Distinguished:
Zeno Van Erdewyk
Taken from Alumni News Fall 2002
All four of Zeno's children graduated from Dakota State in the 1980's. Carol herself had graduated in 1977 with a degree in elementary education; son Michael graduated in 1983; son John in 1984; daughter Mary (Vogel) in 1985; and daughter Julie (Streff) in 1986. Michael is living in Minnesota where he is CEO and founder of Bioverse, Inc. a biotechnology company with headquarters in Bloomington. John received his M.D. from University of South Dakota and is an anesthesiologist at Queen of Peace Hospital in Mitchell, South Dakota. Mary is a stay at home mom of five children. Julie is also at home near Salem with three children.
In the early 1980's, Zeno chose to increase his service to the worldwide educational community by becoming a presenter at international conferences and seminars. Zeno credits a positive and supportive administration, including the dean of the College of Education, Dr. Tom Hawley, with giving him the tools he needed to be a success in his career. Since 1984, Zeno has presented papers at nearly thirty national and international conferences and has done consulting work for both private and military organizations in Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and in England and Europe.
Zeno was on his way home from one such consulting job when his most memorable moment of the 1980's occurred. The year was 1988, and the plane Zeno was aboard was returning to Miami from Puerto Rico when it suddenly started to descend from the air. Assuming it was a mechanical problem, Zeno and the other passengers awaited word from the captain. When the word finally came, it gave small comfort to the 121 passengers. The captain, it seemed, had made an unscheduled stop in what he stated, for reasons that became obvious later, was Havana, Cuba. It did not take long for Zeno and the others to realize that the plane had been hijacked, and that they had landed on Grand Turk, Island off the east coast of Cuba. The hijacker was a young Cuban, apparently distraught over the recent death of his mother. Through the interpreters he told authorities that he didn't want to hurt anyone; he just wanted to go back to Cuba. After hours of negotiations, the hijacker gave himself, the passengers and their luggage were thoroughly searched, and the flight continued to Miami.
By 2000, Zeno was entering his sixth decade of affiliation with Dakota State University. During those six decades on of his classes had been general psychology, a required course for most majors, and populated mainly with freshman. By the year 2000, Zeno estimated over three thousand freshmen had taken his classes, including his wife, his four children, his granddaughter, and the mother of Tom Hawley, the Current Dean of Education.
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