“What I tell young women today is, you’re hired for a job and you’re going to do that job. You should volunteer for everything you can volunteer for.”

Dr. Davie Jane Gilmour, the president of the Pennsylvania College of Technology, who is retiring in the coming weeks, certainly lived by those words during her tenure at Penn College.

Her contributions both to the school and to the community are well-known. She has helped lead Little League International, the Williamsport-Lycoming Chamber of Commerce and other community institutions. She was the chamber’s volunteer of the year in 2012 and has also won awards from the Williamsport YWCA and Lycoming County Brotherhood Alliance.

Her words to the Sun-Gazette in our most recent weekend edition and, more importantly, her example should inspire young women and young men.

The sense of public service she brought to Penn College, as well as her humility — she repeatedly praised the school’s faculty and staff, particularly for their heroic efforts during COVID-19. It was just as clear from the scope of her conversations with the Sun-Gazette as it has been from covering Penn College over decades that Gilmour paid attention to the details in her pursuit of making Penn College a world-class institution.

The humility and public service Gilmour’s example teaches can help any business, school or organization thrive.

While we hope younger people in our communities can put Gilmour’s shoes on, so to speak, we don’t expect that anyone will truly fill them for quite some time.