Cassara, Beverly Benner

Beverly Benner Cassara is an American professor of adult education, with a particular focus on participatory research, international/multicultural education, and women's education,

Beverly Cassara was born in Hanover, MA, daughter of the Reverend Guy Percy Benner and Julia Caroline Whitney Benner. She received her B.A. from Colby College in 1947 and her first job after graduation was as a news editor and broadcaster for WBET in Brockton, Massachusetts. Soon after this she married Ernest Cassara (1949) and taught in the Massachusetts schools for several years while working on her Master's degree which she received from Bridgewater State University in 1954. She and Ernest had three children: Catherine (??), Nicholas (1957), and Shirley (1962).

In 1962 Cassara was a Visiting Scholar at Cambridge University and in 1963-1964 she and her family spent a year in Churwalden, Switzerland where she was the Director of Personnel and student counselor at the Albert Schweitzer College. Returning to the United States, she worked for four years (1966-1970) as the Director of Adult Education at Goddard College, a small liberal arts college with a highly individualized approach to instruction. She continued to take graduate courses while working, and in 1970 received her Ed.D. from Boston University; one of her professors was Malcolm Knowles, with whom she became good friends.

For the next twenty years (1970-1990), Cassara's primary position was Professor of Adult Education at Federal City College (FCC) in Washington, D.C. and then at the University of the District of Columbia, created by FCC's merger with two other institutions. During these years, in addition to her regular work at FCC and later UDC, she served as Acting Director of the Institute for Continuing Education for Women (1972-1976) and as Dean of Graduate Studies (1973-1985), produced several television programs for the local NBC affiliate (1979), and taught at several other institutions including Northern Virginia Comunity College (1971-1972), Fairfax County Adult Education Program (1971), and Virginia Polytechnic (1974-1979).

In 1974 she was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship and as a result the Casssaras spent much of 1975-1976 in Berlin, Germany where Ernest guest lectured in American History while Beverly lectured at the Pädagogische Hochschule Berlin and undertook an extensive research project into women in adult education in Germany. She put serious effort into becoming fluent in German; many of her lectures were delivered in German and she maintained close professional relationships with several educators whom she met in Berlin including Helge Pross, Gerd Doerry, and Helmuth Dolff. In 1982 she returned to Germany to give a series of lectures under the auspices of the Forschungsinstitut für Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften (FIGS) at the Universität Gesamthochschule Siegen.

Cassara was also interested in adult education in third-world countries, particularly Africa. The University of the District of Columbia maintained a collegial relationship with the University of Nairobi, including doctoral student sponsoring and faculty exchange, and Cassara visited Kenya more than once and worked closely with several visiting faculty and doctoral students.

One of Cassara's projects in Washington, D.C. involved work with low-income women, and she encouraged her adult education students to become involved as part of their coursework. She directed adult education students who worked in the Jubilee Housing Project as well as a similar project at the Montana Terrace Housing Project (which resulted in a number of articles and papers). One of her students, Eve Tetaz, went on to found Life Pathways, Inc., a literacy and educational assistance organization in the D.C. area.

After retiring from UDC, she worked as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Southern Maine (1990-1995) and then founded the Cambridge Senior Volunteer Clearinghouse in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The CSVC matches seniors and other persons interested in volunteering with agencies in Cambridge and nearby communities that can utilize their skills and talents.

Ms. Cassara received a number of awards and recognitions over her career from organizations with whom or for whom she worked, including the Vermont Council for the Social Sciences (1968), the District of Columbia Public Schools (1976), and the Adult Education Association of the USA (1978). In 1978 she was named a "Woman of Achievement" by WETA in Washington, DC (the audiotape of her interview on this occasion is in the collection) and was inducted into the International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame in 2003.

From the guide to the Beverly Cassara Papers, 1943-1999, (Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries)