. He was a three-time Amateur Athletic Union decathlon champion and a two-time National Collegiate Athletic Association high-jump champion. He competed in the decathlon at the 1948 London Olympics, finishing in eighth place.
He coached the United States track and field team that competed in the 1950 Maccabiah Games, the Jewish Olympics, in Israel. He then coached Israel’s first Olympic track & field team at the 1952 Helsinki Games.
Mr. Mondschein was a head coach at Lincoln University before joining Penn as an assistant coach in 1965. Upon Penn Athletics Hall of Fame coach Jim “Tupp” Tuppeny’s retirement, Mr. Mondschein became Penn’s head track & field coach in 1979. He left Penn in 1987 and was an assistant coach for the 1988 U.S. Olympic team competing in Seoul, South Korea. He was a volunteer coach at Haverford College into his late 80s.
In 2014, in front of a large crowd of Mr. Mondschein’s family, friends and former athletes, Penn named its brand new, state-of-the-art throwing venue, the Irv “Moon” Mondschein Throwing Complex, in honor of one of the school’s most beloved track & field coaches.
Mr. Mondschein was inducted into the US Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Hall of Fame as well as into the NYU Athletics Hall of Fame, the National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, the New York Jewish Sports Hall of Fame and the Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.
He is survived by his wife, Momoe; two sons, Brian and Mark; a daughter, Ilana; a sister, Roslyn Lampert; a brother-in-law, Stanley Lampert; two grandsons and one great-grandchild.
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Ralph J. Roberts, Roberts Proton Therapy Center
Ralph J. Roberts, W’41, Hon’05, the founder of Comcast and longtime supporter of Penn, died of natural causes on June 18 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He was 95 years old.
Mr. Roberts was born in New York City and grew up in New Rochelle, New York. He attended Germantown High School in Philadelphia and went on to graduate from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in 1941. He also served in the US Navy.
He founded Comcast Corporation with the purchase of a 1,200-subscriber cable television system in Tupelo, Mississippi in 1963. He was chairman of the company’s board of directors from 1969 to 2002. He handed off the presidency in 1990 to his son, Brian L. Roberts, W’81. At the time of his death, the elder Mr. Roberts was past president and chairman emeritus of the board of directors.
Mr. Roberts shared his wisdom for many years as a member of the Penn Medicine Board. He and his family were instrumental in establishing the Roberts Proton Therapy Center at the Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine (Almanac December 12, 2006). The most extensive and advanced cancer treatment facility of its kind in the world, the Center has treated as many as 200 patients a day since opening in 2010.
Among his myriad awards and honorary degrees, Mr. Roberts received Penn’s Joseph P. Wharton Award for Lifetime Achievement (Almanac December 22, 2009) and a Doctor of Laws degree honoris causa (Almanac March 29, 2005).
Mr. Roberts is survived by his wife of more than 70 years, Suzanne; four of his children, Catherine, Lisa, Ralph, Jr. and Brian; and eight grandchildren. Another son, Douglas, died in September of 2011.
Contributions may be made to the Germantown Boys & Girls Club, 25 W. Penn St., Philadelphia, PA 19144, or to the United Way of Greater Philadelphia & Southern New Jersey, 1709 Ben Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, PA 19103 or http://unitedforimpact.org/ways-to-give |
Tom Schneider, Basketball
Tom Schneider, a former Penn basketball coach, died of atherosclerotic heart disease on March 17. He was 68.
Mr. Schneider was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and earned his bachelor’s degree in political science from Bucknell University, where he was also a member of the basketball team. He then earned his master’s degree in history from Georgetown University. During his time at Georgetown, he began coaching basketball at American University.
Mr. Schneider came to Penn as an assistant coach in 1979 and held the position until 1983, when he became head coach at Lehigh University. He returned to Penn as head coach in 1985 and led the Quakers through four seasons before resigning in 1989 to become head coach at Loyola College (now Loyola University Maryland).
Mr. Schneider later coached basketball and taught history and economics at the high school level. For the last ten years, he taught history at Polk State Lakeland Collegiate High School in Lakeland, Florida.
Mr. Schneider is survived by his daughter, Leslie Schneider Boen, C’92, and two grandchildren. His wife, Carol, died 12 days prior to his own passing.
Donations may be made to Polk State College Foundation, 999 Avenue H, Northeast, Winter Haven, FL 33881-4299, ATTN: Thomas Schneider/Lakeland Collegiate High School. |
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