John Maag journeys from aspiring musician to commencement speaker


John Maag

John Maag journeys from aspiring musician to commencement speaker

10 May 2018     By Kelcey Buck

To say John Maag never expected to be speaking at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s graduate commencement ceremony last Friday would be a vast understatement. After all, Maag hadn’t even planned to go to college himself, let alone go on to earn three college degrees and spend his career mentoring future educators. 

A man passionate about music who also loves the outdoors, Maag tells of the winding journey that led him from the suburbs of Chicago where he was born and raised to Wisconsin, Arizona, Maryland and eventually Nebraska, where he has spent the last 29 years as a professor in UNL’s Department of Special Education and Communication Disorders. 

“I wasn’t going to go to college. I’d played in bands with my friends off and on since I was in sixth grade, so I thought, ‘Let’s try to take a stab at this. Let’s really try to do it and write original stuff.’ 

But three of his five bandmates decided to go to college and Maag was left trying to figure out what to do. Admitting he was not the best student in high school, Maag ended up going to the University of Wisconsin-Stout in Menomonie, Wisconsin. It was a brief stay, but that was part of his plan. 

“I just did three semesters there and got my grades up. I knew I wasn’t going to graduate from there because I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do. So, I got my grades up and had enough credits so that when I transferred they wouldn’t look at my high school grades.” 

But it was his short time at UW-Stout that ended up setting Maag on his career path as a leader in the special education field focusing on the area of teaching children with emotional and behavior disorders. While Maag was unsure what he wanted to study, his roommate at UW-Stout was in the vocational rehabilitation program. Maag quizzed him about what a person does with vocational rehab and was intrigued by his roommate’s answer. 

“I always liked psychology stuff, so I took intro to psychology my first semester at Stout, and then one of the classes my roommate, Jerry, was taking was abnormal psychology because it was part of the voc rehab program,” Maag explained. “So, I took it and I really, really liked it. I thought it was really cool. It had a great instructor. After that, I KNEW I wanted to do something with people who have emotional behavior/mental illness/mental health issues.” 

After three semesters at UW-Stout, Maag returned home and worked. While at home, he came up with two areas where he could work with individuals who have mental health issues, behavior and emotional issues. One was psychology. The other was special education. After a year and a half working at home, Maag went to Arizona State University where he completed his undergraduate degree in special education and psychology. 

“I started out in psychology but I knew that I’d have to go on to graduate school and that wasn’t even in the picture then, so, I added special education to it.” 

From there, Maag taught in the Phoenix area, then got licensed as a professional counselor and worked at an adolescent psychiatric hospital as a clinical supervisor. He realized he wanted to go to graduate school after all and had to decide between studying special education at Arizona State or counseling and psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. 

“For me, the decision was two-fold,” Maag said. “One, I thought education, outside of the home, there’s no other environment where kids spend as much time as in school. So, I thought that was where I could have my biggest impact. AND Arizona State was going to give me more money.” 

By the time he began pursuing his doctorate, Maag knew he wanted to work in higher education. After graduating, he applied and interviewed for jobs at several places, before accepting a position as an assistant professor at the University of Maryland in College Park, Maryland. 

Maag spent only one year at Maryland because he wanted to find a place with a lower cost of living. He began his job search process by asking his mentors to update their letters of reference for him. One of those mentors happened to visit with Reece Peterson, now a professor emeritus in Nebraska’s Department of Special Education and Communication Disorders, at a conference. Peterson mentioned that Nebraska had a faculty position open and Maag’s mentor recommended him. Maag got the job and was happy to return to the Midwest since he had family in Chicago and Minneapolis, and friends in Denver. 

“I figured I’d come here for four or five years, then I wanted to get out to the mountains. Then 29 years later, here I am.” 

The pull of Lincoln and life kept him here past that five-year mark. Maag admits he considered going elsewhere in the past, but the right opportunity never presented itself and now that he’s closer to the end of his career than the beginning, he has no desire to start over in a new place. 

Safe to say Maag has seen his share of changes in special education over the course of his career. Asked what some of the biggest changes have been, he is quick to answer – inclusion. Maag has his reservations about inclusion, mainly that the field of special education may lose its identity and become consumed by general education. As for his specific area of expertise – emotional and behavior disorders – Maag has seen changes there as well. 

“The percentage of kids who display emotional and behavior disorders has remained relatively constant throughout the decades – autism excluded. It’s always been at about 3 to 5 percent. What seems to have changed is not the frequency, but the intensity. Kids are displaying more intense inappropriate behaviors. Kids are having more mental health issues, which I view as an intensity issue as well.” 

Over the course of his career, Maag has had plenty of highlights. After all, he says as he has built his career, everything has kind of been a highlight. But he points out a few specific peaks – presenting at a professional conference in Chicago with his dad in the audience, getting complimented on things he’s written, achieving promotion and tenure, receiving standing ovations after speaking, even one time being applauded by his students on the last day of class. And don’t let him forget the one other time he served as a commencement speaker. 

“I gave one other commencement speech in my life and it was 30 years ago to the month of May. It was when I got my doctorate. I ended up being selected as the outstanding graduate student, and part of that was giving a speech. I was sitting behind the governor of Arizona, and I was probably less nervous then than this time because I had no idea what I was getting into.” 

Maag had no expectation of receiving a standing ovation for his speech at Nebraska’s May 2018 graduate commencement, but he knew the opportunity to speak would be added to his list of career highlights. A long list that continues to grow from a remarkable career.


Special Education and Communication Disorders