Linda (Althoff) Bowman came to this community as an undergraduate student at Illinois State University in 1979. She earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in speech pathology at ISU, and joined the faculty there as a full-time instructor and supervisor in 1986. During her 30 years at ISU, Linda taught graduate and undergraduate courses, supervised graduate clinicians and served as the department’s Academic Advisor, Clinic Coordinator, and Clinic Director. She retired from the Department in May of 2015.

Linda and her husband Al served as Illinois State University’s President and First Lady from 2003 through 2013. They support a number of local, national and international charities including: Boys and Girls Club, Home Sweet Home Mission, Red Cross, Heifer Project, International Justice Mission, and the Southern Poverty Law Center. They remain active on campus. Their daughter, Natalie, graduated from the University of Wisconsin, and is a practicing speech-language pathologist in Denver. Laura is an ISU graduate, and works for Banana Republic at their corporate headquarters in San Francisco.