The Washington Post - 22.08.2019

(Joyce) #1

B6 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.THURSDAY, AUGUST 22 , 2019


BY MATT SCHUDEL

Richard J. Ernst, who served
30 years as president of Northern
Virginia Community College,
building the two-year school into
Virginia’s largest institution of
higher education, died Aug. 15 at
a retirement facility in Spring-
field, Va. He was 86.
The cause was listed as acute
coronary syndrome, said a
daughter, Maribeth Ernst Luft-
glass.


Dr. Ernst joined Northern Vir-
ginia Community College (some-
times called NOVA) in 1968, four
years after it was founded. The
school had just opened the doors
of its first campus, in Annandale,
after being housed in an old
warehouse at Baileys Crossroads.
About 4,000 students were en-
rolled.
As the population of Northern
Virginia surged during the 1970s
and 1980s, the college grew with
it. By the time Dr. Ernst retired in
1998, NOVA had expanded to five
campuses, with a sixth in the
planning stages.


About 65,000 students were
enrolled in classes for academic
credit, making NOVA the second-
largest community college in the
country, after Miami Dade Col-
lege in Florida — a rank it still
holds.
“He’s taken [NOVA] from a
start-up college to the second-
largest community college in the
country,” Northern Virginia busi-
ness leader Edward H. Bersoff
said of Dr. Ernst in a 1998 Wash-
ington Post interview. “And he’s
certainly put this community on
the map with respect to the
whole community college move-
ment.”
Before the growth of two-year
community colleges, a college
education was traditionally seen
as a four-year commitment at a
residential campus, often requir-
ing considerable expense. Com-
munity colleges, or junior colleg-
es as many were once known,
were designed to offer education-
al opportunities to working
adults, recent immigrants and
people with modest incomes.
“We have a drop-in, drop-out,
drop-in, drop-out kind of pro-
gram,” Dr. Ernst told The Post in
1977.
NOVA offered a two-year asso-
ciate degree at campuses in An-
nandale, Alexandria, Sterling,
Manassas and Woodbridge. (A
medical education campus
opened in Springfield in 2003.)
With classes in standard aca-
demic subjects such as English
literature, history and math-
ematics, many students took
coursework that could be applied
toward a bachelor’s degree at
four-year institutions. Others
studied technical fields, includ-
ing auto repair, emergency medi-
cal training and heating and air

conditioning.
Older adults often enrolled in
noncredit courses, addressing
topics such as home-buying, dis-
co dancing and the rudiments of
hockey.
With much of NOVA’s funding
coming from state appropria-
tions, Dr. Ernst faced a continual
challenge each year from tight-
fisted legislators. In 1983, when
the Virginia legislature reduced
state spending on higher educa-
tion by 4.6 percent, NOVA’s budg-
et was cut by $3.7 million, forcing

Dr. Ernst to eliminate 34 full-
time and 12 part-time jobs at the
college.
“We have reached the level
where we cannot continue serv-
ing more and more people with
fewer resources,” he said at the
time. “At some point, something’s
got to give in terms of providing
adequate equipment and re-
sources.”
During robust economic
times, enrollment often fell as
would-be students found full-
time jobs. When the economy

contracted, NOVA and other
community colleges gained stu-
dents hoping to obtain more
marketable skills.
In 1985, during a booming
national economy, NOVA’s enroll-
ment dropped by 8 percent, caus-
ing Dr. Ernst to lay off 55 faculty
members.
“We did far better than some
California and Florida communi-
ty colleges who suffered greater
staff reductions than us,” he said
at the time. “Northern Virginia’s
enrollment is leveling out and I

