Mary Anne Doyle hugs the UConn Husky Dog mascot during the 2018 Commencement Weekend festivities. (Photo credit: Frank Zappulla\/Neag School)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nImpacting Graduate Students<\/strong><\/p>\n\u201cDr. Doyle and her many graduate students continue to make significant professional contributions to teaching and improving reading education throughout Connecticut, the United States, and abroad, and will impact children, teachers, and schools across the world for years to come,\u201d says Gil Dyrli, faculty emeritus from the Neag School who was a colleague of hers for many years.<\/p>\n
\u201cMary Anne truly loves reading education, teaching at UConn, sharing expertise with teachers and students, and moving her profession forward,\u201d adds Dyrli. \u201cShe\u2019s one of a kind.\u201d<\/p>\n
Neag School alum and now a professor of education at Eastern State Connecticut University, Theresa Bouley \u201901 Ph.D. recalls working closely with Doyle as a doctoral student from 1997 to 2001.<\/p>\n
\u201cMary Anne was a consistent, supportive, patient, and kind mentor. She went above and beyond, demonstrating her commitment to the program, and to the field of reading\/language arts,\u201d says Bouley, who also served as a tutor in the UConn Reading Language Arts Center.<\/p>\n
Doyle, Bouley says, has also made a positive, lasting impact on numerous teachers and literacy specialists in public schools across the state.<\/p>\n
\u201cI discovered teachers who have worked with Mary Anne to be the leaders in their schools, and on numerous occasions I have personally relied on these teachers to enhance the effectiveness of the professional development I was providing,\u201d Bouley says. \u201cWhile reading programs and assessments come and go, Mary Anne has supported countless educators in developing their knowledge and skills of research-based practices.\u201d<\/p>\n
A former advisee of Doyle\u2019s, Kelly Andrews-Babock \u201901 6th Year, had similar positive experiences.<\/p>\n
\u201cMary Anne \u2026 would often meet with myself and three other colleagues. We would pepper her with questions, and she would calmly answer them, advise us, and always share some laughs,\u201d says Andrews-Babock. \u201cMary Anne arranged for me and another colleague to co-teach for the Neag School in the fall of 2011. Since then, Mary Anne has presented on Marie Clay\u2019s \u2018Observation Survey,\u2019 enlightening my students on the important work she\u2019s still involved with. Her knowledge of language acquisition and beginning reader success is excellent. Mary Anne always has a great smile, words of encouragement, and insight to share with everyone. I have the utmost respect for her.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile reading programs and assessments come and go, Mary Anne has supported countless educators in developing their knowledge and skills of research-based practices.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014\u00a0Theresa Bouley \u201901 Ph.D.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Administrator and Leader<\/strong><\/p>\nJust prior to taking the role of department chair, Doyle served as the professional development coordinator at Manchester and East Hartford (Conn.) Public Schools and was also instrumental in the development of the current Integrated Bachelor\u2019s\/Master\u2019s program. During her 17 years as department chair, the department grew, programs became nationally ranked, and she was largely responsible for the administration of one of the best teacher preparation programs in the nation.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs an administrator, Mary Anne always had the courage to make difficult decisions \u2013 not the easy or quick one \u2013 but the decisions that were the right ones, and in the best interest on the student, or the faculty member, or the Neag School,\u201d says DeFranco. \u201cAs dean, on many occasions when I was faced with making a difficult decision I would speak with Mary Anne about the situation, knowing that she would always give me the advice I needed to make the right decision.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to personally thank Mary Anne for all that she has taught me over the years,\u201d he adds. \u201cOn behalf of the students, faculty and staff in the Neag School, we thank her for all that she has done to advance education, set a high standard for all to emulate, and make the Neag School a much better place.\u201d<\/p>\n
Schwab echoes Doyle\u2019s accomplishments as an administrator. \u201cUnder her leadership, grant productivity soared. International programs expanded, and the Neag School hired many wonderful new faculty. She ran the Reading and Language Arts Center, and she has been a leader in reading and many students have benefited from that work,\u201d Schwab says.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile these professional commitments are noteworthy, it is even more important to note that Mary Anne is a wonderful person. She\u2019s honest and always on top of situations. Fair, yet demanding, and always positive and hardworking. She is a wonderful scholar, mentor, teacher and colleague, we will miss her very much in the Neag School. But we are also very happy for her as she moves into this new chapter in her book of life.\u201d<\/p>\n
View a photo album featuring Mary Anne Doyle\u00a0here<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mary Anne Doyle began her career at the University of Connecticut\u2019s School of Education in 1983 as an assistant professor. She will retire this month after a 35-year career as an administrator and faculty member.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":201186,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2426,1855],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[1879],"class_list":["post-201185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-curriculum-instruction","category-neag"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-03 05:41:59","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201185"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201185\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":201187,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201185\/revisions\/201187"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/201186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201185"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=201185"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=201185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Mary](\"https:\/\/education.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1621\/2018\/05\/20180505_Neag_Pre-Ceremony-Graduation_web-147-Doyle-400x267.jpg\")