After graduating from SLS, I completed college and most of a novitiate year in the Maryknoll seminary system before deciding to leave. I subsequently got drafted and spent time in Vietnam as a conscientious objector Army medical corpsman. Upon returning to the U.S., I did graduate studies at the University of Chicago for the first half of the 1970s, earning a Ph.D. in clinical psychology with specialization in gerontology and geriatrics. During that time, I also married Roberta Staat, who was embarking on a career as a fine arts teacher and oil painter.
After grad school, we moved to Houston, Texas, where I did a postdoctoral fellowship and then worked for the next decade in the geriatric mental health field, mostly doing clinical research and helping run training programs in geriatric psychiatry and psychology – first at research center that was part of the state mental health system and later on the faculty in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Texas Medical School-Houston. During those years, I obtained various federal grants and served on grant review committees. I did research on topics like the impact of depression on memory in older adults, and the family dynamics surrounding care for older adults with dementia. Bobbie and I gave birth to two daughters, who are now in their early 30’s.
In 1987, I was recruited to the National Institute of Mental Health and we moved to the DC area, where I have been working ever since. I have held a number of administrative positions within NIMH, mostly helping run grants programs that support research projects and training of researchers around the country. Much, but not all, of the research which I have helped to promote and have overseen has consisted of clinical trials and other studies of treatment for mental disorders of later life. In my early years at NIMH, I was heavily involved in activities related to Alzheimer’s disease; subsequently this has changed to a focus on other mental health issues. I spend a good deal of time assisting investigators in developing their research plans and grant applications, and to some degree helping with the training of junior investigators. I currently foresee continuing in this line of work for a few more years.
As one of my outside interests, for many years, I devoted quite a bit of effort also to doing volunteer work and serving on the Board of Director for a local nonprofit organization called Beacon House, which operates as a multifaceted community center with various educational and recreational programs for inner-city youth in a particular neighborhood of northeast Washington, DC (see www.beaconhousedc.org).
After many years of mainly holding college and high school teaching positions, my wife Bobbie currently is focusing on pursuing her own artwork. You can see some examples at www.staatworks.com. Our older daughter Alison and her husband both have jobs at American University in Washington, DC and live pretty close to us in Maryland, which is nice because it allows us to see a lot of the two fine grandsons they have given us in recent years – Bence (almost 3) and Akos (1). For the past several years, our younger daughter Kate has been living in Utah and Colorado and finding seasonal work in the area of alternative/environmental education, serving as a field guide for river and backcountry trips, etc. This summer, she is hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada, partly as a fundraising project to benefit several nonprofit organizations. You can see more about this at www.hikingtogetkidsoutside.org.
Though my parents are no longer living, my 5 sisters all remain in good health. My older sister lives in Oregon, while the 4 younger ones still reside in Wisconsin (1 Madison, 2 in Milwaukee area, 1 Fond du Lac).
In terms of SLS classmates, though we have rarely had occasion to meet, over the years I have been in touch occasionally with my SLS “homies” from Fond du Lac (Pat Ahern, Dan Youra, Claude Kennedy), and with several others (Ken Rolling, Joe Kolb until his death 4 years ago).
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