Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Welcome to following the Gone, a podcast for Schreier Scholars, bringing you mentoring on demand from Scholar alumni. I'm your host, Shawn Goheen, and our guest today, joining us from Virginia is Sherry Burnett, one of our earliest scholars from the class of 1983. Sheri, welcome to the show.
[00:00:22] Speaker A: Thanks so much, Sean. So nice to have this time to chat with you.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: Absolutely. It's a nice, bright, sunny morning here in State College when we're recording, probably fall when you're watching when it debuts. And I want to take a trip down memory lane through the sunshine there. Sheri, can you tell us about the earliest days of the Scholars Program and how you came to be a part of that first group?
[00:00:45] Speaker A: I finished my freshman year in 1980 and started my sophomore year. And it's a little bit vague because it really wasn't a very coordinated program. At some point, I guess I went to a meeting, received a letter that I was admitted to the University Scholars Program at that point. And I had had a high gpa, so I assume that's why. And I was told that I could pick a course each semester designated as an honors course, and then do an independent project with the professor of that course. But I don't remember any meetings. I never knew anyone else who was doing that kind of work. So it was a very independent project, but I was honored to do it. And I think also because Penn State was so large and classes were so large, that opportunity to meet with a professor one on one, to have a little mentorship, to get really great feedback on a particular project that I had a lot of interest in, just made my experience at Penn State just a tremendously personal one in such a large school.
[00:01:44] Speaker B: It's funny you say that because, like, our focus now is so much on the community of scholars, but that emphasis on really bringing big Penn State down to scale is something that it's cool to hear that that's from day one, like a factor in how this place runs.
[00:02:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm very, in ways, very envious of that because it must be wonderful to be in an environment with other students who have a kind of strong scholarly interest and to be able to bounce ideas off and have a consistent peer group. That would have been really wonderful. And I'm very delighted that it's developed over the last 40 years into this really tremendous, inspirational program.
[00:02:22] Speaker B: Well, we are, too. But staying back in the 80s, Sheri, what inspired you to major in psychology of all things?
[00:02:31] Speaker A: I was just very, you know, back 40 years ago, it was very reasonable to just Go to college and get a liberal arts degree. I know students now are much more long term. They think from, you know, the age of 12, kind of where they want to go. And they have very specific career paths. But that wasn't such a strong motivation then. So I. It enjoyed psychology. I was in a class of about, I don't know, seems like a thousand. It probably wasn't that many students in the class, but we took a psychology course. And in those days you didn't get a grade just by looking at your computer. You had to actually go to the professor's door, believe it or not. And there'd be this huge spreadsheet. You'd find the last four digits of your Social Security number and see your grade.
So I'll be rushing down to look at the door. So crazy.
And out of these students, I had the highest grade on, I think the first midterm. And I was like, oh, I'm really good at this. And I had. So I had strong aspirations and I was just fascinated by that. Always had been very interested in the human condition. And so that was just the course that I then took.
[00:03:41] Speaker B: That is awesome. Now, if you walk around campus here at University park, you're likely to see a lot of 80s and 90s fashion, the way things are cyclical. But can you tell us what campus was like when these were the newest fashions for the first time? Besides the. I can't wrap my mind around even like going and looking at a physical paper with your Social Security number grades. But like, what was campus like in that. Or in those early 80s, especially when, you know, the football team was perpetually in the national championship conversation.
[00:04:14] Speaker A: Yeah, it really was. You know, Happy Valley, I'm sure it suits your town now and it suited that. It was just a very safe, wonderful place to go to school. It was very. I think my wardrobe was mostly jeans and button downs. It was sort of that preppy collegiate kind of look.
And it was very different, just in many ways. Just. I've been back to visit my niece. I'll give a shout out to Addison Burnett, who's going to start her sophomore year. I've been up to visit and although the campus is much. It's bigger, it's more beautiful, it's more highly developed. The town felt the same. I mean, it's sort of the same size. So all this, it was really odd how little the feeling of walking around town and shopping and getting coffee felt. But we didn't have cell phones, so that's a tremendous difference.