am quite confident about our
future.”
Richard James Ernst was born
Feb. 3, 1933, in Niagara, Wis. His
father worked at a paper mill, his
mother was a homemaker.
Dr. Ernst was 16 when his
family moved to Largo, Fla.,
where he finished high school.
He graduated in 1956 from the
University of Florida, from which
he received a master’s degree in
education in 1959. He served in
the Army from 1956 to 1958.
He began his education career
as a high school mathematics
teacher and later served as an
instructor, administrator and
dean of academic affairs at St.
Petersburg Junior College in
Florida. He received a doctorate
in education from Florida State
University in 1965.
After becoming NOVA’s presi-
dent, Dr. Ernst lived near the
college’s Annandale campus for
many years. He was a member of
Providence Presbyterian Church
in Fairfax, Va.
His wife of 52 years, the former
Elizabeth “Betty” McGeachy, died
in 2012. Survivors include three
children, Maribeth Ernst Luft-
glass, an assistant superinten-
dent in the Fairfax County Public
Schools, of Fairfax County, Terrie
McClure of Manassas, Va., and
Richard James Ernst Jr. of Fred-
ericksburg, Va.; and eight grand-
children.
In retirement, Dr. Ernst was
active in the Senior Olympics,
winning many regional and na-
tional medals in track-and-field
and basketball. As president of
NOVA, Dr. Ernst often took part
in campus pickup games be-
cause, he said, “students love to
play against the president.”
[email protected]

RICHARD J. ERNST, 86


Led Northern Virginia Community College for 30 years


SHAWN THEW/THE WASHINGTON POST
Richard J. Ernst is shown in June 1998, shortly before he retired as president Northern Virginia
Community College. He joined the college in 1968, four years after it was founded, and led the two-year
institution through expansions to six campuses.

FROM NEWS SERVICES
AND STAFF REPORTS

Jack Whitaker, a television
sportscaster who covered the
first Super Bowl, Secretariat’s
Triple Crown victory in horse
racing, and who delivered poetic
essays on golf and other sports,
died Aug. 18 at his home in
Devon, Pa. He was 95.
CBS Sports announced his
death. No cause was disclosed.
Mr. Whitaker began his broad-
cast career in Pennsylvania and
later spent 22 years at CBS and
more than a decade at ABC.
During the 1960s, he anchored
CBS’s coverage of major golf tour-
naments and was the host of a
Sunday program called “CBS
Sports Spectacular,” which pre-
sented a variety of sporting
events.
A onetime play-by-play broad-
caster for the Philadelphia Eagles
and the New York Giants, Mr.
Whitaker covered the inaugural
Super Bowl game in 1967. He
announced many major horse
races, including Secretariat’s 31-
length victory at the Belmont
Stakes in 1973 to win the Triple
Crown.
Mr. Whitaker also covered
baseball and several Olympics,
but he was perhaps best known
for his nuanced broadcasts of golf


tournaments. He was especially
drawn to the British Open, which
he sometimes covered while
wearing a tweed jacket and cap.
He described the venerable tour-
nament, first contested in 1860,
as “golf at its most simple, its
most pure, its most magnificent.”
After covering the Masters
Tournament in 1966, Mr. Whitak-
er was removed as the play-by-

play announcer because he re-
ferred to the crowd around the
18th green as a “mob scene”
instead of the preferred term of
the tournament’s organizers at
the Augusta National Golf Club:
“patrons.”
“It was very crushing,” he told
Sports Broadcast Journal in 2018.
“I was heartened though by some
of the backlash and some nice
pieces by columnists in the news-
papers. Being around golf, you
learn quickly that you lose more
than you win. It teaches you to
take your knocks and move on to
the next shot.”
Mr. Whitaker worked for ABC
from 1982 until his retirement in
1993, often delivering ruminative
essays that touched on history
and the connection of sports to
the human spirit.
“I’d like to bring sports into the
thinking process,” he told Sports
Illustrated.
John Francis Whitaker was
born May 18, 1924, in Philadel-
phia. During World War II, he
was in an Army unit that went
ashore at Normandy three days
after D-Day. He was wounded in
battle twice.
After the war, he graduated
from St. Joseph’s University in
Philadelphia and worked at a
radio station in Pottsville, Pa. He
began his television career in

Philadelphia in the early 1950s,
covering sports and weather and
occasionally acting in station-
produced Westerns. He joined
the broadcast team of the NFL’s
Philadelphia Eagles in 1956.

