Meet Kelley Haynes

Kelley Haynes, coordinator of the McClellan Center for Gadsden State Community College, offered some insights to how she teachers her history courses there when she welcomed the Calhoun County Chamber of Commerce education committee last week.

To jolt some life to the group's 8:30 a.m. meeting, she offered a few prizes for correct answers to some trivia questions, explaining how William Howard Taft needed a specially made bathtub to hold his girth and how those who think Hillary Clinton or Nancy Reagan tried to intrude on their husbands' presidencies obviously never read about Abigail Adams.

"I try to introduce these important people in our history in a way that makes students understand they're regular, accessible people, just like them," she said.

Her enthusiasm for the McClellan center shows. Several times she advertised the CAST production of South Pacific going on this month. She's also excited about the latest opportunity for GSCC at McClellan: a grant to build a cadaver lab, so students interested in forensics won't have to travel to UAB anymore.