We didn't have computers. I brought my electric typewriter to college and TikTok, you know, many, many papers at my desk.
And we also, I spent quite a lot of time in the library because we couldn't look, couldn't Google Scholar, we couldn't simply find sources at our fingertips. So I spent a lot of time sort of doing the Dewey Decimal system and walking around to the stacks and then photocopying it, taking those articles home. I know, I see you laughing.
I guess it is funny, but that's just how. That's how it was. So in those ways, things, I think student life is probably much different.
[00:05:39] Speaker B: Absolutely. Now, one thing that is definitely the same is that you have to write a thesis when you're in the whether it was the University Scholars Program or the Schreier Honors College. Maybe the methodology of how you get your sources might have changed, but you still have to write that thesis. So tell us about your thesis process and how that influenced your career.
[00:06:00] Speaker A: My honors thesis was I was always interested in looking at psychological adverse effects on psychological health. So my thesis looked at a number of childhood adverse effects. Divorce in the family, death of a significant other, perhaps being physically abused as a child, and also looked at depression. And not earth shattering, but students who had an adverse health adverse effect had higher scores in depression and students who had many of these had more severe depression. And it did kind of lay the groundwork for later, my later dissertation work.
[00:06:35] Speaker B: Awesome. Now, I took a class on the 1980s as a student, which is probably funny to you, but you mentioned divorce as one of those mental health trauma things that you can experience in K12 or younger. How did that, what was the. You know, it's pretty common today here in the 2000s, but that was a pretty novel thing in the 1980s as no cause, no right, no cause, divorce really started to become a more common part of society. Did that influence your thesis at all?
[00:07:11] Speaker A: Just that the numbers. I think you're right. The level of divorce has increased. Many of those students had gone through divorce. Divorce can be certainly very traumatic for some children, depending on the amicability of the couple. And sometimes it's not adverse. People have very different susceptibilities to having a very psychological response with trauma.
[00:07:34] Speaker B: So Sherry, you mentioned that you had a dissertation, which means you got a PhD, but before you went on to do that, you actually worked first out in the workforce. How did you go about finding your first job and as a teacher? Now, what advice do you have for scholars who are in the social sciences, the humanities the art where there is plenty of opportunity. To your earlier point, it's just maybe not always as clear cut as some of the STEM or business fields.
[00:08:02] Speaker A: Yes, My first job, I was hired to be a teacher at a private boarding school. It was called the Foreman School. It was in Litchfield, Connecticut, and it was a school for dyslexic high schoolers. So that was sort of my first job. And I obviously did a lot of counseling in that role as well. I also became Dean of Women, which was strange because I was about 25 and the students were in their late teens. It was very interesting to kind of manage boundaries, but a really wonderful learning experience.
So that was my first job. I then went to Boston. I was a mental health worker in an emergency room, and then I got my master's in social work. But my advice would be that in the early part of your career, you know, work with, have as many opportunities, internship, volunteer with as many populations as you can. I've worked with elderly patients, I've worked with crime victims. I've worked with dyslexic students. I've worked with people with medical trauma. And you sort of find your calling in that. So I would really recommend that you get that diverse experience. I'm teaching now in a master's program, and some of the students have had no work experience. They sort of get their bachelor's in social work and then they get accepted to the MSW program. And I just find those students, I think, are hindered by not having that experience. So you're applying these concepts and these skills, and having that practice experience really, I think, makes a difference in your skill set and your ability to really master the techniques in a therapeutic setting.
[00:09:42] Speaker B: That is a really good insight there. And you probably extend that last part out into a lot of different fields where you need a master's degree, get some hands on. So you actually understand the theories, right?
