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Sammelwitz Retires From Teaching After 40 Years at UDSammelwitz Retires From Teaching After 40 Years at UD
With all the grace that comes from 40 years of practice, Dr. Paul Sammelwitz, a professor in the University of Delaware College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, jabs his finger and squeezes a drop of blood into each of three small test tubes to teach a lesson in physiology. His audience is a single student who has missed the classroom lecture. Wide-eyed and intent, she watches as his fingers fly from one thing to another in a demonstration he has done hundreds of times before.

For one student or many, going out of his way to teach the best lesson he can is all in a day's work for Sammelwitz. And he has had lots of practice. After 40 years, almost 9,000 students, and a number of awards for excellence in teaching, Sammelwitz is retiring at the end of September.

Coming to UD was a stroke of good fortune for the steady stream of students that Sammelwitz has taught, but it is something that very nearly did not happen.

Sammelwitz, who grew up in Buffalo, spent every summer of his childhood on family farms, first collecting eggs, then milking cows, haying, and driving teams of horses. From his earliest memory he dreamed of becoming a farmer. That desire took him to Cornell University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in dairy science in 1955. Because he could not afford a farm when he graduated, however, he decided to go to the University of Illinois for a master's degree and doctorate in reproductive physiology.

Sammelwitz will never forget his interview with Dr. George Worrilow, dean of the UD College of Agriculture, in the summer of 1959.

"When the formal interviews were over, Dean Worrilow offered me this job on the spot.

He wanted me to accept it, right then, but I wasn't ready to," says Sammelwitz, laughing at the recollection. Sammelwitz had other opportunities in industry and other universities to consider.

"I thanked him and said I would think about it," says Sammelwitz, his eyes twinkling as he tells the story. But the Dean would not be put off, persuading Sammelwitz that it was a golden opportunity.

"Then he made me an offer I couldn't refuse," says Sammelwitz. "He gave me $6,000 a year, which tripled the salary I had been earning as a graduate student. I didn't know what I was going to do with all that money."

Among the many students Sammelwitz has taught is Dr. John Rosenberger, professor of microbiology and chair of the UD Department of Animal and Food Sciences. Rosenberger says each of the four courses he had with Sammelwitz was valuable to him.

"Paul is demanding in the amount of material he expects students to learn, but he's easy to learn from, and not at all intimidating," says Rosenberger. "He gave us confidence in our ability to succeed at a time in our lives when we needed it most. He played an important role in a lot of people's lives, particularly at the freshman and sophomore level, then later helped us prepare for graduate school.

"I liked him and respected him, and still do," he adds. "Other people who are my contemporaries would tell you the same thing. Paul still gets letters from students he had years ago, as well as from recent grads."

According to Rosenberger, Sammelwitz was one of the first UD professors to use computers in class.

"Computers really caught my imagination," Sammelwitz says. "In the summer of 1977, I learned the basics of programming and came away with many ideas for using computers for interactive instruction as well as for communication. By the late 1970s, my students had on-line instructional programs in animal anatomy and physiology they could access. By the early 1980s, we had a chat group and e-mail we used for personal communication. Students also could visit my grade book on-line to check their personal scores."

Sammelwitz is updating all instructional software onto CD-ROMs, work he plans to continue after retirement.

Dr. Lesa Griffiths, associate professor of animal nutrition and associate dean for academic programs, says the work Sammelwitz is doing with video disks and CD-ROM applications is state-of-the-art in terms of what instructors can do with multi-media.

Griffiths has worked closely with Sammelwitz since arriving as a new faculty member in the department of animal science in 1987.

"He has been an inspiring mentor and role model to me since I've been here. He taught me so much about how to develop relationships with students.

"His students affectionately refer to him as Dr. Samm," she says. "There was a minor uproar on campus when they learned he was retiring."

Because Griffiths served as chair of the promotion and tenure committee for the department when Sammelwitz was promoted to a full professor, she read the many letters students wrote in support. She says his students have wonderful stories and memories of the days they spent in his class.

"I remember one letter, in particular," says Griffiths. "A student wrote about the time that she returned to the parking lot to find a flat tire. Seeing her dilemma, Dr. Samm took over in a fatherly fashion and changed her tire. That's the way he is.  He is quiet, unassuming, never taking credit for much of what he does."

Sammelwitz has his memories too. He remembers the student who fainted with her first dissection, but stuck with it to became a veterinarian. He remembers students who met in his lab and later married. He remembers the many first-year non-agricultural students who took his class and changed majors.

His favorite thing about teaching?
"The interactions with my students," he says as he sits looking around his lab, one he helped design some 20 years ago. It is the size of a small supermarket, created with all sorts of nooks and crannies to get his students excited about science.

His favorite course?
"Probably functional anatomy and physiology. There is an awful lot of me in this course," he says. "I will miss it."