Chuck Shedd

Profile Updated: August 6, 2012
Residing In: Chesterfield, MO USA
Spouse/Partner: Sandra Jean Shedd
Occupation: Community College Adjunct Instructor - Math
Children: Daniel (02/1983) - Project Engineer - Yuma, AZ

Natalie (12/1985) - Social Work - Ft Bragg, More…CA
Yes! Attending Reunion
Comments:

After totally flaming out twice at Harvey Mudd College (Claremont, CA) - I eventually graduated (ironically named Outstanding Senior in Math) from SIU-Carbondale and subsequently completed a Masters in Math at SIU-Edwardsville.

Worked as a programmer/analyst/project manager/consultant at McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing) in St Louis & Milwaukee WI as well as EDS (Ross Perot's former Electronic Data Systems - now part of Hewlett Packard) until retirement in 2004.

Briefly was operations manager of Advanced Cellular Technologies (ACT) which we intended to become the "Bell Labs" of the cellular industry until it ceased operations in 1987. Three for three!

Have been teaching Math part-time at STLCC-Meramec since 2005. Although I am currently taking a semester off (several motorcycle trips planned) to find myself or whatever, I am planning to return for the Fall semester - if not before.

Latest update (July '12): no motorcycle trips this time around / will not teach in the Fall - undergoing adjuvant chemotherapy for colon cancer instead. Probably will return to teaching later. Have been greatly enjoying many updates of classmates profiles.

[2002]
Despite having begun my illustrious (lengthy anyway, BA ’69, MS ’74) academic career at Bunsen School in “old” Belleville, in high school I was the transfer student from Rio (Air Force brat) that nobody knew. I was so shy I didn’t even submit my picture for the ’62 Bellevinois.

My “15 minutes of fame” was as a member (others: Keith Jenkins, Suzie Lutz, Mike Polites, Ken Sliment and Betsy Wobus) of the First Place (“Senior-Advanced Division”) winning team in the annual Math Field Day competition in Carbondale. How the Hy News staff completely failed to cover that moment in history is something that I will never understand.

Currently living in Chesterfield (MO) with wife of 21 years Sandy (we won “most recently married” and “most pregnant” awards at the ’82 reunion), son Daniel (sophomore at Kettering University in Michigan) and daughter Natalie (junior at Parkway Central). Began working with computers (night shift operations) Bank of St. Louis, ’64, then with McDonnell-Douglas, and now EDS.

Based on the performance of my 401K account with current employer, it now appears likely that I will eventually become the oldest working programmer in recorded history. Still enjoying swimming (currently hold 10+ state records in Senior Olympic annual competition), as well as my “stable” of 3 BMW motorcycles – 2 classics and an R1200C.

School Story:

My dad was a career military officer (started flying in 1931) so we lived all over the place - but Belleville was always home since it was my mother's home town and I even lived for a couple years with my grandparents (my grandfather founded/owned Stiehl Drugs in Belleville and elsewhere) where I attended First Grade at Bunsen School.

Though we spent many summers in Belleville typically while my father was relocating to a new assignment, I did not return to school in Belleville until January 1961. Because I transferred into BTHS from an "American" (strangely modified academic schedule) school in Rio de Janeiro, I had already completed the first semester of my Junior year while the rest of you still had a few weeks of classes and finals to go.

This unusual circumstance (attending classes that I had officially completed) allowed me the opportunity of "cutting" the math final exam on January 20th - to watch Kennedy's inauguration on TV instead - to the considerable displeasure of the instructor with whom I seldom saw eye-to-eye anyway so much so that she insisted that I should not be allowed to continue in the next semester's class. Perhaps if I had not "gotten away with" that so easily (Mr Boyles succeeded in overcoming her objections and welcomed me into his solid geometry class), I might not have subsequently developed the habit of cutting exams as a form of personal protest or whatever.

Thankfully, I eventually managed to break that particular self-destructive habit and now do my best to encourage my students to find other forms of self-expression.

One other "school story" that some (current/retired English teachers anyway) may find momentarily amusing is that I came precariously close to not graduating as a result of the number of themes that I "owed" my 12th grade English teacher until he agreed to count extra heavily one that he subsequently reproduced for discussion in his BJC classes that I entitled "The Evil Consequences of Compulsory Theme Writing in High School."

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