Serving students now and into the future

Patrick J. Zengierski was a young boy when he attended UB Bulls games at Rotary Field with his father, Leon Zengierski ’64, and collected chestnuts in back of Hayes Hall.

“UB is home to me,” says Patrick. In 1979 he earned a bachelor’s degree in linguistics and Spanish, along with his brother, James, who earned his undergraduate degree that same year.

Eventually, Patrick’s loves for language, people, education, and the spiritual merged into a priestly vocation that has kept him connected to UB where he has taught, mentored and ministered.  He continues to teach summers at the university’s English Language Institute where he worked in the early eighties and has recently served as an adjunct professor of educational foundations in the Graduate School of Education (GSE). He is also active on campus committees as co-chair of UB’s diversity committee and treasurer of the GSE alumni board. He has been a campus minister at UB’s Newman Center since 2001.

For Father Patrick--who earned an Ed.M. in foreign language education with a specialization in English as a Second Language from UB in 1980 and a Ph.D. in higher education administration in 2001—learning is a lifelong endeavor. It’s his love for the students and the educational process that motivated his bequest to UB. “I love UB, and it is still a big part of my life,” he said. “I will do whatever I can to advance its mission.”  His bequest gift will be used to establish a lecture series in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy in the GSE.  “It excites me to know that people involved in academe will be able to gather together and develop an ethos of inquiry because of my gift.”