Interviews with Retired SJSU Faculty

SJSU is fortunate to have been one of 15 campuses nation-wide to receive a Transitions to Retirement award from the American Council on Education and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. As part of this award, we have created a series of brief videotaped interviews with retired SJSU faculty. We have sought to provide a window onto their experience as they contemplated, completed and then adjusted to retirement. Our hope is that current faculty will find these perspectives useful as they consider their own career paths.

Interview Questions

We asked our interviewees to share with us the following:

  • What considerations prompted them to begin thinking about retirement
  • What steps they took (the people they spoke with, the information they gathered, the events they attended, and the like) once they began thinking about retirement
  • How their actual experience of retirement compared with their pre-retirement expectations
  • What they have found easy and what they have found challenging about retirement
  • What they wish they had known earlier, about the process or about what to expect
  • What advice they cared to share with other faculty, in order to help them with their transitions to retirement
  • What keeps them busy and active, now that they are retired
  • How, if at all, they remain connected with SJSU

Interviews

Overview

These video segments consist of excerpts from our interviews with retired faculty, as they address the question of what they would have liked to know before they retired, or what advice they would like to offer current faculty. Click on the names below and you will be linked to their interview.

Juana Acrivos, Chemistry (2000)
Jill Cody, Hospitality, Recreation, and Tourism (2006)
Phyllis Connolly, Nursing (2011)
Abdel El-Shaieb, Organization and Management (2006)
Bob Gliner, Sociology (2003)
Patrick Hamill, Physics (2008)
Cindy Margolin, Psychology (2004)
Bill McCraw, Political Science and Humanities (2001)
Susan Meyers, Special Education/College of Education (2009)
Denise Murray, Linguistics and Language Development (2005)
Pat Nichols, Linguistics and Language Development (2000)
Arlene Okerlund, English and Comparative Literature (2001)
John Pollock, English and Comparative Literature (2003)
Terri Thames, Counseling (2011)
Jo Bell Whitlatch, Library (2006)
Dennis Wilcox, Journalism and Mass Communications (2005)
Marian Yoder, Nursing (2008)