New Faculty Endowments

Drs. Vanessa Dennen and Lyndsay Jenkins have had impressive careers, and this year, each faculty member celebrated their latest accomplishment: being named an endowed professor. Endowed professorships often rank as the highest academic honor a university can award a faculty member, and both Dennen and Jenkins have distinguished themselves as excellent scholars, mentors, and teachers.

Dennen was named the Mack and Effie Campbell Tyner Distinguished Professor. She teaches in the Instructional Systems & Learning Technologies program in the department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems. “This is my 20th year at FSU, and I’ve been reflecting a lot on what I’ve done during the last two decades,” says Dennen. “Receiving an endowed professorship this year really affirmed my growth and accomplishments as a leader and a scholar during this time. It also felt like a vote of confidence in my contribution to the college and my field.”

Jenkins, who is also in the department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems, was chosen as the Michael and Jean Shahnasarian Endowed Associate Professor. She teaches in the School Psychology and Counseling Psychology programs, as well as serves as the associate chair for the department. Her accomplishment is made all the sweeter by the fact that this is a new endowment for the college. “I still have not fully gotten used to saying I am an endowed associate professor. It’s surreal!” says Jenkins.

INVESTIGATING BULLYING

Jenkins has spent much of her career investigating bullying. Her research areas include bullying, cyber bullying, sexual harassment, and racial microaggression. In addition to her research, she also focuses her attention on developing interventions for children and adolescents who are bullied or victimized by their peers.

Dr. Lyndsay Jenkins

“I find it fascinating that we can harness the power of witnesses to proactively intervene to stop social aggression,” she says. “A major reason why people do not intervene is that they do not know what to do or they do not feel confident that their actions can make a difference. I am on a mission to find out how we can teach youth and young adults about the importance of intervening and the powerful role that they can play in the prevention of social aggression.”

While a great deal of attention has been placed on bullying, Jenkins says that “there is a surprising lack of support and specific programs designed to help youth who have been chronically bullied.” She received grant support to develop a pilot program utilizing small group interventions. “The initial results suggest that the youth in the program benefited from the skills they learned as well as the social support from their group mates,” she says. She hopes to eventually receive additional support to evaluate this intervention on a larger scale.

SOCIAL MEDIA USAGE

Dennen’s current research focuses on another common element of student life: social media. This area of research saw an increase in demand during the early days during the pandemic, when Dennen became a leading voice on how to effectively build communities online. Now that schools have returned to face-to-face instruction, Dennen’s research still has plenty of important insights to provide, particularly as she works to better understand teenagers’ normal social media habits and “to better support their needs and accomplishments in digital environments.”

Her interest in technology extends to other areas, as she looks to understand how technology can be better integrated into classrooms. Currently, her research group is also looking at “studying norms and best practices for synchronous learning, especially when a webcam is used.” While the project started during online instruction caused by the pandemic, the “study has rapidly become an area of interest that I think I’ll continue to work on for a while,” she says.

Dr. Vanessa Dennen

Many of her research areas are linked together, Dennen says, and she and her team are working to identify “norms, literacies, activities and outcomes in mediated environments.” Understanding how individuals use technology, particularly social media, can be “used to support informal learning and professional development”

BUILDING THE FUTURE

With two decades at FSU, Dennen has a lot of pride in what she has accomplished, but

she says that the thing she is most proud of is the “research community that I’ve built with my students. One of my advisors told me when I graduated that as a professor, you should build the community that you want to work with around yourself. I took his advice to heart.”

“Collectively, my group has had a lot of successes,” she says. “We are researching and publishing. My students are graduating and getting great jobs. And the group itself is a wonderful source of support. The active members rotate around as people graduate and new students arrive, but ongoing relationships and collaborations that live on long after graduation are formed through this group, and it’s been such a positive part of the FSU experience for us.”

Jenkins has also made her mark on the college. “One of my proudest accomplishments is the development and continued directorship of Seminoles ASPIRE.” Seminoles ASPIRE promotes mental health at Florida State University Schools (FSUS) through a multitiered approach. The program delivers programming to FSUS students designed to promote healthy social and emotional skills. Through the small group counseling and individual counseling sessions, Seminoles ASPIRE sees nearly 100 students each year.

“For the most part, students participating in the counseling services would not be able to receive counseling otherwise,” Jenkins says.

Not only do students at FSUS benefit from Seminoles ASPIRE, but Jenkins’ graduate students also gain invaluable experience through the program. Doctoral students in the counseling psychology and school psychology Ph.D. program run the group and individual counseling services, and specialist students from the school psychology M.S./ Ed.S. program help run Seminoles ASPIRE. “I am proud of Seminoles ASPIRE because so many individuals are benefiting from the partnership,” she says.

THE COLLEGE COMMUNITY

Beyond Seminoles ASPIRE, Jenkins is proud to simply be a part of the College of Education community. “The FSU College of Education is a special place because it is evident that people within the college care about each other and about the community in which we reside,” she says.

Dennen echoes the sentiment, adding that the college “has consistently been focused on helping people achieve their goals. The college is more than just a place that houses academic programs. It is a collection of people and resources that support learning, exploration, and growth.”

Thanks to supporters like Michael and Jean Shahnasarian and Mack and Effie Campbell, the college continues to grow and provide resources to faculty members, building a stronger community that helps individuals achieve their goals. “I’ve certainly benefitted from my interactions with our faculty, students, staff, leadership, and alumni over the years,” says Dennen. “Their support has been important to my career growth. That makes me want to reciprocate and help others in the college reach their goals, as well.”