Sue F. Bair Endowed Scholarship

Mrs. Sue Bair retired in 1999 from the Department of Kinesiology and Sports Studies (KSS), where she taught for 33 years. She profoundly affected the lives of hundreds of students, staff and faculty while educating students interested in becoming Physical Education (PE) teachers.

Sue received her BA/MA in 1961/67, both from WSU. Her teaching career began in 1961at Roosevelt in Wichita as a PE teacher for four years. This experience proved invaluable to her during the remainder of her career at WSU where she prepared students to become teachers. She became a faculty member in the fall of 1966 after a year as a graduate assistant. She became the supervisor of the women student teachers in 1968 and later, the men and women student teachers until her retirement.

She had the unique ability to motivate students to believe in themselves. She believed that educators were at WSU for the students and debated that point many times while a member of the Faculty Senate. As such, her philosophy was always to help the students as much as possible by imparting her knowledge to them to enable their success at WSU and later in their careers.

During her career, she was the recipient of many teaching awards including the prestigious Board of Regents Excellence in Teaching award. She coached Women’s Softball from 1971-1976. She remains today, a strong advocate for Women’s Athletics. After retiring, she was elected by her WSU peers to membership in the Academy for Effective Teaching and Research where she applies her passion for recognizing excellence in teaching.

This scholarship was established by the KSS Department upon Mrs. Bair’s retirement, to honor her commitment to excellence in teaching.