Dr. Tyler Strickland is a piano-playing, would-be percussionist from Birmingham who longed to bang drums in his school band, learned instead to play saxophone, married Auburn University’s first female drum major, directed high school bands in two states and spent the last three years as a graduate assistant with the University of Iowa bands.
Amid Sumter County’s stultifying August humidity and the sight of University of West Alabama freshmen moving into Gilbert Hall dorms, Dr. Melissa Haab’s vision of students re-engaging with campus life is coming into view.
In the Army National Guard, Breonsya White is an aviation operations specialist preparing for her first overseas deployment. At the University of West Alabama, she is a junior majoring in math education with aspirations of becoming a principal or professor.
The upcoming 2022 Spring Faculty Colloquium at the University of West Alabama will focus on a vital theme: how faculty, administration and staff can better serve the student population in Livingston.
Ilia Dehodiuk never stops checking his phone. Never. “Literally every minute,” he says. He checks it each morning. While walking to class. Before practice. After practice. Before bed. Next day, same thing. He has to check. He must.
For two years, University Cinema in downtown Livingston existed not as a movie theater, but as a time capsule for life immediately before the Covid-19 pandemic shuddered most of the world.
