Alum Spotlight
Bridget Pieschel
The W Caught Hold of Bridget Pieschel and Wouldn't Let Go
It is not unusual for MUW students to fall in love with the W at first sight and after graduation to keep coming back to the campus year after year for special events or just to stand under the ginkgo tree again.
Dr. Bridget Pieschel is no exception. She first came to MUW as a student in the fall of 1975. After graduating summa cum laude, she remained at the W and earned a master’s degree in English. In 1980 she made another connection with the W when she married Steve Pieschel, a professor in the English department.
Although she preferred to teach at MUW, she didn’t think she would be fortunate enough to get a position at the same institution as her husband, so she sent applications to Mississippi State University and the University of Alabama, from which she earned her Ph.D.
Fortunately for Bridget and MUW and the hundreds of students she has taught and mentored in the past 26 years, she was contacted by Ralph Hitt, then Chair of the English Department and Head of the Humanities Division, who offered her a position teaching at the W. That’s when she came back to the W to stay.
During her tenure at MUW, Dr. Pieschel has made invaluable contributions to the institution, both as the co-author of the history of the W’s remarkable first 100 years (Loyal Daughters: One Hundred Years at Mississippi University for Women, 1884-1984) and as a visionary and innovator who has contributed significantly to the shaping of its future.
Dr. Piechel was instrumental in establishing the Welty Writer’s Symposium on campus and now serves as Director of this acclaimed program, bringing a distinguished group of writers to the campus year after year to present and discuss their work.
Students who wonder what kind of student Dr. Pieschel was would not be surprised to learn that she hung around Painter Hall and visited with her teachers and other English majors in her spare time. She was a member of two honorary societies and Mortar Board.
“Another thing I did in my spare time is I actually went to the library to read for pleasure -- I’m not making this up,” Dr. Pieschel said. Now for fun, she describes herself as a genealogy fanatic. “My idea of a great vacation is visiting old graveyards or reading old court house records.”
Through a grant from the United State Department of Education, Dr. Pieschel was able to open the Southern Women’s Institute on the MUW campus. The institute serves as a resource center equipped with archival quality digital recorders, computers, projectors, and a growing library to support research in Women’s Studies, an appropriate mission in light of the W’s traditional focus on the education of women.
Dr. Pieschel’s interest in the history of the W also led her to create the Oral History Project. Students working on the project have recorded and transcribed more than forty interviews with older alumnae. Dr. Piechel’s passion for MUW history and interest in “women’s stories” is evident in what she calls her dream.
“My dream is to have the funding to send students out of town for interviews because many of our older alumnae can no longer come to the campus for interviews. Time is precious. Every alumna whose life story has not been recorded is a terrible loss to history and to education.”
When asked what she foresees as the greatest challenges for the W in the future, Dr. Pieschel replied, “I believe that continuing to focus on our unique mission in our recruiting efforts is the way to keep our enrollment stable and growing. We have something special here, and we need to make sure people know about us!”
She is certainly right about that, and one of reasons it is such a special place is because faculty members like Dr. Bridget Pieschel have helped make it so.