26
COM Outlook . Fall 2013
college. I said, ‘Well, if I can ever help
you in any way, just let me know.’”
Dr. Levy wisely took Dr. Rokusek
up on her offer, which resulted in
her working several days a month
at NSU-COM as a grants consultant
from 2003 through 2005. But by this
time, Dr. Rokusek realized she was
ready for yet another life change
when her parents died in 2004 at the
ages of 96 and 90 within nine days of
each other, making her recognize she
needed to return to the Midwest to
be closer to her extended family and
aging aunts and uncles. This deci-
sion resulted in her leaving Florida to
become dean of Winona State Univer-
sity’s College of Education in Winona,
Minnesota, in July 2005.
Nevertheless, her deep connec-
tions to a man named Bob Petrik and
a college called NSU-COM were soon
to entice her back to South Florida
for good. Amazingly, the two major
grant proposals she had worked on
with Dr. Levy had come to fruition,
resulting in over $5 million in fund-
ing from the Health Resources and
Services Administration to establish a
center for all-hazards education and
develop a curriculum focusing on
all-hazards preparedness for health
professions’ students.
“I had not been at Winona that
long when I received a message—
which I still have saved on my
phone—from Dr. Anthony J. Silvagni
that said, ‘You’re not going to believe
what I have to tell you, call me.’ When
I called him back, the first thing he
said was, ‘Are you sitting down?’ she
recalled. “I told him yes, so he pro-
ceeded to tell me the good news and
ask if I would be willing to come to
NSU-COM full-time to develop the
new center and its curriculum.”
Dr. Rokusek, who was enjoying
her life in Minnesota immensely, was
now being courted on two fronts
thanks to the heightened contact
from Petrik, who was still living in
South Florida. “Bob was calling me
every night, but I didn’t give it much
thought because although we had
developed a nice relationship and
gone on several trips together, I knew
he was a confirmed bachelor,” she
explained. “But one night he said,
‘I have been thinking about it, and I
want you to come and spend the rest
of your life with me in Florida.’ After
hearing that, how could I resist? I re-
alized at that moment he was my true
soul mate and the love of my life.”
Enhancing NSU-COM’s Esteem
Since becoming a full-time NSU-
COM faculty member and administra-
tor in September 2006, Dr. Rokusek
has played a key role in establishing,
refining, and redirecting new pro-
grams, centers, and institutes that
have played a key role in burnishing
NSU-COM’s esteem on local, state,
national, and global levels. This fact
also is reflected in the various job titles
she currently holds, which range from
executive director of the college’s
Florida Coastal Geriatric Resources,
Education, and Training Center
(GREAT GEC) to project manager of
the Institute for Disaster and Emer-
gency Preparedness (IDEP) and direc-
tor of the Center for Interprofessional
Education and Practice.
One of her most significant contri-
butions was assisting in the establish-
ment of the Center for Bioterrorism
and All-Hazards Preparedness, which
was renamed the Institute for Disaster
and Emergency Preparedness several
years ago to better reflect what the in-
stitute does and the nature of the field.
In its current incarnation, the multi-
faceted IDEP serves as a regional and
national resource center focused on
interdisciplinary training, information
dissemination, and technical assis-
tance related to all-hazards prepared-
ness in a global society.
Another pet project was the cre-
ation of the college’s Geriatric Educa-
tion Center, known as the GREAT
GEC, in September 2007, which is
one of 43 federally funded centers
located throughout the United States.
Currently, the center provides health
professions’ educators, students, and
community practitioners with numer-
ous opportunities to learn more about
providing interprofessional health
care to older adults and their families.
In fact, all GREAT GEC activities are
designed to enhance the ability of
health care professionals to deliver
interprofessional geriatric and cultur-
ally appropriate care in a variety of
community-based environments. In
2010, the GREAT GEC aligned with
the Lifelong Learning Institute that
Dr. Rokusek oversees working closely
with its director, Linda Maurice.
A similar success story that oc-
curred thanks to Dr. Rokusek’s careful
ministration was the creation of the
college’s Master of Science in Disas-
ter and Emergency Preparedness 36
credit-hour degree program, which
came to fruition in 2012. The program,
