Valerie Davis remembers when she first met John Bardo as a teenager. 

“He was the guy with the long hair and the beard coming over to take my sister out. And the pink pants,” Davis said. “I’m sure it was quite a shock to my dad. My parents were pretty conservative.”

Bardo ended up marrying her sister, Deborah, in 1975. The couple first met in Neff Hall on the Wichita State campus and little has changed in their relationship since.

“They are like a young couple in love still,” Davis said. 

Davis, along with her sister, is a graduate of WSU. Davis currently teaches 5th grade at Irving Elementary in Wichita. 

Bardo lived in Wichita a number of years, including from 1978-83 when he served as the chairperson for the Department of Sociology and Social Work at WSU. 

For the nearly 30 years since, Bardo has served in numerous academic roles across the country, his most recent post being the chancellor of Western Carolina University. 

Now, Bardo finds himself back in Wichita in a role he never thought would be his. 

“One of the people I respected most in my whole career and in my life was the president who was here the first time, Clark Ahlberg,” Bardo said. “To know that I am now sitting in his office and living in his house, that really is quite an emotional thing.”

Bardo, 63, is now the president of WSU. His term officially began July 1. He takes over for Don Beggs, who stepped down after 13 years as president.

While the unpacking is pretty much done, Bardo and first lady Deborah are still in the process of making the president’s home their own. Part of this process is to find time for their favorite hobbies. 

“Many times I’ll get up early on Sunday morning and do a couple of hours of glass work, quietly in the basement by myself with the music playing,” Bardo said. “It clears my head.”

Bardo has always had a fascination with stained glass, something he attributes to growing up in an older house with stained-glass windows.  

“I just always thought stained glass was beautiful,” he said. “When we first got married, my wife was trying to think about what to give me for a present and gave me stained glass lessons.”

At the time, making stained glass was an expensive hobby. A little more than a decade ago, Bardo resurrected his hobby when prices came down. 

He has made around 20 stained-glass panels since then, despite often having only weekends to work on them. 

Now that he is president, Bardo realizes he will have even less time to dedicate to stained glass. 

But for him and his family, putting aside his favorite hobby to lead his favorite university is almost a dream come true. 

“It’s always been a dream of ours for him to come back here and be the president. It’s something we thought would never, ever happen,” Davis said. “He may be the big wheel out at the university, but we still put him to work in the kitchen, doing the dishes.”