KU News Release

Graduation stories: Longtime KU faculty member to join her students on the Hill

Mary Klayder

LAWRENCE — Being on the Hill, proudly watching her students culminate their academic careers, is nothing new to Mary Klayder. This year, she’ll be there again, only this time, she’s going to be one of them.

Klayder, University Honors Lecturer in English at the University of Kansas, will take part in the doctoral hooding ceremony, marking the successful completion of her doctorate. She finished her dissertation while continuing to teach and advise the students who will be joining her on commencement day.

Klayder is a longtime Jayhawk, earning her bachelor’s in art history and master’s in English education from KU. She taught high school for several years before coming back to KU in 1985. Over the course of her career, she’s worked at what she calls “the triangle,” teaching English, serving as associate director of the University Honors Program and regularly directing three study abroad programs. On top of that, she’s been an adviser for many years, one of the duties she says she enjoys the most.

An English major at heart, Klayder never stopped writing and had plans to complete her doctorate. She began working on her dissertation in the mid ’90s. Not all went according to plan, though.

“Life took over,” she said.

Her husband passed away. She had started a dissertation in metaphor theory in literature but had to put it aside. She returned to what she knew and loved: teaching and advising. For the next several years, Klayder focused on her career.

“I just didn’t think about it for awhile,” Klayder said of finishing her doctorate. “But I felt good about what I had written. It really represented who I am.”

The thought of finishing didn’t go away completely. With the friendly encouragement of some of her colleagues, she decided to finish what she had started. This time she did things differently. She continued teaching and advising while finishing her dissertation. She also decided to change course on her dissertation, writing a “memoirist collection of essays and poetry.”

“I’m using a lot of the ideas I had originally, but it’s now a nonfiction, personal work instead of the critical analysis it was earlier.”

Klayder said being both student and teacher was not too much of a stretch. Because she had only her dissertation to finish, she wasn’t attending classes with students she was instructing. The biggest challenge, she said, was taking the time after her teaching and advising duties to devote to her dissertation, “Painted Ponies: Essays on Memory and Loss.” She completed it in December.

Her teaching didn’t suffer either. In November, students chose her as winner of the HOPE Award, the only teaching award given solely by students. Nominations for the award are gathered annually from the senior class. The Board of Class Officers and its Senior Advisory Board select the winner after interviews with the candidates. Her name was announced as the winner at a KU football game one week before she defended her dissertation.

“That was very meaningful, I really appreciated being honored by the students,” said Klayder, who had seen both her teachers and colleagues receive the award. Come commencement day, she’ll walk down the hill with the same senior class that chose her for the award.

With her doctorate in hand, Klayder will continue doing what she loves — teaching, advising and working with study abroad programs. She’ll also continue some of her favorite writing: recommendation letters. Klayder jokes that while many authors have collections of letters, some day she’ll publish a collection of recommendation letters.

The results of the letters are no laughing matter. She’s watched students go on to medical school or law school or become teachers — one even became an “imagineer” for Walt Disney.

While most graduates only walk down the Hill once, or maybe twice, Klayder plans to be there for years to come, watching her students make the memorable walk.

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