RAND Senior Project Associate Tom Russack (along with friendly slug) giving a presentation on green roofs to a fifth-grade class.
After nearly 14 wonderful years at RAND, I have left my regular full-time role of Senior Project Associate to take on a new position pursuing an old passion—teaching masonry preservation at a newly established high school. Before I tell you more about that, I’d like to present a few bits of information:
- There are approximately 8.2 million people in New York City.
- New York City has approximately 975,000 buildings.
- Many of these buildings are more than a hundred years old.
- Most of these older building are of masonry construction.
With a city this big and with so many aging buildings, one would think there would be several schools or training programs that teach how to maintain this vast urban resource. But until recently, there were no high schools, trade schools, or technical schools in New York City that offer basic hands-on training in masonry preservation.
Thankfully that’s about to change. Next month the Mather Building Arts & Craftsmanship High School, the first hands-on preservation trades training high school in the nation, will open its doors at 411 Pearl Street in Manhattan. The school, named after Stephen Mather, who served as the first director of the National Park Service from 1917 to 1929, is a joint partnership between the New York City Department of Education and the National Park Service. I am happy to announce I will be the school’s Preservation Masonry Instructor.
How that came to be has been an exciting, challenging, and sometime exhausting journey for me. In a nutshell:
Two years ago I wrote an e-book titled “Masonry History Integrity, An Urban Conservation Primer.” Published by The National Center for Preservation Training and Technology (part of the National Park Service), it’s a training manual for high school-age students that explains how to repair and restore urban masonry buildings. The book was developed from a hands-on masonry preservation training program I designed and taught for at-risk and underserved youth in Harlem working towards learning a trade and earning their GED.
Tom Russack leads a tour of historic buildings in Harlem for a class in masonry preservation.
The masonry training program was a natural outgrowth of the thesis I wrote for my Master of Arts degree in Historic Preservation at Goucher College in Baltimore, where I studied through its online program. My inspiration for that master’s degree came 10 years ago, when RAND’s President Stephen Varone called me into his office and said: “Tom, you’ve always been passionate about historic preservation. Why don’t you continue your education and get a master’s degree in it? RAND will help you.”
RAND did help me and has continued to do so throughout my career here. Stephen allowed me a flexible schedule needed to research, write, and teach while I juggled my work projects, family, and other responsibilities. He has also graciously invited me to continue working part-time on RAND projects as my new school schedule allows.
The help came in other forms as well: Many of my RAND coworkers volunteered at the masonry preservation training program I led in Harlem, and I would not have been able to write my book without the guidance from my colleagues Steven Tingir, RAND’s Chief Specification Writer, and Lynne Funk, RA, one of RAND’s Senior Architects and a fellow preservation enthusiast. Ryan Ballinger, a graphic designer at RAND, was also of great assistance.
Looking back over these past 14 years, I’ve been blessed with amazing colleagues who have become like family to me and have supported and encouraged me every step of the way. The journey continues, and I’m grateful for where it’s taken me and where it leads to next.
