Jaime Simpson, Dean of Academic Programs at Manor College, spoke with Bucksco Today about growing up in a blended family in Bucks County, where she learned to prioritize education, independence, and looking to the future.
Simpson attended Harcum College to become an Expanded Functions Dental Assistant (EFDA), but discovered another passion while serving as a student teacher. After earning her associate’s degree in EFDA, she began practicing full-time in a clinical setting while continuing her studies with a new focus on education.
Today, she’s excited to improve and expand on the programs that help Manor College’s students become career-ready, especially in allied health sciences.
Where were you born, and where did you grow up?
I was born at Holy Redeemer Hospital, right down the street from Manor. I originally lived in northeast Philadelphia, and from second grade on, I lived in Bucks County, first in Southampton and then in Ivyland.
What did your parents do?
My father is a Union Carpenter. I think this is going to be his retirement year; he’s 66. He had a hand in some of Philadelphia’s major buildings. He owned his own business within the union and became an Estimator. He’s more in the office now.
My mom currently works at a C&N Bank in Newtown. She’s still working as well, looking at retirement. She was a homemaker while raising my younger sisters, but she’s worked in the banking industry for over 20 years now.
Where were you in the pecking order?
My parents divorced early on, when I was about two. I was the oldest and the only. However, both of my parents remarried, so I have a lot of other siblings. I have stepsiblings, one older, one younger, and then I have one brother and two sisters.
That blended family has definitely been a blessing. I helped raise my younger siblings, who are in their 30s now. I’ve seen them since they were babies, and now I’m seeing their babies. It’s really cool.
What do you remember about growing up in Southampton and Ivyland?
My favorite memories are meeting my lifelong friends. We went to grade school, high school, and some of them I went to college with, and we still stay connected today. One is a professor at LaSalle. She became a mentor for me as well.
And I remember dancing, going to the shore in the summer, playing sports, and seeing my younger siblings grow up.
What shore did you go to?
Ocean City, N.J. We still have our family shore house there today. I remember going there with my grandparents, playing Monopoly, going to the beach, and hanging out on the boardwalk.
Did you play any sports in high school?
No. I primarily played sports in grade school, like softball, basketball, and soccer. But I managed the softball team in high school.
As an adult, in the past couple of years, I’ve been part of an adult kickball intramural league and a women’s intramural softball team.
How did you distinguish yourself in high school?
I went to an all-girls Catholic high school, Villa Joseph Marie, in Holland in Bucks County. I had a lot of friends go with me, so that gave me the flexibility to just learn how to be myself. I learned that I don’t need to worry about influence as much.
That’s where I learned that I had a voice and could be a leader in a group. Community service was important, and that was introduced in those high school years.
Did you work in high school?
I did. I worked at a place called Gerard’s, which was a little market in Southampton, and I also worked at a Rita’s Water Ice in Richboro. That was my favorite job from my younger years, and it was a good foundation for future jobs.
What lessons did you learn from those jobs that still stay with you today?
Working as a team. Managing busy times. If you went to Rita’s on those beautiful days, the line was out forever long. You had to maintain the water ice in the freezers to keep it from chunking up. You had to handle the money. You had to manage that long line and work together with the other people to get the job done on time.
The owner trusted us. We had managers, but he let us handle things alone sometimes and gain that leadership and independence.
What kind of music were you listening to as a teenager?
I always had a wide range of music that I enjoyed, and I still do to this day. It could be the Steve Miller Band. It could be rap and R&B. In high school, Dave Matthews was a favorite.
College was more of that rap era with the Notorious B.I.G. I still listen to all of them today. I just saw Steve Miller Band in concert last summer.
What’s your favorite concert experience you’ve had?
My favorites have been ones where there are multiple talents. I went to the iHeart Festival in Vegas, and I was able to see so many artists, from Journey to Coldplay to Billie Eilish, all in one night.
But my family goes every single year to see Train. It’s multi-generational. It’s my mom, my cousins, my daughter, my husband. And we have a ball. Train is our favorite.
I’m going to guess that you were a pretty good student in high school?
Not really. I was a B to C student. As I got older, it got better. I tell my students that today. I wasn’t the one who was being thrown to the major colleges. It would have been an obstacle for me to get in.
Where did you end up going?
I went to Harcum College in Bryn Mawr. I thought I wanted to be a Dental Hygienist, but was introduced to another dental profession called EFDA, Expanded Functions Dental Assisting. This is how a lot of my students come into my program now.
Because I was concentrating on this dental program, there weren’t many schools. It was Manor. It was Harcum. And I went to Harcum. I didn’t know about this profession called EFDA. I ended up going into that and received my associate’s degree in it, and then I went into practice in a pediatric office.
After Harcum, I went on right away to West Chester University as a full-time student, and I worked full-time clinically. I eventually got my bachelor’s degree in Health Science with an education concentration.
Your LinkedIn profile mentions Widener. How did you get there?
When I was at Manor, I came in with a bachelor’s degree, and at one of the first meetings, I was with a bunch of people who had their PhDs, their EdDs. Some had their master’s degrees. And I was like, “I have a voice in these meetings like they do. I can do this. I can get my graduate degree.” So, I applied to Widener for my master’s in Allied Health Education, and I graduated during COVID in my living room.
When I was at Manor, I did my student teaching there, so that was my first glimpse at Manor in a professional sense, and then it became my goal to do what those ladies did, what that program director did. I didn’t know in 2015 that I was going to become the next program director.
Looking back over your career, who were the people who saw promise in you and opened up doors and gave you opportunities?
