Jessie A. Lewis Reading Endowed Scholarship

The Jessie A. Lewis Reading Scholarship Endowment was established in 1981 by Jack S. Staggs in memory of Jessie A. Lewis, a member of the SHSU Faculty from 1966 to 1974. Jessie Lewis received her formal education in the public schools of North Dakota and Minot State Teachers College prior to moving to Texas. She earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Texas A & I University and did post-graduate work at North Texas State University, Texas A & M and The University of Texas. Her professional career spanned 47 years holding positions as a teacher, principal, superintendent, reading consultant for schools in North Dakota and Texas, and finally as a university professor. She taught in several Texas school districts but her specialty was reading. She served as a reading consultant in 75 school systems and conducted many training programs for teachers. She joined the faculty at Sam Houston State University in January 1966 as a reading professor and ended her long and distinguished career when she retired in 1974. Her contribution to the reading programs in North Dakota and Texas was significant. Classroom teachers often stated that she was the “expert” in reading. With his efforts and contributions, Dr. Staggs has helped create the Valine Hobbs Elementary Education Scholarship, and the Mozelle Powell Spanish Endowed Scholarship. When the Educational Leadership and Counseling doctoral program began, he established the Jack Staggs Educational Leadership and Counseling Dissertation Award. Since then, he has amended that award to be given to students whose dissertation is in Educational Leadership and also established the Jack Staggs Counseling Dissertation Award. Dr. Staggs funded state-of-the-art audio-visual equipment for the counseling doctoral program. The clinic was named Jack Staggs Counseling Clinic.