[00:09:54] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
[00:09:56] Speaker B: Now, you've mentioned the word trauma, and this is a word that gets used a lot in discourse. Now, mental health is something that we're much more likely to talk about than in past generations. PTSD gets thrown around a lot, and there's other terms in this space, but for the sake of our conversation, can you tell us what these, like, give us like a quick and dirty definition of what these are to inform the rest of our chat?
[00:10:20] Speaker A: I'd be happy to. So trauma is really an adverse experience, very distressing experience that disrupts sort of the psyche and it overwhelms one's normal coping skills. So that's very broad. So it could be a one time acute trauma, like being in a very serious car accident. It can also be chronic trauma, which is what children who grow up in abusive households experience because it's cumulative. So in sort of a very quick way, that's how we look at trauma.
Now. PTSD is sort of the psychological disorder that can occur after a trauma only about we'll all have traumatic events in life. About 15% of people who've had severe traumatic experiences develop PTSD. And that stands for post traumatic stress disorder. And it's really a cluster of four different symptoms.
One is a re experiencing or intrusive thoughts about the trauma. You can't stop thinking about it, you can't stop dreaming about it. The other are avoidance symptoms. You might avoid anything that reminds you of the event. You might avoid going out places. Then there's also negative changes in thinking and your mood.
Not to go on too long, but Ronnie Janoff Bulman talks about shattered assumptions that all of us have these assumptions. The world is safe, people are generally good and good things happen to good people. So when a terrible trauma happens, those assumptions are shattered. And part of the work of recovering from PTSD is to rebuild those assumptions over time. The fourth is just what we're finding out now is significant changes in physical and emotional regulation that once you have that trauma, your wiring becomes much more sensitive to stress, much more reactive to stress or triggers for trauma. And those are some of the symptoms that we see in ptsd. I hope that's helpful.
[00:12:21] Speaker B: Yes, absolutely. I think that is a good quick. Obviously there's whole programs of study and all this, but for the sake of our conversation, nice to have just a baseline there.
Now you were at this boarding school, you're a dean of women, which is title we don't really hear too much anymore. But the history of universities and all, there was deans of men and deans of women.
[00:12:42] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:12:43] Speaker B: So you know, but you decide to go from that into clinical social work and then on to the. The MSW there. What made you decide to switch from being in that teaching setting to out in the field working in social work?
[00:13:00] Speaker A: I think, you know, I spent a year working, as I said, in an emergency room at New England Medical center in Boston. And what was really great about it is that we assisted the psychiatry team when anybody came into the emergency room with a psychiatric crisis. So a lot of those were state hospital, very chronically mentally ill patients who would go to the state hospital. But it was a teaching hospital. So each week we were included in the psychiatric rounds. So we would go over every patient, we had these brilliant psychiatrists and they would talk about the case and give us the case history. And so I just became fascinated in learning more and that led me to become a go to pursue my MSW in Boston.
[00:13:46] Speaker B: Nice. Was there any like aha moment from one of those patients that was like, I really want to help folks like this?
[00:13:58] Speaker A: I think just seeing the kind of intense suffering and knowing that there are ways that we can, with the proper treatment, help alleviate some of that suffering, that was very appealing to me as a career choice.
[00:14:15] Speaker B: Awesome. Well, I'm really glad that there are folks like you who want to go into these. They're typically called caring or helping based professions. So what advice beyond the maybe have some experience before you go to a master's program that you shared earlier. Would you give to aspiring social workers or others who are in helping and care based professions? And that could include things like teaching, nursing or a myriad of other jobs and careers in that kind of orbit?
[00:14:46] Speaker A: Well, I think, I think you might have mentioned earlier that I think to be successful you really need to be thinking about a graduate degree. I think getting a BA in psychology is very limiting. Once you get a master's in counseling or social work, you have so many more opportunities in terms of being licensed, going into private practice, being more of an administrator. I also pursued my PhD in social work, which was a very research based program. It doesn't teach you how to be a better clinician, it teaches you more how to do administration, which I had the opportunity to do. So I think knowing that it's a bit of a long haul is very important. I also, again, I think getting as much work experience I did Many my first 10 years was medical social work. I worked as a trauma social worker and what a wonderful way to learn. Every day is different. You meet all kinds of people, you have all kinds of different things that you have to deal with and learn and manage. So just sort of throwing, I think throwing yourself into the fray for a number of years can really help you have the basis for then applying more sophisticated education or training.
