UCMP welcomes Heather Leitzke! |
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As our new Administrative Assistant, Heather juggles the many tasks that keep the museum running smoothly, from keeping office supplies stocked, to ordering plaster for fossil preparation, to greeting the visitors who come through the museum’s front doors. She describes this as her “first real job” and notes that one of the greatest challenges about it, as well as what she likes most about it, is she is constantly learning new things. These include picking up new computer skills and learning about office management and her mantra seems to be: “Oh yeah, I can definitely do that!” Heather comes to us from the East Coast as a recent college graduate of the University of Virginia, where she earned BAs in English and Psychology, the latter with High Distinction. While a student, Heather filled her “spare” time with volunteer work, music (violinist in the orchestra), and reading. She finds life on the Berkeley campus quite a contrast to her alma mater—the faculty and students are much more casual here and Berkeley is enriched by a high level of ethnic diversity. Though Heather was not very familiar with paleontology before coming to work at the museum, she enjoys learning more about it. “This may sound elementary, but I never thought about how much room there is in paleontology for the study of topics in evolution. Paleontology is really a way to study not just the past, but the present too—we can learn a lot about the changes in our environment today by studying how organisms evolved in the past.”
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Ultimately, Heather would like to return to school to earn a higher degree and then follow one of two possible career choices: family psychology or teaching English at the high school level. She is very interested in preventive family counseling, both in research and in clinical application. However, she remains influenced by her own high school English teacher who taught her to love literature and she would like to share that passion with others.We are delighted to have Heather with us. She has tremendous organizational skills, keeps us all on task, and makes our lives more cheery.
We also welcome the new staff of the Berkeley Natural History Museums (BNHM): Helen Ettlinger (MSO), Mary Anne Glazar (Human Resources), Ed Luby (Administrative Coordinator), and Joyce Leighton (Administrative Specialist). UCMP is one of six natural history museums on campus, along with the Botanical Garden, Essig Muse um of Entomology, Jepson and University Herbaria, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, and the Phoebe Hearst Museum of Anthropology (see Letter from the Director). You will hear more about the BNHM in future issues.
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