Two faculty receive 2018 CEHD Emerging and Distinguished Scholar awards

Oct. 1, 2018

KALAMAZOO, Mich.—The College of Education and Human Development (CEHD) at Western Michigan University is honoring Dr. Stephanie Burns, assistant professor in the Department of Counselor Education and Counseling Psychology, and Dr. Edward Brooks Applegate, professor in the Department of Educational Leadership, Research and Technology, for their scholarly accomplishments and influence on their fields.

Burns

Professional headshot of Dr. Stephanie Burns

Dr. Stephanie Burns

Dr. Stephanie Burns, the 2018 CEHD Emerging Scholar Award recipient, came to WMU in 2012. Dr. Burns has published two chapters in edited books, 20 peer-reviewed journal articles, one peer-reviewed practice brief and one encyclopedia entry. 

Dr. Burns’ scholarship focuses on counselor professional identity, an important topic for a relatively young field that is still struggling to obtain public recognition separate from psychology and social work. Over the last five years, she has published six journal articles that research various aspects of professional identity to better understand the phenomenon and provide specific direction for moving forward. Her most recently published article, Evaluating Independently Licensed Counselors’ Articulation of Professional Identity Using Structural Coding, received The Professional Counselor’s 2017 Outstanding Scholar Award. Burns also researches ethical decision-making by licensed professional counselors.

The Emerging Scholar Award recognizes one individual with outstanding scholarly accomplishments and the potential for continued excellence. The recipient must be a full-time, board-appointed faculty member in CEHD at WMU. At time of nomination, faculty member must not be tenured. 

Applegate

Professional headshot of Dr. Applegate

Dr. Edward Brooks Applegate

Dr. Edward Brooks Applegate, the 2018 CEHD Distinguished Scholar Award recipient, has been employed at WMU for 18 years. In that time, he has published over 55 peer-reviewed journal articles, and his work has been cited over 1,000 times and presented at more than 120 professional conferences.

Dr. Applegate has made vast and innovative contributions to educational research on assessment and statistical modeling. His extraordinary analytic skills and interdisciplinary scholarly insights substantially contribute to the investigation of how psychometric principles fit in a larger research context. His national collaborations cross a wide range of disciplinary areas including psychology, neuroscience, medicine and physician education, and his work has been widely published in top ranked journals such as the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, the Journal of Abnormal Psychology and NeuroImage. Applegate also contributes to numerous grants, where he plays a variety of roles ranging from statistician, core evaluator, co-investigator and principal investigator. In 2016, he was awarded the Excellence in Discovery: Research and External Funding over $1 Million for 5 years by Western Michigan University.

The Distinguished Scholar Award recognizes one individual with a body of outstanding scholarly accomplishments that has had an impact on the field. The recipient must be a full-time, board-appointed, tenured faculty member with a minimum of seven years of service in CEHD at Western Michigan University. 

In 2017, Dr. Carla Adkison-Johnson won the Distinguished Scholar Award, and Dr. Brett Geier won the Emerging Scholar Award. 

For more information about the CEHD Distinguished and Emerging Scholar Awards, please visit the Tate Grant and Innovation Center policies and forms webpage