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Every child is unique in their abilities, strengths and interests. With multiple options for online learning and academic programs available for purchase, it can be overwhelming to decide how to best support your children and their continued learning in the summer months.

Stephanie Lorenze and Ashley Martucci, service associate professors in the College of Applied Human Sciences, School of Education, have offered a guide for summer enrichment options.

West Virginia University leads the way in providing learning opportunities for nine of the 27 graduating high school seniors who were selected for the Underwood-Smith Teaching Scholarship.

Earning this year's scholarships were:

In West Virginia, inequities in youth access to mental health services have been magnified by the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and a statewide school counselor shortage. Research demonstrates that classroom teachers want to assist students who are experiencing mental health issues, but they do not always have the knowledge or resources to intervene.

To better equip West Virginia teachers and other school personnel to identify the signs and symptoms of mental health crises among students, Rawn Boulden, assistant professor, and Christine Schimmel, associate professor, of the School Counseling and Well-Being at West Virginia University, have received a five-year, $500,000 grant to provide Youth Mental Health First Aid Training in West Virginia schools.

Haley Sperringer has joined the Office of Student Success as a student success coordinator in the School of Sport Sciences.

Sperringer, from Morgantown, says she is looking forward to her new role. “I’m excited to work with students in the School of Sport Sciences to help them achieve their academic goals,” she explained.

A College of Physical Activity and Sport Sciences faculty member and a CPASS alumna are members of an international team that received the highly competitive Prince Faisal Bin Fahad Global Award for Sports Research by the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Sport and Leader’s Development Institute.

Dana Voelker, CPASS associate professor of sport, exercise, and performance psychology and Amanda Visek, associate professor at The George Washington University (WVU PhD SEP 2007), aim to advance youth sports in Saudi Arabia. The group includes Lisa Delpy Neirotti, The George Washington University, and Mohummed Alkhraji, King Saud University.

The Hayhurst family is renewing its commitment to keep West Virginia students in the Mountain State with three gifts to support full-ride scholarships at West Virginia University's John Chambers College of Business and Economics and the new College of Applied Human Sciences.

The family’s latest contributions – totaling $873,000 – support one new and two existing scholarships established to honor brothers Robert, Robin and Ronald Hayhurst and their shared passion for WVU.

Jihad Dixon, a native of Charleston, W.Va., made the most of his time at West Virginia University. The list of accomplishments, roles and clubs are too long to list, but suffice it to say you aren't named one of the Daily Athenaeum's most influential people in 2016 by just sitting in your dorm.

Dixon left WVU after receiving a bachelor's degree in political science (2017) and a master's degree in higher education administration. He has leveraged his skills learned in the classroom and as an active member of campus to land him as the associate director for strategy and operations for the My Brother's Keeper Alliance through the Obama Foundation.   

Inspired by her family, rising sophomore Lauren Marquart's decision to attend West Virginia University and major in elementary education was a relatively simple one.

Marquart, a native of Wheeling, W.Va., is heavily involved in numerous activities despite being on campus less than a year. She serves as a student ambassador and is involved with student government, and gave a talk at the TEDxWVU event in April.

Many mass killings are rooted in some sort of grievance — real or imagined unfair treatment — a  West Virginia University expert said in the aftermath of the Texas elementary school shootings that left more than 20 dead.

Jeff Daniels, a professor of counseling, helped develop a model that focuses on detectable behaviors of school and workplace violence perpetrators based on research in an upcoming book. Daniels, who studies school violence, hostage crises and police ambushes, said the model aims to identify people “going down what we call the fatal grievance pathway.”

Yamile Gonzalez made history as she become the first graduate student who successfully completed a sport management master’s thesis at West Virginia University.

Gonzalez came to WVU from Guadalajara, Mexico, in the fall of 2019. She initially enrolled in the traditional industry track of the CPASS sport management master’s program. After a year, she chose to change to the thesis track. “In the traditional track, it was not required for me to write a master’s thesis, but I opted to do it because I wanted to learn how to conduct research," Gonzalez said.

A dual M.S. in sport management and master’s in business administration degree at the College of Physical Activity and Sport Sciences has provided a solid foundation for Adrian Dowell's career path. Dowell serves as the vice chancellor and director of athletics at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, a position he has held since December 2021.

In this role, Dowell oversees Omaha Athletics, a Division I athletics program in the Summit League and National Collegiate Hockey Conferences. He also serves on the Chancellor’s Cabinet which includes additional leadership roles on campus. Currently, a typical day includes six or so meetings with staff, coaches, student-athletes, campus peers and external constituents and usually a game, according to Dowell.

Tracy Morris, a professor of psychology and current dean of the WVU College of Education and Human Services, will soon join the Office of the Provost as West Virginia University’s new associate provost for academic personnel. She was selected through an internal, University-wide search process.

Morris joined the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences Department of Psychology faculty in 1993 and has more than a decade of administrative experience at WVU. In 2018, she was named interim dean of the College of Education and Human Services and later given an additional two-year appointment as dean through June 2022. Most recently, she has been integral in efforts leading up to the creation of the new College of Applied Human Sciences.

A new internship program, hosted by WVU Sports Medicine, continues a long history of collaboration between CPASS and WVU Athletics. In the arrangement, Health and Well-being students serve as sports medicine student managers who observe the ‘day in the life’ of master’s level students. The arrangement supports the HWB undergrads as they look to the future and explore career options.

Rafael Joseph had plenty of options when it came to where he would pursue a master’s degree in counseling. He knew that there would be numerous similarities between programs when it came to curriculum. For Joseph, his decision to attend West Virginia University was based on the in-class education and the level of care and support from faculty.

The guidance he received helped lead Joseph to land one of 30 spots as a National Board for Certified Counselors Minority Fellow for Mental Health Counselors for 2022-23. The fellowship provides financial support to attend professional development trainings, seminars and symposiums throughout the country. The programing centers on mental health issues for underserved populations.

As CPASS prepares to honor student milestones at the May 2022 commencement ceremony, students reflect on the success and challenges that they experienced coming out of the pandemic and returning to campus life. Join us as we celebrate the big day, Friday, May 13 at the Coliseum.

Health and Well-being graduate Dalton Perdue says he chose WVU because he believed he would excel in the HWB program. He feels that the relationships he has developed with fellow classmates and professors will help him prepare for future endeavors. Perdue is using his degree to springboard his education into health sciences and continue by attending medical school.