Andrea Ferraco-Redinger - Saint Vincent College

Andrea Ferraco-Redinger credits her biology degree from Saint Vincent College with opening the door to numerous career opportunities.

While at Saint Vincent, Mrs. Redinger was inducted into Alpha Lambda Delta and Alpha Chi. She was the recipient of the student service award for leadership roles on campus, and was awarded the opportunity to conduct her senior research on breast cancer at Allegheny General Hospital. Mrs. Redinger was a student-faculty-administration board member, a biology teaching lab assistant, and senior class president.

Mrs. Redinger was captain of the women’s volleyball team at SVC. Her experience in this leadership role served her well as head volleyball coach at Hampton High School. As the junior Olympic volleyball coach for the Greensburg Area Volleyball Association (GAVA), her 16-and-under volleyball team came in third place on the East Coast in 2004.

Immediately after graduating from SVC in 2001, Mrs. Redinger worked for the University of Pittsburgh Medical School, Dept. of Pathology, on Hepatitus C research while also attending Duquesne University for her masters degree in education.

She completed her student teaching requirement at Hampton High School, Allegheny County and went on to Gateway High School as a full-time substitute biology teacher.

“After Gateway I started interviewing at various schools. I had four full-time teaching offers and I chose to take a position at Greensburg Salem High School,” she said. "One of the main reasons I had that many offers was definitely due to the strong education I received at Saint Vincent."

Mrs. Redinger has received numerous awards including the National Association of Biology Teacher’s Outstanding New Biology Teacher of the Year, Pennsylvania Science Teachers Association’s McIllwaine Science Teaching Award, and Who’s Who Among American High School Teachers. She was also the recipient of Duquesne University’s Dean’s Teaching Fellow.

In addition to her duties at Greensburg Salem, she is a biology book reviewer for The American Biology Teacher, a ‘Master Teacher’ with the Center for Genomic Science, an Allegheny General Hospital Teacher Research program, and the Bio-Adventures Club advisor at Greensburg Salem. She was chosen to participate in Connecting Humans and Nature in a Costa Rican Environment program to study ecosystems and is currently developing a web-based module focusing on global warming.

Mrs. Redinger is also a National Biotechnology Teacher Leader for the Biotechnology Institute, and the H.S. Biotechnology Outreach Coordinator at Saint Vincent College under Brother Norman Hipps, O.S.B., Dean.

“Biotechnology, though not an 'old' science, is a 'new' science for high school curriculums and many teachers haven't been exposed to it. I have given presentations and have been invited to give presentations all over the nation on some of the modules we've been developing at Saint Vincent," Mrs. Redinger said.

She met her husband, David, when she started teaching at Greensburg Salem. They were married on Nov. 26, 2005 and now live in Greensburg.

"I could have done anything with my degree - medical school, run a laboratory, and I chose to go into education. I received great background knowledge in biology at Saint Vincent,” she said.