June 16, 2015
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
CONTACT: Cristina Diaz
Media and Community Relations Manager
215.753.3664
PHILADELPHIA, PA – Chestnut Hill College alumna Ritamarie Moscola, M.D., M.P.H. ’78, was awarded the College’s Alumni Association’s Distinguished Achievement Award at its 70th Annual Reunion Weekend, which took place June 3-5. Dr. Moscola was honored at the reunion luncheon for her accomplishments in her professional life, her dedication to community service and her continued commitment to the College’s core values.
Although she didn’t know it when she graduated from Chestnut Hill College and went on to earn several more degrees, certifications and numerous awards — Ritamarie Moscola, M.D., M.P.H., ’78 learned just about everything she needed for life at the school on the hill.
“It has taken me a whole career to put together what I learned at CHC,” she says. “When I left, it was hard to go from a liberal arts atmosphere to a ‘memorize-this’ world. And now I can talk about philosophy, spiritualty and speak Spanish, a language I have often needed, and so much more, because of Chestnut Hill College.”
She sees the whole of her life as a ministry, one in which her work in medicine has joined her painting and musical skills, all under the auspices of a Catholic education and the teachings of Catholic social justice. She tells the story of Saint Rita, a peacekeeper, who sat with the dying, and of Saint Therese, The Little Flower, who espoused the belief that we humans are right where we are supposed to be in our lives — right where God has put us. And she appreciates the connections between her learning at Chestnut Hill College, these women and her life’s work.
Moscola earned her M.D. from the Pennsylvania State University and her M.P.H. from Johns Hopkins University. After completing the post-baccalaureate certificate program at the Maryland Institute College of Art, she began to integrate her painting, drawing and multi-media artistic skills with her healing profession.
Today, as the Service Line Manager for Geriatrics and Extended Care at the Veteran’s Administration Medical Center in Manchester, N.H., Dr. Moscola, the geriatrician and hospice physician, is the medical director of the facility’s inpatient and outpatient programs. Dr. Ritamarie, the artist and musician, considers her art a true ministry to help women in shelters, teen groups and hospice patients — integrating all of her roles in her work and in her life.
“It’s pretty funny when I play Bon Jovi on my accordion,” she says with a laugh. But for her, and everyone with whom she comes in contact, it’s all part of her life journey of education and service that got its start at Chestnut Hill College.
About the Alumni Association’s Distinguished Achievement Award
The Distinguished Achievement Award identifies graduates of the College who have produced a history of accomplishment in their business or profession or in civic, philanthropic, or other volunteer activities.
About Chestnut Hill College
Celebrating more than 90 years of tradition, Chestnut Hill College is a four-year, coed Catholic college in the Ignatian tradition that offers a traditional liberal arts undergraduate program as well as accelerated undergraduate degrees, master’s and doctoral programs. The College has been rated by US News & World Report as among the best master’s universities in the North, as among the best Northeastern colleges by The Princeton Review, and has been classified as selective by The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
Since 1924, the College has offered a rigorous curriculum that provides students with a broad background in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. The goal of Chestnut Hill College has been to prepare students for life’s challenges by helping them to grow intellectually, spiritually, emotionally, and socially. http://www.chc.edu/
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