Kathy Stofer, professor of communication arts, first stepped on the HC campus as a student in 1979.
She returned to her alma mater in 1988 to teach journalism in the Gray Center. Twenty-two years later, Stofer is retiring.
"I knew they were building the Gray Center," Stofer said. "I also knew Hastings was looking for someone to be the yearbook and newspaper adviser."
When she started, there were three full-time faculty members. Today, there are eight full-time communications professors and one part-time.
Stofer served as The Bronco yearbook adviser for 12 years and The Collegian adviser for 17.
"I enjoyed working with the students in a different environment," Stofer said. "In the classroom, there is a hierarchy. When you advise a publication, you are more like a colleague. I also enjoyed getting to know them as people.
"The people I worked with on The Collegian are the ones I have maintained relationships with through the years," she said.
The relationships are what she will miss most in retirement.
"I am going to miss my colleagues," Stofer said. "We have become a unit. We have our differences, but we work through them. We work well together. I will miss those day-to-day interactions with them."
Stofer, who focuses on print journalism, said the industry has changed dramatically.
While she was a high school journalism adviser, the first issue of USA Today was published.
"USA Today changed the face of the industry," she said. "The influx of online journalism forced the print industry to rethink, too. We have adapted, though.
"Basic writing skills are the core of anything you do. What we do well as journalists is research," Stofer said.
In journalism, everything must be accurate and fair, she added.
Stofer has hopes of becoming the college historian.
"I have 35 years of institutional knowledge," she said. "I also enjoy recording history, so I figured I could use what I enjoy somewhere."
Stofer said otherwise she might do something with the Hastings Historical Society.
Writing is one thing Stofer has always enjoyed. She has published three textbooks.
"Who knows? Maybe in retirement I will write another textbook," she said.
The textbooks are Stofer's lasting impression on students and the learning community.
"Teachers live on borrowed glory anyway," she said.
"We live off the successes of our students. So, knowing students will use the textbooks in a learning environment shows I have influenced someone."
"It's the things that have influenced lives beyond my classroom I look back on and feel were the important things I did," she said.
