Dear Colleagues,

I am sending sad news of the passing of three members of our UWM community, shared with me by colleagues in the College of Letters and Science and the College of Nursing.

Gerald “Jerry” James Alred
Dr. Gerald “Jerry” Alred, Professor Emeritus in the Department of English, within the College of Letters and Science, passed away on June 1, 2021. Jerry completed his undergraduate and graduate work at the University of Dayton and Miami University of Ohio. He taught at UW-Milwaukee for thirty-five years. During his time at UWM, Jerry advised many graduate students, directed several doctoral dissertations, and reached the rank of full professor in the Department of English. He was a teaching award recipient and retired from UWM as an emeritus professor. He was internationally known as an author of numerous scholarly articles, several standard bibliographies, and many editions of the leading handbooks on business and technical writing used in colleges throughout the United States and abroad.

Jerry was Associate Editor of the Journal of Business Communications and a long-time member of several professional societies. He was invited several times as a guest professor at Justus Liebig University in Giessen, Germany. He co-founded an institutional partnership between the University of Applied Sciences and Arts at Hannover, Germany, and UW-Milwaukee.

For additional information, including details about July 31 services, please see Jerry’s obituary online. Jerry had a lasting impact on many students and will be missed by friends and colleagues.

Geraldine L. Dickson
Dr. Geraldine “Geri” Dickson, a former faculty member in UWM’s College of Nursing, passed away on April 26, 2021. Geri earned degrees from Milwaukee Area Technical College; Alverno College; Marquette University; and she received her PhD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Geri joined UW-Milwaukee’s College of Nursing in 1982 and taught in the College into the early 1990’s. One of her colleagues shared that Geri was well received by students and her colleagues, because of her knowledge and teaching style.

Following her time at UWM, Geri moved out East and taught at New York University (NYU) and Rutgers University. Her contributions to the field of nursing research and education were many, including founding, leading and permanently funding the New Jersey Collaborating Center for Nursing (NJCCN) at Rutgers University in 1995.

For additional information, including details about June 11 services, please see Geri’s obituary online.

Raymond Lincoln Weiss
Dr. Raymond Weiss, Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy, within the College of Letters and Science, passed away recently. Ray received a BA from the University of Cincinnati. He studied at the Hebrew University in Israel and earned an MHL (Master of Hebrew Letters) from the Hebrew Union College. He served in the active rabbinate from 1956-1962 and following that, he received a PhD from the University of Chicago.

Ray taught in the Philosophy Department at UW-Milwaukee for over three decades, beginning in 1965. He retired from UWM in 1996 as an emeritus professor. Ray is the author of the book, Maimonides’ Ethics: The Encounter of Philosophic and Religious Morality (1991), and co-editor, with Charles Butterworth, of the Ethical Writings of Maimonides (1975).

For additional information, please see Ray’s obituary online. Funeral services were held in late May.

Our condolences to Jerry’s, Geri’s, and Ray’s families and to the many others whose lives they touched.

Take care,

Johannes

Johannes Britz
Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs