Rodin, Ware welcome new house deans

With the start of the new school year, Penn welcomes not only incoming freshmen but also new faculty and staff.

Among the new faces are Rodin and Ware College Houses’ new deans: Ryan Keytack and Utsav Schurmans.

The new Rodin dean is Ryan Keytack, a Johnstown, Pa. native with a master’s degree in theater. Not only new to Rodin but also to Penn, Keytack said he is “looking forward to working with this particular staff and building a strong upper-class community in Rodin.”

Having worked with students prior to his arrival in Philadelphia, Keytack called it a “great experience” and looks forward to the job since his own advisor “really shaped my life, and now it’s my turn to extend that developmental hand.”

Before coming to Penn, Keytack was the associate director of undergraduate admission at Case Western Reserve University. Before that, he served as a first year coordinator in Case Western’s residential college system.

Though Keytack has not been here long, his colleagues are already excited about his arrival.

“Ryan’s clear focus, enthusiasm and ready sense of humor make him a natural leader,” said Music professor Jay Reise. Keytack’s background in both theater and higher education administration will ultimately make Rodin a “leading undergraduate showcase for the arts and personal development,” Reise said.

Rodin residential assistant and College junior Aaseesh Polavarapu said Keytack has already had an impact on him. “He has helped me tackle some unforeseen challenges and has encouraged me to go above and beyond with my ideas for programming,” he said.

Keytack shared his funniest college memory of when he was performing on stage and the college’s president was in the audience. Not going into great detail, Keytack finished the story with “let’s just say I had a wardrobe malfunction on stage that rivals that of Janet Jackson.”

Unlike Keytack, Ware College House’s new dean is a Penn veteran. Schurmans is originally from Belgium. He came to the United States and earned his master’s degree from Arizona State University, and he went on to receive his doctorate at Penn in anthropology.

He is most excited about “the new energy that is coming from the freshmen class,” and he can’t wait to hear the students’ ideas and suggestions.

As he previously noticed while working at the University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Schurmans finds that when he takes into consideration the opinions of students, everything works “much more smoothly and creatively.”

Schurmans thinks his three-year-old daughter and baby son will benefit from life in the Quadrangle. “They are going to have a ball,” he said.

Hoping to build on the energy that Ware has previously thrived on, Schurmans said that if freshmen remember that “we’re all in this together,” with their feedback, Ware will have a great year.

College senior and RA Sarah MacIntosh has known Schurmans since her freshman year.

“Not only is he a man who is dedicated to his area of academic study, but he is also a man who is dedicated to the community around him,” MacIntosh said. She added that his influence will definitely have a “favorable impression” on the new freshmen class.

Colleague and Major Gifts Officer at the University Museum Therese Marmion immediately recalled how Schurmans would approach team-building activities.

After a few glitches where people did not know which team to go to, Schurmans took it upon himself to create his own team and called it “Bondo.” It ended up being the largest team, and when word chain games were used, Schurmans without fail would use the same answer ­­­­­— his favorite car ­— Lamborghini.

Classical Studies professor Brian Rose summarized Schurmans as being “incredibly creative, extremely collegial and an excellent scholar.”

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.