Eastern professor of secondary education, Earl S. Cummings Jr. died of pulmonary fibrosis, a rare lung-related illness, May 21 at St. Vincent’s Hospital in Indianapolis.

Mahmood Butt, chair of the department of secondary education and foundations, said Cummings was a dedicated professor and stood out as someone who truly cared about the methods of education.

“As chair of this department, I have seen student evaluations of his classes,” Butt said, “They continually rated him as a superior teacher with a caring style of teaching.”

Butt said Cummings encouraged his undergraduate students to challenge themselves to be better teachers by utilizing material outside of the general curriculum.

Butt said Cummings made himself available to students for long hours outside of the classroom and was a highly dedicated teacher who truly cared.

Cummings had been teaching classes at the undergraduate and graduate level and has been an annually contracted Eastern professor since 1992.

Cummings was born in Sullivan Indiana in 1933. After earning an undergraduate degree from Indiana State University, Cummings went on to earn a master’s degree from Ball State and returned to Indiana University in the early 90s earning his doctorate.

Before his time at Eastern, Cummings taught at Indiana University and Purdue University at Indianapolis.

His wife, Patricia Cummings, said he was one of the founding developers of the Correctional Training Institute in Plainfield Indiana, which is a training facility for Indiana police officers.

Butt said Cummings was a 32 degree mason, one of the highest positions in the organization, and served as a minister at the First Christian Church in Brazil, Indiana for twelve years.

“We had a (Eastern) counselor say that when students come back in the fall (to register) they’ll be disappointed because everyone says, take Cummings, take Cummings,” Mrs. Cummings said.

Cummings is survived by his wife patricia, his son John, his daughter Joan and his five grandchildren.