David Wasson

Winter 2016

Power to the patient

The health care system has long been focused on finding ways to improve patient care.

But to pharmacist Josh Neumiller and other members of an interdisciplinary research team at Washington State University Spokane, too often something was missing.

Patient perspectives.

“We flipped that around,” explains Neumiller, an associate professor at WSU’s College of Pharmacy who studies medication lapses and other adverse conditions among those who take multiple prescription drugs. “There’s been this realization…that the people these improvements were supposed to be for weren’t being included in the decision-making process.”

Neumiller, along with researchers from the WSU College of Nursing and Providence Health … » More …

Winter 2016

Wagyu

Seattle chef Thomas Dodd’s customers demand the best, so the only steak on the menu is marbled, tender, and flavorful American wagyu.

He sees orders climb each week for the breed developed largely from Washington State University research to help Northwest ranchers compete with Japan’s famed Kobe beef and other specialty brands.

“When people were tasting it for the first time, they were kind of freaking out over how flavorful it is, saying things like it’s the best steak they’d ever had,” says Dodd, executive chef at Liam’s. “Now we’re starting to see this expectation because people know … or have heard about American wagyu.”

… » More …

Winter 2016

Call it the Urban Extension

The massive Oso landslide killed 43 people, caused extensive flooding, and destroyed a key highway north of Everett in 2014, pushing the communities of Arlington and Darrington to their breaking point.

For months, grieving residents and community leaders remained so immersed in the search and recovery demands that nearly everything else had to be put on hold. That’s why, when they were invited to participate in a national competition that could funnel up to $3 million or more toward desperately needed economic revitalization efforts, Arlington Mayor Barb Tolbert was practically on the verge of tears, again.

“It was this rare opportunity but we had no … » More …

Fall 2016

Cougs behind the Seahawks

Nearly two weeks before the Seattle Seahawks won Super Bowl XLVIII, Cindy Kelley was arriving in New York to set up a temporary team headquarters that would become like a cross between a satellite office and a MASH unit.

Kelley ’81 and the rest of the advance crew scrambled to keep up with a schedule measured in hours, not days. Telephones, computers, office space, accommodations, meals, air and ground transportation, special events, family activities—all needing to be arranged immediately.

“The whole goal is to make sure there are no distractions for the players and coaches,” says Kelley, vice president for human resources for the » More …

Fall 2016

Preserving the story of America

Fort Hunt was built during the Spanish-American War on a portion of George Washington’s Mount Vernon estate to help bolster the Potomac River’s coastal defenses.

It later served as a staging point for the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Great Depression, hosted an ROTC unit for African American soldiers during segregation, and now is managed by the National Park Service.

But until historians began digging, a clandestine piece of the 136-acre site’s military service was so tightly hidden away, it was at risk of being lost forever.

“This started coming together during a tour when someone raised their hand and mentioned their neighbor used … » More …

Fall 2016

Staying a jump ahead

Long before he was elected to the New Zealand Parliament, served as immigration minister, and held other national cabinet positions, Tuariki “John” Delamere ’74 was a long jumper with an attention-grabbing technique.

Delamere, a fixture on Washington State’s track team in the early 1970s, didn’t invent The Flip. But he so excelled at the leaping mid-air forward somersault it sometimes seemed as if he had.

His style was so gravity-defyingly smooth that when Sports Illustrated wanted to learn more about The Flip, and the debate that would eventually lead to the technique’s prohibition, the magazine sent a crew to the 1974 national qualifiers to … » More …

Summer 2016

Pete Rademacher

Long before the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team’s Miracle on Ice, there was Pete Rademacher ’53.

The tenacious 6-foot-1 boxing heavyweight stunned the world during the 1956 summer games with his one-round knockout of previously undefeated Soviet champion Lev Moukhine for the gold medal.

The decisive, triple-knockdown bout in Melbourne, Australia transformed Rademacher into a Cold War hero and international inspiration. Hungarian athletes, still reeling from the Soviet invasion of Budapest just a few weeks earlier, joined the U.S. team in hoisting Rademacher onto their shoulders in celebration.

“It was very emotional,” recalls Rademacher, 87, now a retired business executive living in Ohio and the … » More …

Summer 2016

The Pharmacist will see you now.

Shelves full of informational brochures, health aids, and other over-the-counter remedies. Pharmacists filling and checking prescriptions, tending to paperwork, and meeting with customers.

Tucked into a portion of a busy Fred Meyer retail store, it looks like a typical community pharmacy.

Except there’s a difference. A big one that could help transform how and where many routine health care services are delivered.

Located in the Vancouver suburb of Mill Plain, it’s among the first wave of enhanced pharmacies where customers not only can fill prescriptions but receive direct medical care for a range of common ailments that would otherwise require a trip to a doctor’s … » More …

Summer 2016

More than God Demands

Politics & Influence of Christian Missions in Northwest Alaska 1897–1918

Anthony Urvina ’85 with Sally Urvina

University of Alaska Press: 2016

Tucked away in cabinets and forgotten closets at the Alaska regional offices of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Juneau was a collection of old documents known simply as the Reindeer Files.

Anthony Urvina ’85, a natural resource manager at the BIA, began digging through them in 2003 while trying to … » More …

Summer 2016

Kim Reykdal ’94

High school counselor Kim Reykdal ’94 doesn’t wait around for students to make appointments. She searches them out.

Whether it’s scholarship applications, information about opportunities with the U.S. military, or the latest on specialty or technical colleges, Reykdal is known to work the lunchroom, if necessary, to get students setting goals for life after high school.

That commitment to student achievement earned Reykdal a trip to Washington, D.C. in January as one of four 2016 national Counselor of the Year finalists, where first lady Michelle Obama praised her efforts in a White House ceremony. The recipients also met with lawmakers and attended a congressional … » More …