During the International Leadership Awards held at the NFDMA Convention in New Orleans last August, Sharon L. Gee-Mascarello was honored as 2013 Mortuary Science Instructor of the year.

  Sharon serves as Clinical Faculty in the Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, Fundamental and Applied Sciences, Mortuary Science Program, at Wayne State University in Detroit, MI. An alumnus, Sharon began teaching a decade after graduation.

  As Instructor of Embalming, Sharon is responsible for both classroom and laboratory sessions.  She coordinates Practicum, a two semester job-shadowing intensive wherein students gain valuable field experience in area funeral homes, aligned with licensed mentors.

  She also teaches Religions Values, and Death and a newly designed course, Presentation & Cosmetics.  This recent addition to the curriculum is designed to give students hands-on exposure to dressing, casketing, cosmetic airbrushing, flag and pall folding, decedent transfer, as well as the proper usage of mortuary equipment.  Students are encouraged to develop a detail-oriented mindset to finesse every case for open casket viewing. 

  Sharon is a member of the Michigan Funeral Directors Association, serves as President of the Michigan Embalmers Society, Vice President of the American Society of Embalmers, past board member with the British Institute of Embalmers and member of the Ohio Embalmer Association. 

  Sharon enjoys speaking on numerous embalming-related topics, and presents regularly to national, state, and local funeral service organizations. Most recently Sharon presented “Embalming Infants and Children” at the American Society of Embalmers Conference in Chicago at Worsham College.  Earlier this year, she presented “Worry Free Cranial Autopsy Care” and “Embalming the Creutzfeldt-Jakob Case” for Arbor Memorial in Halifax, Nova Scotia. 

  In September, Sharon traveled to Atlantic City, NJ to present to the New Jersey State Funeral Directors Association.  She is a contributor to the 4th and 5th editions of the textbook, Embalming: History, Theory, and Practice by Robert G. Mayer.

  Sharon provides embalming services adherent to the Islamic ritual procedures for Gate to Heaven Funeral Home in Dearborn, MI where one of the largest Islamic Communities in the nation resides.

  Professionally astute and personally passionate about funeral service, Sharon was recognized  a few years ago by the Michigan Funeral Directors Association as a 25 year Michigan licensee and honored that same year with a Recognition of Teaching Award from her students in the Mortuary Science Program at Wayne State University.