From Brooklyn to Stuyvesant to Monteith College

With Martin Herman, PhD, Professor Emeritus, Wayne State University

Listen to Martin Herman’s journey from Manhattan's Stuyvesant High School to Wayne State University’s Monteith College, and everywhere in between.  Martin made undergraduate general education more meaningful by creating the environment of a small liberal arts college within a large university. In 1969, he became chair of Monteith’s Division of Humanistic Studies, a position he held until the University decided to phase out the College in December 1975. 

Martin explains his path from an undergraduate degree from the College of William and Mary, to Yale, to the University of Michigan, to teaching musicology at Colorado College.

Herman is also one of the founding fathers of SOAR (Society of Active Retirees), a lifelong learning program affiliated with Wayne State. Established in 2003, it offers non-credit classes to retirees and all who remain devoted to continuing education. Its faculty, consisting largely of retired faculty members from area universities and colleges, all volunteer their services and, as Herman says, “consider it an important contribution to the well-being of the community by helping to fulfill an unmet need. People are living longer, and not all of them want to sit in front of a television set watching reruns and game shows.” 

Martin was also involved in the i.Detroit project, created by Marcus Lyon, which spotlights 100 Detroiters and their community involvement. A strong commitment to education and spirituality — along with actions taken to realize those commitments in Detroit — has brought Martin Herman a place in a new book, i.Detroit — A Human Atlas of an American City.