Cover Story
Wanda Barrs leads gently but firmly in raising Georgia’s educational standards.Alumni Reunion in the Most Unlikely of Places
FACS alumnae Louise Hill (BSHE '79, Home Economics and Journalism) and Jill Kellner (BSFCS '05, Human Development and Family Science; BS '05, Psychology) could have crossed paths in any number of ways—at the annual Alumni Awards luncheon, the South Campus Tailgate, or the Chilly Dawg Run. But fate brought the two together in a location that Hill, under different circumstances, would likely have preferred to miss—Atlanta's renowned Shepherd Center, self-described as a "hospital specializing in medical treatment, research, and rehabilitation for people with spinal cord injury and brain injury."
"I thought I had blown the discs in my back," Hill says of waking up on Feb. 20 and discovering she couldn't move her lower body. "I have had back issues and had back surgery in 2008. I had moved a box of books on Saturday that really wasn't that heavy, but I was sure that must have caused this." But the problem was not ruptured discs, she soon discovered. Instead, Hill had contracted idiopathic transverse myelitis, a swelling, with no known cause, of the sheath that surrounds the nerves in her spine and resulted in paralysis. After a week in Athens Regional Medical Center undergoing batteries of tests, Hill was transferred to Shepherd to begin intense therapy and to learn what adjustments she would need to return to her home and to her career at UGA's Fanning Institute.
A leader in leadership
Louise Hill works on the state-of-the-art "locomotor" at Shepherd Spinal Center. The machine provides support for part of Hill's bodyweight and also helps her move her legs as part of a program designed to retrain the spinal cord to "remember" the pattern of walking.
Prior to contracting myelitis, Hill was living her professional dream by working with communities throughout Georgia. "At Fanning, we focus on building capacity through community, economic and leadership development," she says. "Communities that are healthy and continue to prosper have an intentional process for developing leaders."
Hill's work in the area of leadership dates back to her first job out of college with the Georgia Farm Bureau Federation in Macon. "My assignment was to develop the Women's Program, which trained farm wives to be advocates for agriculture at the local and state levels. We created a speakers bureau and programs on agriculture for the classroom," she says. "I also served as interim director of the Young Farmers' Program and of the field-service department. Eventually, I became director of program development and education."
After 16 years, Hill was named development director of the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, a position that allowed her to move closer to her family. In 2003, she assumed her current position as a community-leadership specialist with the Fanning Institute, which is named for one of the nation's founders of leadership training. Hill travels the state, meeting with a variety of groups that are focused on leadership development. For most groups, she conducts eight to 10 sessions, helping emerging leaders learn what is expected of them and how they can aid their communities.
Hill's success has been recognized in numerous ways. She received the 1994 Kerr Award, for example, for her support of Leadership Georgia, and the 2005 Leadership Georgia Threadgill Award honored her community service. On April 12, Hill was to enjoy her most recent accolade, the Walter B. Hill Award for Distinguished Achievement in Public Service and Outreach. But rather than being on the UGA campus to receive the award, she was at the Shepherd Center preparing to move to a nearby apartment as the next transition before returning home.
Helping people return to their lives
Occupational therapist Jill Kellner offers support as Louise Hill learns to use a "grabber" while grocery shopping.
Kellner doesn't pretend to understand what it means to be paralyzed. "I can sympathize with my patients, but I can't empathize with them because I haven't experienced what they're going through," she says. As an occupational therapist at Shepherd, what Kellner does do is help restore function, as well as dignity and self-respect, to patients. "One of the first things they say to me is, 'I want to walk,'" Kellner notes. "But what they really want is to be able to take a shower on their own and to take care of themselves."
Kellner's first major at UGA was psychology, with reservations. "I liked psychology, but I wasn't sure that it was what I wanted to do 100 percent," she says, "and I began to look for other classes I was interested in. I had a background in child care so I took CHFD 2100 with Linda Walters." That experience, and others in Dawson Hall, spoiled her, she says: "Everyone had the same ideals—to help others, to be involved with their communities, to be interested in children and families."
Ultimately, Kellner opted for a double major, but still wasn't sure what career would grow out of those majors. "I was thinking about becoming a physical therapist like my older sister, but then an occupational therapist spoke to one of my classes," she says. "I liked the idea of helping people find ways to return to their lives, whether that means learning to feed themselves or how to navigate a grocery store in a wheelchair."
After earning her undergraduate degrees, Kellner attended Boston University to study occupational therapy. The Shepherd Center is her first job as an OT and, given the center's state-of-the-art equipment and the positive energy that abounds there, this job could also be her last. "There are a lot of people who have worked here 20 or 30 years," she says. "I'm always laughing here. I have the best time at work."
When Kellner and physical therapist Jill Roecker (who earned her undergraduate degree in exercise science at UGA) learned that a patient who worked at UGA was going to be assigned to their team they began to "stalk" her. "And when I saw that she was also a FACS graduate, I was really excited," Kellner says. "When Louise arrived, Jill [Roecker] and I came in her room saying, 'We're so glad you're here! Not because of why you're here, but because you're from UGA!'"
Alternately hands-on, hands-off
Louise Hill watering flowers.Such positive energy is a hallmark for Shepherd. "When a patient first arrives, they're the most popular person here," she says. "Doctors and nurses check on them and Jill and I meet with them and begin discussing their PT and OT schedules. We take measurements of their body so we can order a customized wheelchair, which is ready on the second day. And we assess the level of injury and sensation. In Louise's case, she already had some movement in her legs, so we assessed that, too."
By 10 a.m. on most days Hill is in the gym at Shepherd working with Kellner on strengthening her core muscles and those in her buttocks and legs—strengthening that can be accomplished despite the fact that Hill can't really feel them. During the exercises, Kellner is poised next to her on the raised mat that's the size of a king-sized bed, encouraging her to tighten her abdominal and back muscles in particular so that she can kneel upright while leaning on a prop.
While Kellner is attentive during much of Hill's activities, at times she seems unconcerned as Hill struggles in and out of her wheelchair or works to put her tennis shoes on—pulling her leg onto her knee, trying to catch the shoe onto her foot, only to have her leg fall off her knee and the cycle begin again. "I always know what's going on," Kellner explains later. "One of the hardest things for me to learn was to be hands-off, but one of the things we emphasize is that we can't go home with the patients. We have to let them learn to do these tasks without our help. When we're first teaching a task, we're right there with them, making suggestions and helping them problem-solve. But later, it's good when the patient isn't in the spotlight, when they don't have me just sitting there watching them."
Working hard to go back to work
Kellner describes Hill as a star student at Shepherd. Within a couple of weeks of her arrival at Shepherd, she had already learned to accomplish showering and dressing on her own—tasks that take tremendous energy when you must primarily rely on your upper body for moving. But she doesn't know when she'll be able to walk again. Her prognosis is good, however. "If she doesn't regain any additional feeling, she will probably need braces from her knees down, but she should be able to walk with an assistive device," Kellner says. Until that time comes, Hill expects to return to Athens in a wheelchair. Suggestions that she wait until she can walk again before she begins traveling the state for her job are met with a good-natured scoff. "When this first happened, I put it in God's hands," she says. "I said, 'I'll get better, but if I don't, I'll live with this.'"
She'll also put her experiences to good use. "In leadership training we talk about an inclusive environment, but we probably haven't done everything we could," says Hill. "Georgia's communities will be much more accessible when I'm done."
(Update: In early May, Hill returned to her home in Athens. She continues to commute to the Shepherd Center on a regular basis for physical and occupational therapy, but hopes to return to work part-time this summer and full-time by fall.)
