Vivian Alicia Rogers
Memorial services for Vivian Alicia Rogers, 84, West Hartford, Conn., will be at St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church in Lawrence later this summer.
Ms. Rogers died Monday, June 14, 2004, in West Hartford.
She was born Sept. 3, 1919, in New Haven, Conn., the daughter of Josephine and Martin Rogers. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and sociology in 1941 from Albertus Magnus College, a Master of Arts degree in international relations in 1949 from the University of Chicago, a Master of Science in Education degree in counseling from Kansas University in 1973 and a doctorate in adult education and development in 1975 from Kansas State University.
Ms. Rogers was an officer candidate in the first class of women to be commissioned in the United States Marine Corps during World War II. She was commissioned at Camp Lejeune, N.C., in 1943 and spent three years as a recruiting and rehabilitation officer before completing active duty. She served as Marine Corps archivist in Washington, D.C., and was promoted to captain in 1953. She was honorably discharged in 1954.
She returned to the work force in 1966 as an administrator at the KU Division of Continuing Education. She founded and directed the Adult Life Resource Center in 1968 to help nontraditional students, many of whom had raised families or returned to earn mid-career college degrees. She was appointed assistant dean of the KU Division of Continuing Education in 1980 and served as director of the Center for the Education of Women at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor from 1985 to 1988.
Ms. Rogers retired to Wilmington, N.C., where she wrote the column “Live and Learn” for the Wilmington Star-News and was active as a consultant, counselor, writer and visiting scholar at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.
She married Donald R. McCoy in 1949. They divorced in 1980.
Survivors include a daughter, Patricia McCoy, Farmington, Conn.; two sons, Bernard McCoy, Gahanna, Ohio, and William McCoy, Olathe; and three grandchildren.
The family suggests memorials to the Women and Nontraditional Student Leadership Fund, sent in care of the Kansas University Endowment Association, P.O. Box 928, Lawrence 66044.