Visiting Committee

The College of Arts & Sciences Visiting Committee is designed to bring different perspectives to the college and to inform university constituencies of the varied academic, research, and professional activities of the college.

What is a Visiting Committee?

Visiting Committee Members

• Are asked to assist in creating a climate favorable to voluntary support for the university and encouraged to help raise funds.
• Are asked to contribute financially during their term of service.
• Review the programs and activities of the college.
• Offer counsel to the dean, the faculty, and the president of the university.
• Review curricula, tour facilities, and meet with faculty, students, and administrators.
• Assist in planning, identify operating and capital needs, and suggest how resources may be developed.

Visiting Committee Members

Chair

Thomas W. Shepard III, '77

• After studying Physics and Computer Science at Loyola, Tom worked in aerospace, process automation, oil & gas, and computer hardware & software.  From 1995 until his retirement in 2017, he was a Senior Software Developer on a small team that developed and supported an application that is still in use. Tom and his wife Anne moved to Crested Butte, Colorado in 2018, where Tom does extreme skiing and mountain biking.  In the last couple of years, he’s played guitar and sung with a local 60s & 70s band.  When visiting Houston, he dabbles in radio-controlled airplanes.

Virginia M. Angelico-Tatum, D.D.S., '75

Margaret M. Baier, '86

Josephus R. Barnes, '65

David J. Cheramie, Ph.D., '81

• Graduating from Loyola University in 1981 with a B.A. in History, David Cheramie grew up in the Cajun village of Golden Meadow on Bayou Lafourche. He is the former Executive Director of the Council for the Development of French in Louisiana (CODOFIL) and the former Chief Executive Officer for the Bayou Vermilion District which runs the living history museum, Vermilionville. He now owns and operates Bayou Zen Media Services, LLC which offers translations, lessons, articles, and tours in and about Louisiana French history, culture, and language. He is a Knight in the French Order of Arts and Letters and a member of the Quebec Order of Francophones in the Americas. He holds a doctorate in Francophone studies from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, specializing in Acadian and Louisiana French literature. He has published four collections of French poetry in the US and Canada. He co-founded the Louisiana French literary review, Feux Follets. He has been writing" En français, s’il vous plaît" in Acadiana Profile magazine since 2011. His writing in French can be found on his blog, Un Bougre du bayou, at davidcheramie.blogspot.com. 

Lynn Coatney

Laura Coatney, '20

Daniel Daigle

Michelle Daigle

Marilyn Dittmann

Julian B. Feibelman, Jr.

Janice Foulks, '72 

Stephen Fowlkes

Holly Gardner, '11

Ana Gershanik

Dr. Robert Giardina, '67

Dr. Steffon Gray, '12

Alicia Clay-Jones, '88

Rachel B. Kent, '74

• After studying Biology at Loyola, Rachel spent more than 25 years working as a molecular biologist in academic and biotechnology research. From 2000 until retiring in 2008, she was a Research Director at a small biotechnology firm that developed an anti-inflammatory biologic that is currently available by prescription to treat a rare genetic disease. Rachel and her husband, Steve, are New Orleans natives who moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts for graduate school in 1974. They now live in Boxborough, Massachusetts.  In retirement, they each have served on the Loyola Board of Trustees, and have traveled together to various locales around the world, most recently to Antarctica, Galapagos, and Madagascar.

Virginia Kindelan, '85

Bradley S. King, '96

Monica Ledee, '94

James Llorens, Ph.D., '68

Helene Lopez

Dr. Taniecea A. Mallery, '05

Francis G. "Frank" Martello, D.D.S., '75

• Frank was born in Uptown New Orleans, and grew up on Maple Street.  He went to
  Mater Dolorosa on Carrollton for grammar school, De La Salle High School,
  and Loyola University, graduating in 1975. He received his DDS from LSUSD in
  1979 and has been in private practice in Uptown since then. Frank is also a
  part-time clinical associate professor at the School of Dentistry since
  1995, and for almost forty years has provided care to special needs
  patients at United Cerebral Palsy of Greater New Orleans.

Natalie Mesko, '94

Joyce Sameulson Pulitzer, '79

Jennifer Quezergue Diana Reeves

M. James Schott, Jr, '88

Albert N. Swafford, Jr., '89

Jennifer H. Traina, '88

Richard Traina, '92

Carol Waguespack, ‘62

Roland Waguespack, M.D., '92

Georgie Weilbaecher, '64

Robert Weilbaecher, M.D., '60