TU: EVE Education winner: Jacksonville woman's childhood inspired desire to help others

Times-Union

http://jacksonville.com/news/metro/2015-06-05/story/eve-education-winner-jacksonville-womans-childhood-inspired-desire-help

By Sandy Strickland

To understand Patty Adeeb’s compassion for her students, you have to go back to her childhood. It was a traumatic one that inspired a deep desire to help others.

For 45 years, that’s exactly what Adeeb has done. She’s worked with every type of student — wounded veterans, the sick, the dying, the homeless, the mentally ill and the incarcerated. She’s worked with students in adult education, high school equivalency, regular college degree and doctoral programs. She’s even trained teachers.

Adeeb, who is director of pre-collegiate studies at Florida State College at Jacksonville, has been so effective that she is the recipient of the EVE Award in education.

“I don’t like to see people hurt,” she said. “I want them to see they are worthy.”

Adeeb was born in Pensacola and moved to Jacksonville when she was 6. Her mother, who was divorced, worked two jobs to raise her five children. Money was scarce, but Adeeb said she didn’t realize they were poor until she got to school and saw others had more.

Though her mother had only an eighth-grade education, she was intuitively intelligent and instilled in her children a love of reading and learning. That helped Adeeb win scholarships, and she was the first person in her family to graduate from college.

For someone who said she had to work at building self-esteem, Adeeb excelled. In 1971, she won the Miss Jacksonville crown wearing a borrowed bathing suit held together by 20 safety pins. She was running out of money to go to school, and her mother signed her up for the pageant because of the scholarship money. She graduated summa cum laude — with highest honors — from Florida State University where she was named Best All Around Woman. She wanted to be a doctor, but her scholarship money wasn’t enough to cover medical school so she switched to education, specializing in children with special needs.

Adeeb began her career at Englewood High School teaching children with specific learning disabilities and then went to Florida State Hospital in Macclenny to work with patients with a range of mental disorders.

Her next position was at Wolfson Children’s Hospital where she taught children with terminal illnesses and severe medical conditions. Though they were often in physical pain, she sometimes used humor to deflect their attention to their studies. When they had to lie prone, Adeeb would go under the bed to show them their lessons. If they were flat on their backs, she would stand on a ladder and put their work on the ceiling so they could see it. Because she formed a bond with them, Adeeb was often asked to do eulogies at their funerals.

She spent 21 years with the University of North Florida training teachers and serving as an administrator. She also earned a doctorate in educational leadership at UNF. At times, she incorporated innovative techniques. She and her brother, for example, raised a chimp named Bonnie who grew to 5 feet. Bonnie knew sign language, and Adeeb used her in behavioral management projects at UNF.

Later, there was a stint at Nova University training teachers at the undergraduate level and working in the doctorate program.

Then Adeeb was named director of Florida State College’s Deerwood Center, where she was executive director for 14 years. She made it a point to know everyone there, from the maintenance workers on up, and what was going on with their families, said Susan Brandenburg, who nominated her for the award. In 2008, Adeeb helped develop the TRACK academic program for Wounded Warriors and oversaw 13 graduations. TRACK guides them through their first year of college and facilitates their transition from soldier to student.

In her present position, overseeing 5,000 students, Adeeb is based at the Downtown Campus in an office that is an extension of herself. There are family photos, a collection of angels reflecting her faith and a replica of Dorothy’s red shoes and a picture from “The Wizard of Oz,” whose classic standard “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” is her signature song. She sang it in the Miss Jacksonville pageant and to her children at night after they said their prayers.

Slideshow: EVE Awards luncheon
During the past year, Adeeb has implemented educational programs at the three Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office correctional centers. She met with corrections director Tara Wildes to set up a program whereby inmates could finish high school and prepare for the workforce or pursue an academic degree.

“We want them to be a valuable person in our community but also a valuable person to themselves and their families,” Adeeb said.

She’s also enhanced an existing educational program for the homeless at the Sulzbacher Center.

In 2014, Adeeb started a program offering day classes at Eureka Garden, a historically crime-plagued apartment complex on the Westside. While it was difficult to get started, she said, there have been no issues.

“We are trying to reach the unrepresented population in our community so they can change their lives and know they have people who care about them,” she said. “I love the students, and the staff I hire is the same. Nobody does it alone. It’s with a team that we make things happen.”

Through her leadership of the College Reach Out Program, middle and high school students who are underserved are brought on campus for academic enrichment and taken on college tours. And as a board member of Family Promise, she serves as an advocate for homeless families and children.

Colleagues and friends talk about her work ethic, compassion, warmth, wit and servant-leadership style.

She’s revitalized the adult education program and led efforts to augment its curriculum, instruction, assessment and state attendance requirements, said Kathleen Ciez-Volz, FSCJ’s executive dean of Academic Foundations, in Adeeb’s nomination form.

Though she works long hours, Adeeb said she has a high energy level and strikes the proper balance between family and career. She has been married to restaurateur Barry Adeeb for 44 years, and they have two married children and four grandchildren. Adeeb said she loves to spend time with her family, be it going to a lake, playing board games or cooking dinner together.

“I believe in servant leadership,” Adeeb said. “To me, it’s not a coined phrase. It’s the way I live my life. … Anybody we teach teaches us back. It’s not a one-way journey. We help them, but they help us.”

Sandy Strickland: (904) 359-4128