Pugno, Lawrence (1921-2010)
Date Updated
8-7-2019
Department
Secondary Education
Academic Rank
Professor
Year Retired from SJSU
1984
Educational Background
Teachers College, Columbia University, 1957 MA; EdD
Indiana State Teachers College, 1943 BS
Teaching Experience
San Jose State University, 1957-
Illinois State Normal University, 1952-1955
Valley High School, West Terre Haute, In, 1945-1948
Administrative and Professional Experience
U. S. Naval Reserve Officer, 1943-46
School Principal, Redmon IL, and Merom IN, 1949-52
Bookstore owner and manager, Murphys CA, 1980-95
Selected Publications
Ford and Pugno, The Structure of Knowledge and the Curriculum: Secondary School Curriculum. (contributed two chapters)
Files
Personal Commentary
I am the son of Italian immigrants, Filomena and Battista Pugno, neither schooled beyond third grade. (It can only happen in America – through good public schools, inexpensive state colleges and the G. I. Bill – the son earned a doctorate.)
I joined the Naval Reserve V-6 program just after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. Upon graduation in 1943, I began officer training and was commissioned as an Ensign in the U.S. Naval Reserve. I was shipped off to North Africa to begin service on the LST 383, which continued for 18 months in the Mediterranean Sea and Atlantic Ocean. This encompassed the invasions at Anzio and Normandy D-Day. The years of 1944 and 45 were spent on the U.S.S. Laertes in the Pacific theater, ending in Okinawa when the atomic bombs were dropped on Japan.
I was married in 1943 to my high school sweetheart, who passed away in 1996. She was a great wife, mother and Registered Nurse.
I began as an assistant professor at San José State University in 1957 with a supportive and highly professional school and departmental staff. Bill Sweeney and G.W. Ford led a rapidly expanding teacher education program that provided great numbers of well-qualified teachers for schools of California and the West.
My major accomplishments in addition to teaching during my years at San José State University were the development of a field-based teacher education program, and the Intercampus Program that gave hundreds of practicing teachers comparative experience in schools in Scotland and Sweden.
During my 32 years at San José State University, I received two sabbaticals—one for comparative study of Scottish education centered at the Aberdeen College of Education, and the second with the Pedagogical Research Institute in Stockholm, Sweden.
I have traveled extensively—being able to become acquainted with 57 countries worldwide.
Date Completed: January 2, 2010