[00:15:58] Speaker B: Gotcha. Yeah, I was going to ask you like what is the difference there? Because you, if you want to be like on the front lines helping folks. As a social worker, the MSW is probably a terminal at a point. Right. So a lot of people do very.
[00:16:13] Speaker A: Well and I'm very satisfied and have very interesting and varied careers with the MSW.
The PhD gives you a little more. Certainly has given me the opportunity to teach and probably assisted me in getting a leadership job in state government in Vermont.
[00:16:29] Speaker B: Yeah, I was trying to ask about that next. So you get your PhD from our friends down the road at Pitt. So shout out to our fellow state related university there. And in true scholar fashion, Sherry, you made this pivot. You go from being like, you know, in the hospital working with folks like you said, you go to this administrative role in a completely different state. I think you might be the first guest I've had on here who's been at some point in Vermont in their career.
So walk us through your headspace of like this entire pivot. I'm going to move states. I'm going to go work on policy and leadership. How did you prepare and just adapt to that whole shift going from Pittsburgh, which probably is almost as big as the state of Vermont in terms of population.
[00:17:22] Speaker A: Well, I recommend Vermont to anyone. It's a beautiful, beautiful place to live. I focused my dissertation on gunshot wound survivors, people that had been admitted to the hospital with a gunshot and lived and did research on PTSD and risk factors.
So I became kind of an expert and did many, many in depth qualitative interviews with folks that had had that experience. I became kind of an expert in crime victims. And the Vermont Department of Corrections was looking for a victim services director.
There's never been a person responsible for how we treat victims in corrections. So it was a wonderful opportunity to take what I knew about crime victims and recovery and how one supports crime victims recovery into corrections, which I knew nothing about. And there's a lot to know. It's a very complicated system. And the more I understood, the more I was able to be able to explain things to victims. And it was really a policy job to become victim informed and trauma informed. And so we basically looked at every practice and policy and how can we make this more trauma informed for victims. So I'll give one example is there's a parole board victim has the right to attend a parole board hearing if the offender is being considered for early release.
So before we developed a more trauma informed approach, the victim would receive a letter, the date and the time. They would have to drive to the prison, go through all those gates, be metal detected to enter. They would sit in a waiting room with the offender family, which can be a pretty adversarial relationship. Walk into a room, very stilted people, you know, you never walked in there. Victims are extremely re triggered. They're sitting maybe 15ft away from the offender that may have assaulted them, raped their daughter, drunk, you know, Killed them in a drunk, killed someone in their family in a drunk driving. And then they are expected to stand up and be super articulate about their reasons why they feel this offender should be held perhaps longer in jail. So we changed all that. We offered victim service accompaniment, we would go with them, we would prepare them before they could now send just a videotape and not appear. They could then meet with the parole board without the offender present.
So just a way of like taking a more trauma, looking at different practices and policies and how do we make it not re traumatizing or less re traumatizing for victims of crime. And we do that through all kinds of policies and practices.
So that was what a wonderful opportunity to apply my clinical experience to really beginning to change a bit a whole system.
So it was really a wonderful opportunity.
[00:20:17] Speaker B: That is really, really cool. Especially, you know, one of your foundational rights here in the United States is that if you are accused, you have the right to face your accuser. So was there a difference between like how for somebody who has no legal background, like if you're in a courtroom and you're standing trial versus your been convicted and you're up for parole, is there a difference in that process for that, that relationship between victim and either alleged or convicted person?
