When Sherry Peters is not working as the administration specialist in Cabrini University’s Nerney Leadership Institute, she enjoys spending her free time down the shore or with her friends and family. Although Peters is retiring and is very wistful to leave Cabrini behind, Peters has an array of things she wants to do after she retires.
When she came to Cabrini in February of 2011, Peters took the job as a bridge between her previous job and what would hopefully be a new job. The company she was working for beforehand went out of business, so she started putting out applications everywhere and saw an ad that Cabrini was hiring.
Before her position in the Nerney Leadership Institute, she worked as the administrative assistant in the president’s office for two years. After that, Board of Trustees member Deb Takes was hired as an interim president of the university and asked Peters to be her executive assistant. Peters worked as her assistant for a year until Donald Taylor was hired as the university’s next president.
When President Taylor was hired, Peters worked with him for six months and then told him that she felt that the position of executive assistant was not for her anymore. She had heard about the Nerney Leadership Institute because Maria Vizcarrondo, the executive director of the institute, had an office in the President’s suite. Peters became very familiar with what was going on in regard to the institute and so she was both intrigued and excited to start working with them. Vizcarrondo played a big role in this for Peters.
“She had a very impressive background, a lot of energy and was very inspirational,” Peters said of Vizcarrondo. “I knew she was looking for an assistant and long story short, I’m here.”
Peters originally did not think that she was going to stay at Cabrini when she accepted her original position, but she was glad she did. The job at Cabrini was a significant pay cut for her, but she knew that in order to get interviews with other companies, she had to have a job. Peters understood from the start that they were not interviewing people who were jobless and that was a significant reason she took the job.
Peters quickly fell in love with Cabrini’s atmosphere and decided that she was going to take on a second job so that she could keep her job at the university.
“I fell in love with Cabrini. I fell in love with my coworkers. I fell in love with the environment, the culture, their mission. I actually took a second job in order to stay here,” Peters said. “I have a lot of affection for Cabrini and though the time is right for me to be leaving now, I’m very torn because I feel like I’m leaving part of my family.”
Peters’ coworkers had nothing but nice things to say about her and are going to miss her dearly.
Timothy Goodly, the executive director of the organizational development doctoral program at the Nerney Leadership Institute, worked with Peters since spring of 2015.
“I have had the pleasure of working with Sherry Peters since my first day at Cabrini in April of 2015,” Goodly said. “She is the consummate professional. She is diligent, service-oriented and exudes warmth and collegiality. She is very generous of her time, always willing to lend listening ears and nurturing words of support. She epitomizes the great values of our institution. I am very grateful for her presence in my life.”
Peters describes her life outside of Cabrini as very busy but dull. She says that her week nights consist of meeting friends and family members for dinner, doing chores, getting dinner and ramping up for the next day.
Peters very much enjoys going to the shore and her absolute favorite thing to do is be with her friends and family. She considers herself very blessed that she has a lot of friends.
“I enjoy walking. I enjoy theater. I enjoy music. I enjoy just connecting with people and I’m looking forward to doing a lot more when I leave here,” said Peters. “I’d like to get more involved with my community, seeing what volunteer opportunities there are for me to take advantage of and I’d like to travel.”
Peters is going to miss everything about Cabrini. She is particularly going to miss the drive in. She has a beautiful ride into work and takes all the back roads so that her day begins on a pleasant and beautiful note. She genuinely loves everything about being here.
“Once you’re here, everybody says hello, you smile, students walk in— either they’re lost or they have a question, but at least I know that I can direct them or help them myself,” Peters said. “It’s just a delightful place to be because you’re in an environment where everyone is helping everyone else.”
Peters is retiring for many reasons. With turning 70 on Jan. 24, Peters decided that she wanted to retire now before she became too old to be able to fun things anymore.
Once she retires, Peters plans on catching up with her family. Although her daughter lives local, her son moved to Sioux Falls about five years ago. She does not see either of them nearly as much as she would like to and is excited to spend more time with them.
“I want to be able to do all these things before I get too much older. And also, even though I’m older, I’m still young enough that there’s still a lot to do out there,” Peters said. “It’s important to keep yourself plugged into the universe. It’s important, otherwise you become stagnant. I like to feel plugged in, so to speak.”
Working at Cabrini for seven years has taught Peters many things. Not only about the university, but about life in general.
Peters loves the mission of Cabrini and the fact there are no slackers here. She loves that everyone works so hard and that people give 100 percent of themselves to everything that they do.
“I would say to anyone who’s looking for a career to consider a service-orientated industry,” said Peters. “Because I’ve worked in corporate as well as non-profit and there’s no comparison.”
“As the executive director of the institute, I needed someone to work with me that had the courage to tackle a start-up organization, the passion to work with young leaders and the desire to make a difference. Sherry came equipped with all of those qualities and more,” Vizcarrondo said. “She’s been the wind beneath our wings.”
I had the pleasure of working with Sherry and sharing an office space with her for over 2 years. She is an amazing person who did a great job for NLI and Cabrini, and she will be missed. Thank you Sherry!