Melicent J. Malchenson M'81/M'93

The first day she arrived in 1979, she almost turned around and went right back home. Her father, who had just moved her and her belongings into Gray Hall, encouraged her to stay for just a week. He knew she would get over the fear that often gripped her in new situations. “The mountain worked its magic on me,” she said, and she never looked back.
Now, 30 years later, Malchenson has two master’s degrees from Frostburg, has been a member of the Alumni Association Board of Directors for the past two decades, chairs the Old Main Society and, with her family, has established the Ethel Hollinger Malchenson Scholarship Fund in memory of her mother. Malchenson, who has movement and mobility problems caused by cerebral palsy, credits her parents with raising her as a person with a disability, not a disabled person. They expected as much out of her as they did her brothers and sisters, right down to the chores they all had to do. It was her experience living with her disability that encouraged her career choice as a special education teacher.
In addition to her desire to work with children, “I wanted also to prove that somebody with a disability could … make a contribution to society,” she said. She thought she could serve as a role model. She earned a bachelor’s and the first of three master’s degrees before encountering Frostburg. She taught for 17 years, then moved into guidance counseling for the next 10. She retired in 2003.
Her Frostburg love affair began with her second master’s degree, and continued through her third. All the while, the mountain – and the people there – continued to work magic. “I feel a closeness to the entity of the University, the quality of the University, the personhood of the University. When I picture the University, I picture a collage of people who very much worked together to make me who I am,” she said with a catch in her voice. As the years have passed and she has increased both her volunteerism and philanthropy, her devotion has grown.
The scholarship, created as a memorial soon after her mother’s death, supports education students from Washington County, where she grew up, and Frederick County, where she had her career, and neighboring counties in Pennsylvania. Since it was established in 1992, …Malchenson sets goals to reach certain giving levels each year, and her latest effort has been to help the FSU Foundation encourage people to consider remembering FSU in their estate plans, which is the role of the Old Main Society. She has written FSU into her will. Despite her and her parents’ natural reluctance to “never toot your own horn,” she is determined to continue working for the place she loves so much. “I want my parents to have this legacy,” she said.