The University of Maryland College of Education inducted new members into its Dean’s Circle on December 2. The Dean’s Circle recognizes donors who have a cumulative lifetime giving amount of $100,000 or more to the college.
Patricia S. “Pat” Koskinen Ph.D. ’75 and John A. Koskinen have established three scholarships and fellowships in the College of Education. First, in 2014, they created the Patricia S. and John A. Koskinen Scholarship for students who are graduates of Prince George’s Community College. In 2021, they instituted the Patricia S. and John A. Koskinen Endowed Fellowship in Urban Education to support a graduate fellowship for a Ph.D. student specializing in urban education. That same year, they launched the Elaine Johnson Coates ’59 Endowed Scholarship in honor of Coates, the first Black woman to receive an undergraduate degree from UMD. This scholarship supports students who promote racial diversity in the College of Education through activism or service or have distinguished themselves through their research, internships or presentations on the topic of racial diversity. The Koskinens are also members of the President’s 1856 Society for donors who have given more than $1 million in their lifetimes to the University of Maryland.
Pat Koskinen earned a doctorate in elementary education at UMD. She was an adjunct professor at the College of Education for more than 25 years and served as associate director of the National Reading Research Center, a federally funded consortium led by UMD and the University of Georgia. In addition, she is a former president of the College Reading Association (now the Association of Literacy Educators and Researchers). Her research has focused on reading fluency and comprehension, literacy instruction and vocabulary acquisition. Before receiving her doctorate, Koskinen taught elementary school in Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles. She was a member of the College of Education Board of Visitors and the college’s Fearless Ideas Campaign Committee and has served on the boards of the National Children’s Museum, Heads Up afterschool program, and Pierce-Warwick Adoption Agency.
John Koskinen is a former Senate-confirmed commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service and also served as the non-executive chairman of Freddie Mac and the deputy mayor and city administrator of Washington, D.C. Koskinen chaired the President's Council on Year 2000 Conversion and was a senior staff member of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders (also known as the Kerner Commission), which studied the conditions of urban communities before and after the uprisings of the late 1960s.
Barbara K. Shapiro ’55 established the Bebe & Bebop Shapiro Endowed Scholarship in 2019 to provide merit-based scholarships for students enrolled in the College of Education’s K-12 teacher certification programs who began their education at Baltimore City Community College, Community College of Baltimore County or Prince George’s Community College.
Shapiro, who earned her bachelor’s degree in early childhood education at UMD, is a board member of the M. Sigmund & Barbara K. Shapiro Philanthropic Fund. She and her late husband Sig managed the family shipping and logistics business, Samuel Shapiro & Company, which their daughter Margie now leads as president and CEO. A lifelong resident of Baltimore and a respected philanthropist, Barbara Shapiro has supported numerous nonprofits in the city and invests in projects that make a difference in the lives of individuals and families.
