Second Shift How employees spend their time once the workday is through Archived article from Dec 1, 2000 By Douglas Frank   Accustomed to public speaking Lisa M. Covi and Pearl Scott have spent many after-work hours talking -- not just idle chitchat, but targeted speech to audiences aimed at improving communication skills and overcoming fear of public speaking. Both belong to the Conackamack Toastmasters Club of Piscataway, a division of Toastmasters International, which has more than 7,000 clubs worldwide and more than 100 in New Jersey. Covi, an assistant professor in the department of library and information science at the School of Communication, Information and Library Studies, was previously a member of two other clubs in California and Michigan when she was in graduate school. She says she initially joined because as a young teacher she wasn't able to get the kind of advice and feedback that is now available from the Teaching Excellence Centers at Rutgers. Also profiled: Alexander Motyl The global gallery John Payne His home is his hobby Cheryl Wilson Looking good, feeling good Stan Kolasa Giving the band a hand Even today, as a veteran teacher, Covi finds the Toastmasters experience helpful in "keeping your wits about you and maintaining poise. It still happens sometimes in front of a class that your mind goes blank, and it is important to be able to pick up and continue," says Covi, who has served as vice president of public relations for the club. Scott, who for many years was program coordinator in the Office of Minority Undergraduate Science Programs in the Division of Life Sciences, says joining Toastmasters in 1995 "literally changed my life." "In addition to helping people express themselves, Toastmasters also challenges its members to reach higher by accepting leadership roles in and out of the club," she says. "Over the years I have made many Toastmasters friends, locally, nationally and internationally, who have helped me to challenge myself and grow." She recently accepted the position as assistant to the dean of the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy. But the accomplishment that Scott is most proud of is an eight-week Youth Leadership Program she conducts at Schorr Middle School in Piscataway for pupils in grades five through eight to help them build self-esteem and self-confidence and overcome shyness by speaking in front of others. "I am always pleased when I see the personal development of these children, many of whom return semester after semester. One young man started the program in the fifth grade and stayed with it until he graduated from the eighth grade," she relates. "I have watched him grow from a shy, timid boy to one who had developed the confidence to run for class president." More information about the Conackamack club can be obtained from its president, Charise Hepburn, via e-mail at hepburnc@plural.com. Hanging in the global gallery To his colleagues and students, Alexander Motyl is an associate professor of political science at Rutgers-Newark, author of six books and numerous articles on nations, empires and revolutions. But to a growing number of art afficionados, particularly those who surf the Web, Motyl is a neo-expressionist artist who brings to life the curves, slopes and assorted shapes of Manhattan's roofs, windows, walls and skyline. In art, his admitted first love, Motyl found an outlet for the creativity he had experienced first as a youngster and again in college art classes. "I didn't have the courage to be an artist. You have to be very committed or very bold, and I wasn't quite sure then if I was either," Motyl recalls. Happily, thanks to the Internet, he has also found a market for the many works that have poured out of him in recent years. Motyl's cityscapes are on display online, inviting site visitors to search, select and purchase original contemporary paintings, works on paper and photography from around the world. Motyl's journey to this new and burgeoning worldwide art venue began in 1994, when he resumed painting on weekends and evenings. "After a half year, I had produced a fair amount, and I got into some group shows in various small galleries in New York." In the summer of 1999, "out of nowhere" the curator of Paintingsdirect called. She had seen and liked his work and offered to represent him. "I have sold 15 or 20 paintings in the year I have been with them, and I have been given an enormous amount of exposure. The very first painting I sold in October 1999 was to a collector in Turkey," he says. "It's an opportunity for me to be doing what I wanted to do 25 years ago. At the same time I'm actually selling the stuff." His home is his hobby Ask John Payne what his hobby is, and he could easily answer "living in my house." An architecture buff since he was a child, Payne in recent years joined a group dedicated to preserving the houses designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. He then found one he liked in Glen Ridge, bought it and moved in. Payne, a professor of law at the School of Law-Newark, is now a member of the board of directors of the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy, a nationwide organization. He spends a generous amount of time attending conferences and meetings and serving as chair of the annual