I have to start with my mom and stepdad, Frank. They always made education the priority, especially my mom and stepdad. I do this with my children. That’s your full-time job until it’s not.
In high school, with our guidance counselors, it wasn’t just, “What do you want to do with your life?” It was, “What do you want to do? Okay. Here are the colleges that have it.”
And I would definitely say that played a role in giving me opportunities, because nothing comes easy. Any job that I got, I had to put myself out there. I applied, interviewed, and got the position.
My grandmother was a Catholic elementary school teacher who taught religion, English, and social studies for over 30 years. She was definitely a mentor. Having good role models, good parents, and a good support system opened up doors.
You talked about making a lot of friends in high school. You have a personality that attracts people. Where does that come from?
I come from a group of very strong women. My mom and my sisters are very outgoing. I’m the quieter one, but a long line of women in my family are Type A leaders.
Keeping friends and fostering relationships is important to me. Friends I’ve had since grade school, we’ve supported each other in the hard and easy times. I try to make it a priority to reach out.
Social media definitely helps. But to reach out on a personal level and say, “Hey, let’s get lunch,” or, “Let’s all meet up before the holidays, since we know everyone will be in the area.”
What are you focused on for the last quarter and into the new year at Manor? What are your priorities?
I’m excited to build on Manor’s current initiatives, expanding potential programs, especially in the allied health arena, because we see that’s what people want. What students are looking for is career pathways, especially in allied health or health sciences.
And strengthening partnerships with graduate institutions for our students for transfer, or starting graduate programs ourselves. Innovative new programs in high-demand fields that are going to make them career-ready.
The other big initiative is flexible learning modalities, meeting students where they are. You have a lot of people who go, “They should be in the classroom.” And we need to grow from that. Being in the classroom is important, but so is having those flexible learning modalities, while preserving Manor as the small, mission-driven, unique gem that we have here.
Maintaining our students’ mental health is a priority, too. There are so many things I’m still learning every year about the obstacles our students face. They might be worried about family members who aren’t citizens, where they’ll find their next meal, or maybe they’re in foster care and have to take four buses to get here. You don’t realize those 18 balls that they’re juggling sometimes.
But we also, especially as program directors in professional programs, must prepare them for a profession. We must teach them to communicate if they’re late, and to give themselves that extra 15 or 30 minutes of wiggle room, even though it means getting up earlier, because sometimes the world isn’t as forgiving.
What are you most excited about at work right now?
I was the Dean of Allied Health. Now I’m Dean of all academic programs.
I’m excited to make a difference. I don’t want to just be another person in a role, and have people feel that nothing happened or nothing improved.
So, my strategy with meeting with the teams under me is, “What is our 90-day plan? What can we do to improve? How can we retain our students? How can we retain our faculty?” I’m excited to be constantly evolving and trying for improvement.
What do you do with all that free time that you have?
I’m in a new era of being a parent to adult children. I just had my baby turn 18 and go to college. My 20-year-old son goes to Manor, and he’s home, but he does his own thing. He has his girlfriend and his own time.
So, I feel like I’m an empty nester, and I’m trying to focus on myself, my mental and physical health, while still providing community service. I still volunteer with the parents’ guild at my high school alma mater.
I’m looking to potentially learn the sport of pickleball. One of my colleagues here is an empty nester as well, and I said, “What are we going to do? Let’s learn pickleball!” I got her a pickleball set for her birthday. That’s a plan.
And lots of walks. I’m trying to do things to keep me moving.
Are you a reader?
I am not an avid reader. That’s a goal for me, to read more. I listen to podcasts all the time.
Recently, I saw a keynote at a program directors’ conference. Her name’s Kim Strobel, and her book is called Teach Happy. I’ve been listening to her podcast, and right now that’s my favorite. It was nice to hear that message this summer, about finding what got you into this profession in the first place and holding on to that. I shared it in my first meeting with my chairs.
Jamie, what’s something big you’ve changed your mind about over the last 15 or 20 years?
When I came to Manor, I was so excited. I thought I got my dream job. I was a program director for the Expanded Functions Dental Assisting program. I remember telling my stepdad how excited I was. And he said to me, “All right, what’s next?” And I went, “Well, this is my dream. This is my goal.”
And he goes, “I think you should write a grant.” Well, I ended up writing a grant, and now 11 years later, I’ve got my graduate degree.
I’ve been receiving a grant every year at Manor, many years in a row now, over $100,000 at this point. What’s next? Am I going to get my doctorate? Nothing is off the table. I’m looking forward to potentially doing that.
The biggest change in the past 15 to 20 years is knowing it’s not static. What we think is the ultimate goal isn’t.
It’s a crazy world out there. What keeps you hopeful and optimistic?
I try to hone in on three specific things I’m grateful for each day. I have a child with a chronic illness. I’ve had family issues, the death of my grandmother, who was such a mentor to me. And there are times that are so rough, or a hard day at work.
I remember in the summer, when I was having one of those days, one of the things I’m grateful for was being able to sit in my pool in the sun and drink my coffee in the morning for 30 minutes. That was something very specific that gave me happiness.
I give that advice to others. Be specific. It’s not, “I’m grateful for my family.” It’s, “I’m grateful that my son did this today.” It has helped me through some really hard times.
Finally, Jaime, what’s the best advice anybody has ever given you?
It was ingrained from the time I was younger that you need to be able to support yourself, stand on your own two feet. And education is key. I try to instill that in my children as well.
And in my professional life, I already shared the advice of “What’s next?” Maybe you don’t call it advice, but that question has impacted my life greatly and unlocked the drive that’s gotten me to where I am today at Manor.
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Publisher’s note: Helen Harris contributed to this profile.
