In Memoriam . . . . . Dr. Ted Drake

As we (future nursing educators) are so acutely aware of that there are gifted teachers. It doesn't happen very often, students are blessed with the chance assignment to work with a person who is truly worthy of the title, teacher. Someone who very soul could not possibly been happy in any other profession in life.

Back in the Fall of 2006, I took the course LS 5573 (Non-Library Science Majors); The Internet. The description of “concepts, principles, and techniques associated with identifying and using information resources via the Internet; standards and protocols; browsers and search engines; classification and indexing issues; distribution of information. Credit: Three hours” did not look that daunting at the time. I consider myself slightly above average user of the Internet. As mundane as the title and description of the class is, this class is FAR from that. The information and skills that I received, I use everyday. If I don’t graduate in 20 days, I've learned an invaluable life long skill. It has been easily one of the most useful classes I’ve ever taken in my entire life. The class syllabus stated, “to help prepare TWU graduates to take their place in the Information Age. The skills taught in this course will be vital to your successful use of the Internet as a research tool.” This was definitely an understatement.

It has taken me awhile since that class to also understand that my professor was just as important as the class. The class would have been dry and boring without the right professor. The class was never boring with the clever tips and Internet savanger hunts. I actually learned to write a Boolen search string that was half a page long that actually worked!

I worked very hard under the instruction of Dr. Ted Drake. Dr. Drake was an adjunct professor at the time and I’m unsure of how long he had been teaching at TWU. His other job was the Director of Library Services at Tarrant County College. He had been teaching for nearly thirty years. He was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. He never told the class in spite of his horrible symptoms and side effects from chemotherapy. I’m not sure why he told me. I think one of my projects that focused on cancer patient education websites must have been the trigger. We only discussed his situation a few times during the semester. After the semester, we chatted and email regularly. He resigned his teaching positions to focus on his health.

Dr. Drake was so supportive and such a wonderful teacher. I think he considered me one of his pet projects. He encouraged, cajoled, guided, gave advice, etc. He never gave me answers and claimed he never had any. He had a special way of asking questions that on first glance had no answers. The assignments also seemed just as impossible. So many of my IT skills and willingness to try new ones, he helped me through. The hardest project in my entire academic tenure was creating a website using html code. We were not allowed to use software assistance. It took two weeks of solid work to get my website up and running with all project requirements.

I never dreamt when I took the course how much it would prepare me for all of the educational technologies that I’ve learned how to use or have learned about over the past 2½ years. I swore that if I ever had to build another website, I would either shoot myself or hire someone. Here I am again building a website for my best friend. The currently used wiki website requires knowing html code to create and refine the appearance of the pages. The wiki reminds me of what Dr. Drake call WYSIWYG [what you see is what you get] website building software. Just like WYSIWYG software, the wiki appears to be really good at creating html code but also throws in some junk code; making the appearance hard to control until the junk code is removed.

WOW. I never thought I would ever be able to talk about a subject like html code when I signed up for this program and definitely not in my previous years of my professional career until now.

Working on the wiki was a bit hard this week and so was creating this blog. I had asked Dr. Drake to “hood” me at graduation. He helped me discover a side of myself that I had no idea even existed. He opened my eyes to my own potential as a Geek Nurse as well as the incredible need for nursing educators willing to learn IT skills and a desire to teach computer literacy.

Now you know why my passion is what it is. Dr. Drake was the first professor to assist me in my self discovery and the first to believe in my willingness to think outside the box. When I was frustrated with school to the point of willing to only just “get by”, he was always quick to remind me that ‘pushing envelopes’ and challenging ideas (even those we believe in), is what academia and especially graduate school is suppose to do. “The school can’t fire students with passing grades but they do hire those with great grades” was his usual parting email comments.

As I stated, Dr. Drake and I chatted on a regular basis after that semester. And now, he is gone. Strangely, I never met him face to face until his funeral. I will forever be grateful and truly miss my teacher who was so kind to me through out this graduate program that without his help, I might not have come to the appreciation my own understanding, skills and potential skills utilizing educational technologies. I already miss him and his fatherly support.