Biography
Dana Larkin Sauers came to the Mount after her retirement from secondary education in 2010.
As an adjunct, she served as a Freshmen Seminar faculty member. The following year she began teaching Writing Intensive courses for Communications and Sociology departments. In 2014 she became the Associate Director of The Institute for Leadership and a teaching fellow. In 2015 she became the Interim Director and was promoted to Director of The Institute for Leadership Ethics, Achievement and Development in 2016.
Education
Master of Science, Western Maryland College, 1995
Instructional II, Pennsylvania Department of Education, 1995
Bachelor of Arts, English, York College of Pennsylvania, 1978
Honors & Awards
- Young Educator of the Year (1991-92)
- Apple Teacher of the Year (1995)
- Outstanding Educator ITI (2000)
- Middle States Commission on Secondary Schools Recognition (2004)
- Poet Laureate, Hanover, PA (2005-07)
- U.S. Armed Service Recognition for "Iraqi Freedom" (2008)
- Founder and facilitator of First Friday "Welcome to My Living Room," Ragged Edge, Gettysburg (2005-12)
- Included in the historical archive, Faithful Women of Leadership in Adams County (2009)
- Director South Central PA, NEA, Poetry OutLoud (2012-14)
- The National Society of Leadership and Success Excellence in Service to Students Award (2017)
- Camino Compostella (2017)
- Spiritual Mentor (2019)
Areas of Study
Education, English, Poetry, Communications, Leadership, Wellness.
Publications
- Between the Space of Grace and Gray (2006)
- My Letter to the World (2010)
- Pura Vida (2013)
- If These Stones Could Speak (2014)
Additional Information
Dana Larkin Sauers was born in Moses Lake, Washington. The child of an Air Force Commander, she toured the world in her youth. When her father retired in 1969 her family returned to Pennsylvania, her mother’s origin.
She graduated from Delone CHS in 1974, received her bachelor of arts degree in English and secondary education certification from York College of Pennsylvania in 1978, achieving faculty bestowed honors and belonging to Pi Delta Epsilon honorary fraternity. During her undergraduate experience she was the student liaison to the president, editor of her college newspaper and literary magazine.
Dana graduated summa cum laude from her master’s degree program in curriculum from Western Maryland College in 1995.
Employed at Delone CHS for 32 years and acting as department chair of English for 22 years, she has also worked in Gettysburg and York Colleges through the LIU as a drama instructor, offsite supervisor and adjunct professor of Alvernia College. She received the Young Educator of the Year Award in 1991 and numerous other Teacher of the Year recognitions. Dana initiated major curriculum advances such as implementing advanced placement, the dual credit program and reading and research programs. Certified through Student Assistance Program, she assisted in writing the first drug and alcohol policy for her school. She was an educational provider for all new teachers of the Harrisburg Diocese, acted as a cooperating teacher to assist new teachers in certification, successfully administrated three Middle States accrediting processes and acted as an away team evaluator to other schools in the East coast area.
As a lecturer she has spoken at national, state and local educational and writing conferences and community events.
She was recognized as a United States of America Flag Recipient flown over headquarters of the Multi-National Corps Iraq in honor of troop support during Operation Iraqi Freedom, 2008. She was bestowed ITI faculty recognition in 2009. Included in the historical archive, Faithful Women of Leadership in Adams County, 2009, Dana has been an ardent leader in her community throughout her life. She worked as an entrepreneur in technical writing through businesses such as Northrop Grumman Corporation, Litton Advanced Systems. Dana was also named the Hanover Poet Laureate by the Hanover Borough Council in 2005-2007 and facilitated numerous community educational functions such as working with adjudicated youth through Children and Youth Services, Boy Scouts, York county libraries and YWCA Safe House for abused women and children.
Throughout the entirety of her tenure she was a weekly columnist for the Hanover Evening Sun and instituted and facilitated a first Friday poetry event at the Ragged Edge Coffee Shop in Gettysburg. She served as the Poetry Out Loud regional manager for four Pennsylvania counties. She has published four books, is noted in sundry poetry journals and is currently working on two books including a spiritual autobiography.
She is an active member of Sacred Heart Basilica and functions as a lector. Dana was one of the first youth Eucharistic ministers in the Harrisburg Diocese and assisted in leading Koinonia retreats and editing religious publications.
She is married to her husband Kent, and they reside in Hanover, PA. They are the parents of four adult children and six grandchildren.
Media Expertise:
Leadership, poetry, communications, Cathoic identity
