Meet a member of the Science and Technology Subcommittee, Barbara Shew! 

Barbara joined OLLI in 2022 after obtaining 2 of her 3 degrees from NC State and working in the Department of Plant Pathology at NC State for over 30 years. Throughout her career, she helped carry out NC State’s land grant mission. Working in extension she educated peanut growers about disease control and conducted product testing and provided unbiased reviews. She taught a graduate level course in plant disease epidemiology for more than a decade. She concluded her career as the Director of the Plant Disease and Insect Clinic. 

Like many OLLI members, Barbara’s interests are eclectic. She typically looks for a mix of science and history courses when she is signing up for OLLI classes. For Barbara, favorite courses have included Brand Fortner’s End of Everything, William Kimler’s History of Evolution, and Carolyn Happer’s History of the 1920s. Outside of OLLI, she enjoys gardening, hiking, landscaping and yard work, being in nature, birding (“I enjoy identifying and watching the ones I know,” she says), knitting, and cooking. She also enjoys spending time with her 15-month old grandson – particularly at this time of rapid learning in his life when she can observe so much growth and change in just a week’s time. 

Barbara enjoyed her OLLI classes so much that she wanted to get more involved, joining the Science and Technology Subcommittee in late 2023. The niche of developing science-related programs is a place where her “connections could be useful and contribute a lot.” If you enjoyed the summer semester’s “What’s wrong with my lawn?” lecture, you can thank Barbara. Reflecting back on the “What’s wrong with my lawn?” lecture, she shared how much the instructor told her he enjoyed teaching the class. “It’s his job – talking about turf,” but he was so excited about how engaged OLLI members were in the course. (This is feedback the OLLI office hears from instructors all the time!)

I asked Barbara what surprised her about the program planning process, and she quickly replied, “How many ideas there are….Figuring out which ideas will make a class people want to take…How to find good ideas that seem like they could go somewhere.”  

Barbara has planned a Spring course on chocolate and vanilla that she’s really excited to see in the OLLI classroom…and we’ll be excited to share more on this course with all of you in November. 

What’s on her programming wishlist? She wants to develop a course on time and timekeeping that blends history and science – from Stonehenge to the Atomic Clock. Barbara also hopes to develop courses on the plant diseases that have changed history (think bananas, coffee, tea, and the Irish potato famine) and on crops that played a role in colonization. 

Barbara, thank you for the creativity, enthusiasm and expertise you bring to OLLI through your work on the Science and Technology Subcommittee!