Eliyahu Gasson | editor-in-chief

I had a pretty rotten start to the 2024 semester. I don’t remember why. It probably had something to do with taking 18 credits and thinking about my job as the opinions editor for The Duke and relying on the bus to get back home to Squirrel Hill and not having money … yada yada. I was having a rough time.

My last class on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays was Sex, Myth and Media, taught by Professor Maggie Patterson. My interactions with her before I started her class were pretty limited.

I had seen her at Student Publication Board dinners at the end of the year at Bucca de Bepo before it closed and at a Society of Professional Journalists meeting when, disappointed by low membership, I proposed we disband.

Outside of those handful of events, I didn’t really know her.

I don’t remember how, but she somehow found out that I was from Squirrel Hill, probably the result of an ice breaker.

She told me she was from Squirrel Hill too, and we spent about an hour after class talking about the neighborhood and growing up in the East End of Pittsburgh.

I had a disposition early on in my undergrad that authority was not my friend, as though I wasn’t worthy of knowing professors or administrators. On that night, Maggie helped me get rid of that disposition.

Something about relating to a professor in that way — not about class or school, but about life generally — was special.

I felt a kinship with her. She helped teach me that people are people, despite status — that everyone has something interesting to say and is worth listening to and knowing.

That lesson not only made my college experience easier, but made me a better journalist.

I started to worry less about interviewing politicians. I felt myself listening more to people who I did speak to. I was asking better questions and having more natural conversations.

Maggie was down to earth. She was curious. She wanted to know about people.

There are few people like Maggie that I know of. She was polite, she listened and had sound advice to give.

She was accomplished but humble, smart but not arrogant. She is what I aspire to be as a person and a professional.

I’ll miss seeing her on Murray Avenue and in College Hall.

Eliyahu Gasson can be reached at gassone@duq.edu