Columbus ‘Ted’ Grace, an assistant professor in the School of Education, died suddenly Wednesday morning, saddening students and fellow faculty.

Grace, 52, collapsed in his home early on Wednesday, said Kathleen Hinchman, a reading and language arts professor and friend of Grace.

‘It was so sudden, none of us were prepared for it,’ said Jen Allard, an inclusive education major and one of Grace’s students. ‘It was a shock to everybody.’

An exact cause of death is not known, but Grace suffered from severe asthma which had been causing more problems than usual within the last few weeks, Hinchman said.

Allard and her classmates were sitting in class Wednesday when the assistant dean and several administrative assistants came in and told them the news, Allard said.

‘He was one of the professors that everybody loves, and everybody admired him,’ Allard said. ‘He made you want to be a teacher.’

Grace taught a three-hour Elementary Language Arts course, which met Tuesday morning, said Allard, a student in the class.

He taught within the Block One undergraduate 300 level of education courses, and also taught some graduate level courses, Hinchman said.

‘He was an unbelievable professor,’ said Shawn Simon, a sophomore inclusive education major in the Elementary Language Arts class. ‘He taught us in ways that were really different.’

A nationally known storyteller, Grace also researched storytelling’s effect on teaching children to read, Hinchman said.

Grace began teaching at SU in 2002, and taught courses such as Literacy Across the Lifespan; Elementary Language Arts Methods & Curriculum; Children’s Literature. He also worked as an instructor in the reading and language arts center from 2000 to 2002, and served as an adjunct professor from the summer of 1998 to 1999 at SU, LeMoyne College and the State University of New York at Oswego. He earned his master’s and doctorate degrees at SU.

Grace and his wife, who teaches at a local elementary school, have five children, said Laurie Deyo, an academic adviser and recruiting specialist in the School of Education.

‘He was one of these incredible men who had a gentle power about him,’ Deyo said. ‘This is going to be a tough one.’

NEWS EDITOR KATY STECH AND ASST. NEWS EDITOR SAM EDELSTEIN CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT

Published on April 21, 2004 at 12:00 pm