Celebrating CETA’s Past and Future

The faculty and administrators who laid the foundation for what is now the College of Engineering, Technology, and Architecture (CETA) came together on June 9 to celebrate the past and look ahead to a promising future.

During a reception and dinner at The 1877 Club, the university paid tribute to former deans and faculty members of the College of Engineering and Ward College of Technology, which merged in 2003 to form CETA.

Thanks to the work of these honorees, the university is poised to move into a position of regional prominence and national visibility in the areas of science, engineering, and technology. In addition to forming CETA, the university is in the final phase of building an Integrated Science, Engineering, and Technology (ISET) complex, and just completed the first year of the University High School of Science and Engineering.

“By any standard of measurement, the University of Hartford has emerged as a ‘player’ in the New England region in education in the technological disciplines,” said CETA Dean Alan J. Hadad. Many speakers at the June 9 dinner paid tribute to Hadad, who soon will be stepping down in order to teach and serve as a Senior Advisor to the President. Louis Manzione, founding executive director of Bell Laboratories research center in Ireland, will become dean on Aug. 15, 2005.

Attendees at the dinner heard from three University of Hartford presidents. Stephen Joel Trachtenberg, who was president from 1977 to 1988, said he is proud of all the progress that has been made at the university, and of its growing local, regional, and national prominence. Former President Humphrey Tonkin (1989-1998) and current President Walter Harrison (1998-present) delivered videotaped messages.

The dinner reunited many former faculty members and deans of the College of Engineering and Ward College of Technology. Current and former deans in attendance included Hadad, who began serving as Ward dean in 1989 and Engineering dean in 1997; Walter B. Roettger, dean of Ward College from 1985-88; Everitt K. Smith, Ward dean from 1988-89; and John P. Cagnetta, dean of the College of Engineering from 1994-97. Roettger traveled all the way from Batesville, Ark., where he serves as president of Lyon College. He had not been to the University of Hartford campus since 1991, and described the new ISET building as “striking.”

Also in attendance were family members of three former deans who have passed away. They included: Jeannette Lescarbeau, widow of Roland F. Lescarbeau, who was the first dean of Ward College, having served from 1948-1972; Mary Alsing, widow of Carl F. Alsing, who was dean of the College of Engineering from1970-71; and Chester G. Gehman, the son of the late Chester A. Gehman, who was acting dean of Ward College from 1972-73.