Dean Kimberly A. Lawless provides a brief update

The work we do here in the Penn State College of Education is of vital importance. We are working hard to reimagine education to improve the lives of learners, educators and community members at the regional, state, national and global levels. Through our work, we contribute to the creation of more equitable educational opportunities and outcomes for learners across their lifespan.

As important as that work is, what really sets us apart from other colleges of education and makes us rise above the others is our people, and we are celebrating some of those individuals in this issue of our Alumni Magazine.

Our faculty, staff, students and alumni prove every day that they are changemakers. On the pages that follow you’ll get to meet some of them: alumni Elijah Dean Kimberly A. Lawless Armstrong, Christina Parle and Jonathan C.W. Jones; current students Rebecca Duiker and Giani Clarke; and a host of faculty and staff change-makers that our alumni and current students have identified as having made a lasting, positive impact on them.

One of the benefits of being able to write this column is that I can share some of the great things our college community is doing that happened after the magazine’s story lineup was set. For example, I just learned that two of our students won University-wide awards.

Jonni Parker, a senior majoring in elementary and early childhood education, received the Ernest B. McCoy Memorial Award for 2022. The award is presented to a senior student-athlete who has combined successful athletic participation with academic excellence. Read about her at https://bit.ly/3NMK9Ca online.

In addition, Natalia Reed, a senior double-majoring in psychology and rehabilitation and human services with a minor in deafness and hearing studies, has been named the 2022 recipient of the Eric A. Walker Award. The award is presented annually to the student who has contributed most to enhancing the reputation of the University through extracurricular activities. Read about her at https://bit.ly/3tWUpjn online.

This spring we also have had several faculty honored by national organizations: Julia Bryan, professor of education (counselor education), has been honored as an American Counseling Association Fellow. Janice Byrd, assistant professor of education (counselor education) received the 2022 Association for Multicultural Counseling and Development Young Emerging Leader Award. Gilberto Q. Conchas, the Wayne K. and Anita Woolfolk Hoy Endowed Professor of Education, has been honored with the American Association of Hispanics in Higher Education University Faculty Award. Jim Herbert, professor of education (counselor education and rehabilitation and human services), received the Distinguished Career in Rehabilitation Education Award from the National Council on Rehabilitation Education. And Francesca López, Waterbury Chair in Equity Pedagogy and professor of education, was named one of 18 American Educational Research Association Fellows for 2022.

I am humbled to be working in a college full of so many elite faculty members who are truly involved in their students’ learning, staff members who make our students feel welcome and who provide them with the resources they need to succeed, and advisers who truly get to know their students and show a level of caring that makes a palpable difference in those students’ college experiences.

We may still have a long way to go in fulfilling our mission of improving the equity and inclusivity of our education systems, but we also must celebrate the progress we have made. I invite you to continue to follow what’s happening in our college through Bridges, our e-newsletter. If you don’t receive that twice-monthly email newsletter and would like to, please email edrelations@psu.edu and ask to be added to the subscription list.