conference committee. Based in Chicago, the conservancy tries to make sure that none of the existing structures get torn down or are misused in a way that makes them irretrievable, Payne says. Payne read in the conservancy's bulletin that the Glen Ridge house was for sale, and he was curious about it. "A realtor we knew took us through it, and we stoutly asserted to her that we had no interest in buying a house," he recalls. "We had a very nice house with a mortgage almost paid off. "But we went into this house on a clear, sunny, cold February morning, and the sun was pouring into it, and it was just beautiful. We knew instantly that we made a terrible mistake in coming." Wright's houses are named for the original client, and Payne's is the Stuart and Elizabeth Richardson house. It was one of some 300 houses that Wright designed from the 1930s to the end of his career for families of moderate means. Coincidentally, Payne's legal specialty is low- and middle-income housing, and he handles litigation on New Jersey's Mount Laurel doctrine. Though Wright's houses are "collector's items" that often fetch premium prices, Payne's costs were "not out of line with housing in the neighborhood generally." "They're just exquisitely well-designed houses," he says. "I lived in a Victorian house for 25 years that I loved to death, and I thought, 'How can I leave this beautiful house?' After 24 hours in the Frank Lloyd Wright house, I'd forgotten all about the other one." Looking good, feeling good Cheryl F. Wilson, director of the Douglass College Student Activities Office, says she is often mistaken for a college senior and people are surprised when they discover she is an administrator more than 10 years out of college. "Women, especially, would ask me what my secrets were. That's when I started conducting my workshops on health and fitness, body image and self-esteem," says the 1989 Douglass College graduate. Her seminars are usually billed as "African Holistic Tips for Health and Beauty," and she has held them at the university for several years for various offices and organizations including the College of Pharmacy, the Rutgers College Creative Expressions workshop series and the Douglass College Idle Hours workshop series. Wilson creates some of her own skin-care products, which she says are based on ancient African principles that have been passed down through her family or that she has discovered through her own research into African culture. She shows seminar attendees how to mix their own skin-care products from such oils as olive, grape seed, sesame and safflower. They can be made to order for people with dry skin or oily skin, but she urges people not to expect quick fixes and instead look for improvement in slow, gradual results over the long haul. Besides skin care, Wilson also suggests other lifestyle patterns, including getting plenty of exercise and fresh air, using natural products, drinking water instead of soft drinks, eating wholesome foods and occasionally fasting. She doesn't eat after 7 p.m. and usually eats her biggest meal at noon. "I am a vegetarian, but I don't speak out against eating meat," she says. Not a purist, she will have a slice of pizza or carrot cake or an order of French fries once in a while. "It's what you do the majority of time that counts," she advises. Giving the band a hand Stan Kolasa started helping out with the Haddon Heights High School Marching Band when his daughter, Lindsay, entered high school and became a color guard member. Kolasa found the experience to be such a positive influence in shaping his daughter's future and so rewarding personally that he continues to stay involved some four years after her graduation. The school's marching band is very active not only at halftime shows at football games but also in band competitions that are held up and down the East Coast, says Kolasa, associate director of Rutgers University Computing Services in Camden. A weekend earlier this fall is typical of his contribution to the band program: On Saturday, he was at the high school from 9 a.m. to noon building props with another volunteer and the band director for an evening show. From noon to 4 p.m., he helped the band get ready for the football game halftime show, including fixing a broken xylophone and driving the tractor to pull the band's equipment onto the field. After the football game, he helped set the band up for practice, went over to pick up the truck used to carry equipment, loaded the truck and drove to the competition that evening. He helped out during the competition and finally returned to the high school around midnight. "The next day, Sunday, was much easier since we had only one show," he recalls. "So that kept me busy only from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m." Kolasa provides some insight into why he and his wife, Maureen, who is treasurer of the band's auxiliary, continue to lend a hand: "We see the youth at our high school and junior high as our future and have found the young ladies and gentlemen in the marching band and color guard to be the nicest group of young people one could ever meet. The band and guard members refer to us as their 'band parents' and, indeed, I view them as my own sons and daughters."

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