Dr. Gay (Caryll) Malewicki Sweely (Class of 1964)

 

“My years at Taft were a joy and the foundation for my entire life,” writes Dr. Gay Sweely.  While at Taft, she was president of the Debate Club and the Future Nurses Club, a member of National Honor Society, Honor Club, GAA, Future Teachers Association, Bowling Team, and played bassoon in the band.  She was named Miss Chicago Park District, Miss Junior Citizen Chicago in 1963, won 23 science fair awards including honorable mention at the national level, and was a keynote speaker for the 1963 NAACP Convention in Chicago on the importance of youth.

 

Graduating cum laude from Illinois Wesleyan University with majors in art history, literature and writing, and comparative religions, she earned her master’s degree summa cum laude in art history at University of Utah in pre-Columbian art.  Early jobs ranged from director of public relations for the Air Force Sergeants’ Association and technical editing for the Bureau of the Census and IBM Corporation, to teaching art history, technical editing, English and related topics at Northern Virginia Community College.  Relocating to New Zealand in the mid-1980s, Dr. Sweely earned additional arts and art history degrees specializing in Asian and Oceanic art from University of Canterbury in New Zealand and University of Melbourne in Australia, where she completed her doctorate. 

 

Since 2000, Dr. Sweely has been a lecturer in art history and history at Eastern Kentucky University’s Department of Art and Design, and was named the university’s top teacher in 2003. She has edited over 100 publications in three countries and coauthored the book, “Becoming Australians” in 2001. 

 

Dr. Sweely and her husband, Stephen, have two sons.