Viterbo University put John Rice ’83 on the path to a career in higher education, a path that took some twists but was informed by Viterbo’s Franciscan mission. “I have always kept the mission of St. Francis in mind—that of teaching and healing,” he said.
Helen Elsbernd, FSPA ’65 faced a difficult decision in 1976. Then a chemistry professor at Viterbo, she loved teaching. That year however, she was asked to become the academic dean of the college. It was a promotion to be sure, but one that would take her out of the classroom.
If not for a friend’s encouragement and a summer work study job, Dillon McArdle ’06, the new director of Viterbo’s Fine Arts Center, might have taken a very different path in life.
McArdle began life as a Midwesterner, the middle child of three sons living his early years in Anoka, Minn., the Halloween Capital of the World. When he was in third grade, he moved with his mother and stepfather to Las Vegas.