Sylvia
Maxson
Sylvia’s
journey a ‘wonderful experience’
By L’Oreal Battistelli
Online Forty-Niner
Contributing Writer
For some professors, name recognition draws them to Cal State Long Beach. For
others, it’s the opportunity to research their field of study.
For Sylvia Maxson, tenured associate professor in the liberal studies and English
departments, it was her husband’s position with the campus that brought
her to The Beach, but, Maxson said, it was the students who turned her dream
into a reality.
“
I applied for a teaching position and have been teaching ever since. I really
enjoy working with the students,” she said. “That’s my passion.”
When her husband, President Robert C. Maxson, retires in January 2006, Maxson
said she is excited about retiring with him and is looking forward to spending
the coming years together traveling the world, visiting family and friends
and learning to fly fish.
Sylvia Maxson’s first career was nursing. She began her undergraduate
degree in education at Auburn University in Alabama.
It was when the couple relocated to Las Vegas where Robert Maxson was president
of University of Nevada, Las Vegas, that she returned to school to complete
her master’s degree and obtain a doctorate in education.
With her daughter in college and her son in medical school, Maxson jumped in
too. She taught during her nursing career, she said, but wanted to learn more
about the mechanics of teaching, so she enrolled in some educational classes
and “was hooked.”
Part of her curriculum required her to obtain practical experience in an elementary
classroom, “and the rest is history.”
“
I loved the change and loved the challenge of teaching,” Maxson said. “I
had always worked with adults, and this was a major change.”
In 1982, Maxson received her Bachelor of Science in elementary education with
a minor in English. She was also certified to teach kindergarten and received
a professional endorsement in early childhood education for the exceptional
child.
After relocating to Las Vegas in 1991 she enrolled in the University of Nevada’s
graduate program to obtain a master’s degree of fine arts in reading
and language arts and worked full-time as a graduate assistant until her graduation
in 1994.
Her desire for specialization was still not satisfied, so she continued with
her studies and earned a doctorate degree in instructional and curricular studies
and specialized in literacy and cognate early childhood education.
Maxson began her career in higher education in the College of Education teaching
early childhood education at CSULB with classes in reading and language arts
but she “had a passion to teach children’s literature,” she
said. She then taught reading classes in the teaching credential program.
To be able to teach classes in children’s and young-adult literature,
she sought a joint appointment in both colleges. She now works in both the
College of Education in the liberal studies department and in the College of
Liberal Arts in the English department.
“
I really, really wanted to … utilize my vast knowledge in children’s
literature,” Maxson said.
Working in both departments allows her to the opportunity to do that.
“
It was nice that my deans allowed me to do that,” she said. “I
love the students, and love being on campus. It’s been a great experience
for me.”
To help her maintain balance, Maxson said she sought advice from friends and
mentors and began to establish necessary boundaries between her world at the
university and her world at home.
“
We had to work for each other to find that balance that needs to be there.
I think we’ve done a good job of it,” Maxson said about her husband
and herself. “He had his world and I had mine.”
She said the highlight of her career was her association with students.
The best part, she said, was her ongoing involvement with students, and the
most fun she had was as a host in her home.
Having worked so many years with students in both colleges, she is now looking
forward to retiring, and the changes it will bring.
Maxson said her husband will be working with the Cal State University Chancellor’s
Office over the next two years.
They will travel around the state while he mentors new CSU presidents. She
will be on hand to assist new presidents’ spouses, she said, and is looking
forward to the traveling.
They want to travel in the near future to Kauai, Hawaii, Maxson said, and Alaska.
Maxson is revisiting London in the spring for three weeks on her own.
The couple will also travel to the San Juan Islands in Washington where they
have a home. They have plans to visit their five grandchildren, three in Texas
and two in Las Vegas and are looking forward to spending time with them.
While in her new home in Anacortes, Washington, Maxson said she wants to volunteer
in the elementary schools.
Because of Maxson’s ongoing involvement with the children’s literature
institute at The Beach, she has met many children’s books writers and
illustrators and would like to invite them to the island to collaborate.
As for The Beach, Maxson said, “It’s a huge part of us that we
don’t want to walk away from. It’s been a vital part of our lives.
We’ll be coming back. The associations with faculty, staff and students
have been treasured memories and I will never forget the many kindnesses shown
to President Maxson and to me. It has been a wonderful 12 years here at the
Beach.”
“
No one loves this university more than she does,” Robert Maxson said.
To compare her experience at The Beach to any other campus would be impossible,
she said, because working at
CSULB was her only experience in higher education, but also because she “can’t
imagine it being better anywhere else. It’s been a wonderful experience
for me.”
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