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From left: Julie, Janet and Valerie Steinwart at the CLS reception on May 4 at UNMC. |
Last Saturday, Janet Steinwart was among the more than 600 UNMC students who graduated.
A non-traditional student, Steinwart received a bachelor’s degree in clinical laboratory science (CLS).
She is one of two of the first graduates of the new on-line distance learning program for CLS.
Her husband Roger and two grown daughters, one of whom graduated from UNMC in 2002 with the same degree, were at the graduation ceremony to clap, hoop and holler for their mom as she walked across the stage to receive her degree.
Steinwart had started college at Kearney State College – which now is the University of Nebraska at Kearney — but completed only two-and-a-half years of school before getting married and moving to Ogallala.
“I think my dad was always a little disappointed that I didn’t finish my degree,” she said.
In 1979 Steinwart earned an associates degree in medical laboratory technology and got a job in the lab at Ogallala Community Hospital, where she has worked for 28 years.
Time flies by though when you’re a busy mom with two children and soon Steinwart found herself an empty nester.
That’s when she decided to go back to school and get a degree.
“After my daughter, Valerie Steinwart, graduated from UNMC I thought why not,” Steinwart said. “It’s never too late to learn new things and this was a good review for me.”
Steinwart said the course refreshed her memory on the things she learned 28 years ago and taught her a few new subjects that didn’t exist back then.
“There are many things they didn’t know about when I graduated, especially in the areas of immunology and molecular diagnostic testing. It’s been interesting learning about it all,” she said.
But it was the personal satisfaction of having finally earned her bachelor’s degree that motivated Steinwart the most.
That and her dad.
“We lost my mother and my father last year,” she said. “It would have been neat for him to see this.”