I wrote to IUP...

[better tomorrow]

asking them more about Vicki Iseman...

Here is their email, why don't YOU write, too. (snicker, snicker)

[e-mail]

[Divernan]

1. Here's the IUP alumni article about her amazingly quick RIDE to the top.

http://old.www.iup.edu/publications/iupmag/backissues/Fall02/iseman.shtm


With no experience she gets hired as a receptionist and within a couple of months' she approaches the head of the whole firm, who promotes her (no relevant degree in business, government, etc.) and makes her his "special assistant". Next thing you know she' s senior partner. She has a killer body and seems to have a way with older men. The article includes a charming snap of her and W with their arms around each other.


"From her office windows, Vicki Iseman ’90 has a great view of Washington, D.C. The Indiana native is one of the youngest people in the lobbying firm of Alcalde and Fay and one of its most senior partners.

Two weeks after graduating from IUP with a degree in elementary education, Iseman joined a friend in Washington and was hired as a receptionist. With only a few months’ experience on the job, she said she “walked into my boss’s office and said, ‘You don’t really know me, but I answer the phones. I’m a college graduate and I’d like you to consider me for a secretarial or an administrative position.’” He agreed to try her out for three months. Within a year she became his special assistant.

Alcalde and Fay represents clients from cruise lines and universities to airports and broadcasters. With no background in politics or telecommunications, Iseman realized she needed to know as much as possible to survive her new job. She spent most of her waking hours learning the business, and it paid off handsomely. Eight years later she became the youngest partner ever in the firm, counting among her clients PAXtv, Religious Voices in Broadcasting, Telemundo, the Hispanic Broadcasting Corporation, and Computer Sciences Corporation. In addition, she has met Melanie Griffith, Britney Spears, Bo Derek, and former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

Iseman said that the most important aspect of her job is the effect that one person can have on legislation in small communities and educational institutions. “Where my heart lies is in education,” she said. “I believe it is the great equalizer.”

[DavidDvorkin]

2. After a few months on the job, she walked into her boss's office and ...

Up to there, her version is probably true.

[Lint Head]

3. she walked into her boss's office ...and there was a nice

comfy couch. :dem:

[better tomorrow]

4. she walked into...

that corporate jet and there was a nice comfy couch.

[angrycarpenter]

5. I don't trust people who climb that fast.

Positions like that cannot be gained that quickly on just merit and hard work. A skillful manipulator however can do wonders, especially when they don't mind breaking the rules.

I am accusing her of nothing. I really don't care much about this weeks gossip. The media will chew her up and then go on to the next spectacle.

I don't think that this should be an issue. Of course the real issues have been ignored without fail for a bunch of he said she said bullcrap.

[The Gunslinger]

6. Whats the story with her??

I'm curious because I'm an IUP graduate.

[Berry Cool]

7. I don't know what IUP's undergrad education program is like

but it's my understanding that the average undergrad "education" degree is worth shit. The students spend four years learning pedagogy, and they come away having learned absolutely nothing about the actual subject they're supposed to teach. So they know all about the latest fads in teaching math, but they can't do math; all about trends in teaching history, but they know no actual history; etc. In short, you don't have to be the sharpest knife in the drawer to get an education degree from most colleges. (With apologies, of course, to all those who WERE sharp knives, and got undergrad education degrees, and went on from there to become great teachers. If that is you, I salute you.)

Some universities won't even offer undergraduate teaching degrees, and some states won't certify and schools won't hire teachers who don't possess an undergrad degree in the subject they intend to teach, rather than a bachelor's in education. The new standard is becoming a master's in education accompanied by a bachelor's in the primary subject matter to be taught (even at elementary grades).

This woman bears all the earmarks of an ambitious young lady who didn't have a lot upstairs, and soon learned that with her looks, she could get further faster on her back than any other way. "The boss's special assistant" indeed. I bet her coworkers just LOVED seeing THAT promotion that fast. Yeah, she "learned the business" during her "waking hours," all right.

"Where my heart lies is in education." There's a sentence that speaks for itself. Notice she fails to back up that statement with a career in teaching. Nah...something else entirely proved to be "the great equalizer" for her.