Administrator profile: Deb Detzel

ELI is always pleased to have summer faculty return to teach another year. One dynamo in particular has found a way to lengthen her stay indefinitely. Deb Detzel, who first taught at ELI in the summer of 2001, became the Institute's new assistant director in 2005.

	Deb Detzel

Deb has a lifelong interest in foreign languages and peoples from around the world. Raised in a religious family, she grew up aware of the needs of others, especially the poor. In high school, she studied Spanish, French and German. After undergraduate work in linguistics, she lived in Indonesia, where she became fluent in Indonesian and Ambonese, created the first dictionary in Lio Hua Ulu, a previously unwritten language, and developed literacy materials.

Upon returning to the United States, she received a scholarship from Penn State University to study computer science. At Penn State, she began informally tutoring non-native speaker classmates in English, which led to a position as ESL tutor.

After Deb's first summer teaching at ELI, she wanted to return to Newark.

“I was thrilled to meet so many wonderful colleagues here,” Deb said.

The following year she also coordinated the Institute's program for 67 students from the Hankuk University for Foreign Studies. Each time Deb taught at ELI during the summer, she would return to her year-round job at Penn State University and a part-time job where she worked with a very different population—inmates in an immigration prison awaiting trial. In that setting Deb was the sole ESL instructor, and she missed the collegiality she found in Delaware.

In 2003, Deb decided to continue working at ELI after the summer session. Since then she has enjoyed teaching a variety of levels and electives throughout the year. She has also led teacher-training workshops, shepherded special groups and traveled to Jordan and Chile to recruit students and train teachers.

Deb's proven versatility and enthusiasm led to her appointment as assistant director in April. Her background in computer science is helping her update the database and revamp administrative procedures.

“I am lucky to find a way to work in the field I love,” she said.