Provided by Bucks County Community College:
Bucks County Community College recently celebrated the 25th anniversary of its Historic Preservation certificate program. Pictured in Tyler Hall are (left-right) Martin Sutton, former chair of the Social & Behavioral Sciences academic department; Dr. Stephanie Shanblatt, current Bucks president; Professor Pat Fisher-Olsen, an alumna of the certificate program and current program coordinator; and retired professor Lyle Rosenberger, who founded the program in 1991.
Credit: Bucks County Community College
Bucks County Community College marked the 25th anniversary of its Historic Preservation program on Saturday, September 10, by welcoming alumni from across the nation to share their projects and accomplishments seeded by the first-of-its kind program.
In 1991, Bucks became the first community college in the nation to offer a certificate in Historic Preservation. The unique 24-credit program, which combines classroom and practical field study, became the template for many other two-year colleges who wished to offer similar studies of the built environment, according to retired professor Lyle Rosenberger, who recalled the origins of the program.
“I started talking to Martin Sutton, the chairman of the Social Science Department at the time, in 1990 about the need to address preservation concerns in the county of Bucks,” said Rosenberger. As a result, the 24-credit certificate program was launched the following year, allowing students to learn both in and out of the classroom.
“In addition to a required curriculum, the Bucks Preservation program offered practical experience and engaged our students with many experts in the field,” Rosenberger added. “Today, our graduates contribute at the international, federal, state and local level in the preservation of our historic past.”
Through online courses, graduates now hail from across the nation as well as throughout Pennsylvania. In fact, the program boasts students from 40 states, and includes field studies and projects that were completed in each student’s home area.
The 25th anniversary celebration, held in the college’s historic Tyler Hall, highlighted the work of faculty and students over the last 25 years, including capstone project presentations from the most recent graduates, and retrospective exhibitions of student contributions to both local and national preservation efforts. For example, the 2016 graduates completed research and restoration projects Boise, Idaho; Fillmore County, Minnesota; the Bronx, New York; and Philadelphia.
Graduates have certainly left their mark on the field. Pat Fisher-Olsen, the professor who took over as program coordinator in 2008 after Rosenberger’s retirement, is an alumna who was on the team that won the prestigious Charles E. Peterson prize in 2008. The prize, from the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) of the National Parks Service, recognizes the best set of measured drawings prepared to HABS standards and donated to HABS by students. Bucks was the only community college in the competition, besting much larger universities and architectural colleges, and the prize-winning drawings are now part of the permanent HABS collection in the Library of Congress.
“The success of our longevity is that we remain relevant in the field of historic preservation education, and changed how we delivered our classes to keep up with the marketplace,” Fisher-Olsen said. “Building on the solid foundation of the on-campus classes, we launched the online program in 2007 and took it nationwide by 2009, leveraging the college’s virtual campus to offer our courses.”
Indeed, merging the study of historic structures with 21st-century technology is another credit to the program.
“What I am most proud of is that we continue to reinvent ourselves and to keep relevant with the educational demands for historic preservation professionals,” she added. “This has allowed us to attract the most talented faculty who bring their professional experience into our online classroom and to our on-site field work.”
Guest speakers at the anniversary celebration, several of whom are on the college’s advisory board for the program, represented the Pennsylvania Historic and Museum Commission, the Fairmount Park Conservancy, the National Park Service, and Arlington National Cemetery. College president Dr. Stephanie Shanblatt and Carol Tyler, a member of the Tyler family on whose estate the college was built, also addressed the more than 75 people in attendance.
To learn more about the Historic Preservation program at Bucks, contact Pat Fisher-Olsen at 215-968-8286 or Patricia.Fisher-Olsen@bucks.edu, or visit www.bucks.edu.
