by Alli Inglebright
Valerie Jones was selected as a 2017 Kopenhaver Center Fellow by the Lillian Lodge Kopenhaver Center for the Advancement of Women in Communication. As part of the fellowship, she attended the Women Faculty Moving Forward Workshop in Chicago Aug. 8.
The Kopenhaver Center’s mission is to empower women professionals and academics in communication to develop visionaries and leaders. The WFMF workshop is designed to provide support and guidance to junior faculty members through mentoring, networking and preparing for tenure and/or administration positions.
“It was fantastic to hear from particularly accomplished women in academia and hear about their journeys and experiences,” Jones said. “They gave us their dos and don’ts and tips to be successful. It was also helpful to set up external connections. The CoJMC is great and everyone is supportive, but it’s nice to get an outside perspective on things.”
During the workshop, the fellows got to hear from women about their tips for reaching tenure goals, dealing with sexism in the work environment, setting up mentor networks and getting into administration roles.
The fellowship is a year commitment with the workshop in August and a conference in April. The fellows will be responsible for a paper competition for the April conference. They also would like to set up an online community to network throughout the year, Jones said.
Jones’ immediate goal is to focus on tenure and getting her Ph.D.
“I love working with students and working on my own research,” Jones said. “I’m not even close to being tapped out in my enthusiasm for those things. The workshop has also given me an increased appreciation for this college because it is a great environment and I haven’t dealt with some of the situations that some of the other women were talking about. We have a wonderful group of junior professors and we are all in the boat together.”
