The WPSU Board of Representatives is an advisory board of community members that gather on a regular basis to advise the station on programming and other activities. In this blog post series, WPSU Board Member Spotlight, we sit down with these individuals and discuss their love of public broadcasting and its impact in the communities throughout the viewing area.
Donnan Stoicovy has been a resident of Halfmoon Township in the State College area for 35 years. Prior to that, she lived in Edinboro, PA, for 19 years and grew up in the south hills of Pittsburgh in Upper St. Clair. She is the eldest of the six children of Don and Nancy Stoicovy. Her name was a combination of their names (Don + Nan). She has three sisters, Susan, Karen, and Christine, and two brothers, Chip (Donald) and Steve. Her father was an educator, in whose footsteps she followed, while her mother was a registered nurse.
Connections to Public Television and Radio
Growing up in Pittsburgh, her family watched WQED public television. In high school, her film studies class visited the Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood TV set and were fortunate to meet Fred Rogers and learn about the program’s behind-the-scenes workings.
When she moved to Edinboro to attend college, her newly adopted station was WQLN. She regularly listened to the radio and watched the public station. While bicycling across the United States, she listed to public radio stations along the way on her Walkman.
Upon her move to the State College area in 1989, she adopted WPSU (WPSX at that time) as her regular radio station, and it is on throughout the day in her home. She loves the Tiny Desk concerts, StoryCorps, and Science Friday. WPSU finds her a regular viewer of Weather World, NOVA, Austin City Limits, PBS News Hour, and many more programs. She was appointed to the WPSU board seven years ago.
Education Background and Passions
Donnan’s passions are environmental education, natural history, civic education, music, and democracy. She has had two of her schools receive the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE) Green Ribbon School Award — Park Forest Elementary School (2016) and State College Friends School (2019). Donnan has served the Pennsylvania Association of Environmental Educators (PAEE) as president during two different terms, as editor of their newsletter for three years, and as regional director for northwestern PA for two terms. She received PAEE’s highest honor, the Keystone Environmental Educator Award, in 2011. She also received the 2007 Pennsylvania Environmental Council’s Leadership in Education Award, the 1996 Milken Family Foundation National Educator Award, and the Pennsylvania Science Teachers Association (PSTA) Award.
Donnan is a certified Pennsylvania Master Naturalist from the class of 2021. In addition to the WPSU board, she served on the Clearwater Conservancy board for 11 years prior to being appointed as their interim executive director in fall 2023 (until May 2024) and is chair of Millbrook Marsh’s Advisory Committee as ClearWater’s representative. Donnan serves as chair of the Pennsylvania Advisory Council on Environmental Education, which she was appointed to by Secretary Cindy Adams Dunn, PA Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (PA-DCNR), to represent ClearWater Conservancy. She has worked with the Kettering Foundation on K-12 civic engagement and as chair of the Pennsylvania Project Learning Tree steering committee.
In her spare time, Donnan showers her golden retriever, Joy, with lots of love. She also enjoys gardening, running, hiking, bicycling, cross country skiing, canoeing, kayaking, and birding in the many wild areas of Pennsylvania and Temagami, Ontario.
Importance of WPSU and Why Donations of Time and Money Are Essential
WPSU’s outreach into its vast community is many faceted. Not only does it give people the opportunity to hear local and national news but it truly is democracy in action! It is “one of the publics” that truly exist to make democracy, in all of its messiness, relevant to everyone. WPSU highlights aspects of community that are crucial to keeping people civically engaged. It features such things as service learning, a culture of sustainability, and local environmental issues and encourages people to engage in inquiry and learn about a vast range of ideas. It truly is a meaningful public engagement opportunity. With all of that in mind, it is essential that the community invest in what WPSU has to offer by donating both time and money to ensure that it is able to do all of those things for our community. WPSU has had large cuts from its budget and the removal of some essential contingency funds. It is important that supporters, members, and listeners examine ways that they are able to continue to support WPSU.