Mr. Whitaker published a
memoir in 1998 and was induct-
ed into the Sports Broadcasting
Hall of Fame in 2012.
He was married three times,
including to tennis star Nancy

Chaffee, who died in 2002. Survi-
vors include his wife, Patricia
Whitaker; five children; 11 grand-
children; and 15 great-grandchil-
dren.
[email protected]

JACK WHITAKER, 95


MARTY LEDERHANDLER/CBS/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Clockwise from top left, Jimmy Snyder, Mr. Whitaker, Brent Musburger, Jayne Kennedy and Irv Cross
in an undated photo from CBS’s “NFL Today.” Although Mr. Whitaker covered a variety of sports, he
was perhaps best known for his nuanced broadcasts of golf tournaments.

Sportscaster covered first Super Bowl


BY IAN LIVINGSTON

Wednesday marked the 50th
day this year to reach 90 degrees
or higher in Washington, which is
14 days more than the annual
average of 36 days.
Hitting this mark pushes the
city on the list of elite years for 90-
degree days in recorded history.
While it is true summer is waning,
there are probably at least a
handful more hot days to come.
For some quick perspective, to
date there are only three years
with more 90-degree days over
the 148 years records have been
kept in Washington. As recently
as 2010, there were 54 such days
at this point in the summer.
If 90-degree day No. 50 is our
last — and I’d wager it’s not —
then it would tie for 19th most on
record.
All but two of the 19 years that
reached 50 90-degree days failed
to get to 60 days. Reaching
60 days would be enough for
third most on record, with several
years tallying 59. For now, based
on long-range forecasts, 60 seems


as though it would be difficult to
reach, if not impossible.
The years 2010 and 1980
posted the most 90-degree days
on record, both tallying 67. While
we are still ahead of the pace of
1980 this year, that summer was
known for its exceptional runs of
late-season heat.
We piled up most of our 90-
degree days this year when you
would expect — during what are
historically the hottest weeks of
the summer. From June 26 to
present, we logged 40 90-degree
days, only two behind 1988, which
posted the most such days during
this stretch.
Many of our 90-degree days
this summer were hot but not
exceptionally hot, only hitting the
lower end of the 90s. But the
string of days topping 95 degrees
this past Sunday through Tuesday
has pushed the city’s count of
days hitting at least 95 degrees to


  1. That is right around the
    current average of 12 95-degree
    days per year.
    Once we get past Thursday of
    this week, there appear to be few


to no 90s on the near horizon.
However, given how persistently
high pressure over the Atlantic
has blocked cool downs this
summer, it is too soon to say we’re
done with 90s. Early September
could bring another run.
The District averages about six
more 90-degree days through the
end of the season. Odds are quickly
falling for them on any given day,
with only three on average in
September. But in 1980 there were
still 14 90-degree days on the way,
which is the most on record for the
stretch that remains.
Washington’s average final
date of 90 or greater comes
around Sept. 11. In the 2000s,
there have been four years that
delivered a final 90 or higher in
October. The latest one on record
came when it reached 90 on
Oct. 11 in 1919.
[email protected]

CAPITAL WEATHER GANG


Washington has now hit 90 degrees or higher 50 times this year, a rare milestone


FREDERICK M. BROWN/ASSOCIATED PRESS
TV sports broadcaster Jack
Whitaker in 1964. He spent
22 years at CBS and more than
a decade at ABC.

obituaries


“He’s taken [NOVA]


from a start-up college


to the second-largest


community college in


the country.”
Edward H. Bersoff, a Northern
Virginia business leader, speaking of
Dr. Richard J. Ernst at the time of his
retirement in 1998. NOVA retains that
rank today.


ALEX WROBLEWSKI/GETTY IMAGES

People cool off at the fountain
of the National World War II
Memorial during a heat wave
July 20 in Washington.
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