Suzanne Roach

Suzanne Roach of Oakmont just celebrated her 40th wedding anniversary with her husband Frank. It was a celebration of life with relatives and good friends. It was also a time to honor Suzanne for her years of unselfish service to others. Oakmont is more than a community. It is like a family, small enough for most to know each other. It is a community that has many great citizens who invest their lives in others and the organizations that serve the area.

Suzanne Roach is one of those great citizens. A year ago she received news from her physician that shocked her. He informed her she had Ovarian cancer. Today she is in Stage III and currently undergoing treatment at McGee Hospital. Suzanne, in the midst of this news, holds a positive view of her journey. She said, “I am in a win win situation. As long as there is life, there is hope”. She went on, “I am a Christian and get to stay with my family. If I go, I go home”.

That is who Suzanne Roach is. When most would be depressed with a serious disease such as this, she has done what she always does – started working with the Ovarian Cancer Coalition to raise money. The 2006 Tekkoshocon Convention (Tekkoshocon is a Japanese animation and pop culture convention which has been held annually in the Pittsburgh area since 2003) was in honor of Suzanne with monies being donated to Pittsburgh Division of the National Ovarian Cancer Coalition.

Living in Oakmont for 32 years, Suzanne has made a mark on the community. Her first round of service began as a Troop Leader in the Girl Scouts. She then became District Neighborhood Chairperson and later a member of the Council’s Board of Directors. She served the Girl Scouts for seven years. She became interested in drama during her time in the Girl Scouts and joined the New Kensington Civic Theatre. She did costumes and then worked on the lighting board for a while. She also worked with the former Sherwood Forest Theater.

By 1989 Suzanne volunteered to work with the Riverview High School Drama Club. She led the student produced plays that were held each year. In 1990 it was Wizard of Oz. As many know, it requires endless hours after school to set up these plays and carry out practice. Although she was a volunteer, the school district later began to give a yearly paid supplement for the position. She was also Director Activities in the auditorium. Her stint with the Drama Club went until 1996 when her daughter graduated. She fondly remembers each year the Drama Club ended the season by having a lot of fun. One year was a mock Academy Award ceremony. “They always did something nutty,” she said. Another legacy of her time with the Drama Club is a student who today performs on Broadway plays.

Suzanne did another extraordinary act by establishing a scholarship for students that moved onto performing arts in higher education. Funded by the drama club, she also contributed to it. Valley High School (New Kensington-Arnold School District) asked her to help them establish a drama club. She became a Creative Consultant for three years and the income she earned was donated to the Riverview Drama Club scholarship program.

Suzanne has been a member of the Garden Club of Oakmont for 20 years. She served on the Boulevard Committee that carried out the extraordinary project of paving the main shopping district road with bricks. The committee also did much more with gaslights, ramps and making the area green. She was also Operation Chairperson for the Christmas House, a yearly program of using a local home for Christmas tours. This carried a lot of responsibility for security, care and managing tours.

Suzanne says, “Jobs need to be done”. Although she has a passion for students, she has continued to invest in other community projects. She served as Secretary of the Oakmont-Verona Memorial Day Planning Committee and was responsible for assisting with the ceremony and veteran’s luncheon. “I have a great love for our country and to honor the men and women who serve and those who gave their lives,” she told us.

In between all this she also gave a year service to the Oakmont Kerr Museum where she was a docent, a guide in the museum.

Since 1990 Suzanne has worked for Today’s Market, a natural and gourmet food store that offers cooking classes and are specialists in special need diets (i.e. gluten-free, dairy-free, wheat-free). She is an Administrative Assistant and Display Manager. It was in this position that led her to join the Oakmont Chamber of Commerce, where once again she became deeply involved and committed to its purpose. She is now on the Board of Directors and is Chairperson of the Economic Development Committee.

Remarkably, Suzanne said that belonging to these many community organizations has given her a chance to learn many things. It shows that those who invest themselves in community service can also be benefactors of what they learn inn the process.

Suzanne’s credentials for her service in education were established years ago when she graduated from Radford College (now University) in Radford, Virginia. She received her Bachelor of Science in Education and then taught in York County Schools (Virginia). She continued her education at William & Mary earning a Masters in Arts in Education in 1965. She majored in Educational Supervision Instruction with a minor in Special Education. She also met her husband, Frank, who was working for NASA in Williamsburg. He was working on the Mercury program at the time. They were married in 1966.

Frank moved and took a position at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, PA after they were married. Suzanne took a teaching position with the Bethlehem Area School District. Because of her training, she was selected to oversee a pilot program for Phonemic Awareness in Beginning Reading. Unlike phonics, phonemic awareness is the ability to hear and manipulate sounds in words. A program used in England, it was being tested in only two United States schools. Bethlehem was one of them. She taught there for three years. The Phonemic Awareness pilot was cancelled and went no further even though it had proven to show excellent results in England and during the pilot test in Bethlehem.

Frank then took a new position and accepted work at Westinghouse. They moved to Murrysville and began a family. It was at this point Suzanne became a mom at home. One year later they moved to Oakmont. It was being a mom at home and raising two girls that led Suzanne to community service.

Today, in the midst of her battle with cancer and being limited in her ability to move about, she still goes on with a positive attitude. At our interview she turned her attention to a young man who had accompanied me. She began to speak with him about various subjects and all the while she was doing this her teaching instincts were educating him. She truly is a remarkable person.