[00:20:47] Speaker A: I think it's a great question and I think that, you know, the legal field has been ahead of corrections in terms of victim advocacy. And of course you have a prosecute, you have a prosecution team that's supporting your wishes to prosecute and get justice for your family or your family member. Corrections. It's really, there's no, no one's on the victim side. So in a parole board hearing, you know, no one's, it's, it's a very offender focused, offender driven organization. That's how it has been historically. That's kind of how it has to be.
But now victim services and corrections is much more common. I was able to get six correctional officers jobs changed to victim service specialists. So we had people all over the state, state that were able to provide services. So it can be transformed over time with the right sort of administrative support for that initiative. And I had a wonderful commissioner who was extremely supportive.
[00:21:47] Speaker B: That is really, really cool. And obviously a big shift and from like a change management perspective, how, how did you. So you said you had the administrative support of the commissioner, but for maybe for the old hats, the ones who were a bit more what sticklers for how we used to do things or this is how, this is just always how we've done it, how do you, how do you go about trying to change them to your way of thinking? Especially going from the, the convict orientation to centering the victim more in the process?
[00:22:22] Speaker A: That was really challenging, but there are ways. I was extremely persistent. I just kept at it. I did a ton of training with all correctional officers, probation officers around victimology.
I often volunteered to do work that nobody would want to do. And so I made it very victim centered. We were working on restitution policy and so I'll write that or. So I just took on a lot of things where I could make sure I was very patient. It was a very old school organization. Of all the directors, there were maybe 12 of us in terms of offender, mostly offender, based on offender treatment, on overcrowding issues. And so it was just a matter of being patient and being persistent and being helpful. And I also had a commissioner who about every two or three of our weekly executive meetings would say, okay, what have you done for victims this week? And so everybody wanted to please the commissioner. So they thought, well, I've been working with Sherry on this or I was going to call, you know, so that was, that was tremendously important. So all those things I think over time didn't make a lot of change. Probably in particular the mass training that I did with my team in terms of training, you know, basically all the frontline workers in terms of developing a more sensitive, more sensitivity to the victim's experience.
[00:23:49] Speaker B: Let's talk more about that. So you have this background. You've been a social worker, you have the master's, you actually have two master's degrees. You have a Ph.D. in social work. So you could say you're an expert on this and then you come in and you have to teach and basically like crash course folks who have no understanding of this and this can happen in any field, any job where you suddenly are teaching people. I think something we can all relate to is quickly learning zoom and virtual things. During the pandemic and you know, how did you go about like, what was your strategy for teaching person a topic a that they never had any experience with before?
[00:24:35] Speaker A: I did, I used the MAD model, Mothers Against Drunk Driving. And what they do often is they will have family members of people who have been killed or severely injured and they will speak to first time offenders and they will tell their story about how a drunk driver killed or badly injured their loved one. And the offenders, they really hear the story and of course they feel for. And the mothers will say, you know, I don't care if you drink, don't get in the car or if one person in this room doesn't drink and drive because of what I've said, it's worth it. So what I did with staff is I got, I used, trained and supported and screened many crime victims who wanted what had happened to them to make a difference and they were willing to speak on panels. So I would have maybe five or six different victims of crime who had had offenders in our system that were, you know, ready enough to discuss that. And it's very moving. And I think whether you're a correctional officer or a prison guard, you're still, you know, you're still a human. And I think it was just that, developing that empathy and just things they don't, they don't, they haven't seen or haven't been exposed to. I felt very effective. And the victims that did this, the crime often called survivors, were so thrilled, they felt better, they were more confident, they were less depressed, they felt like they were making a difference. So in terms of their healing and their recovery, it was also a wonderful victim service as well.
[00:26:12] Speaker B: Excellent.
Now, in the same space of teaching, you move on from your roles with the corrections department in Vermont and you've been teaching online at what is now we're calling Penn West. Going back well before the pandemic, what strategies do you use to make course content engaging in an online setting?
[00:26:37] Speaker A: Well, I taught actually on campus at Edinburgh and then they merged and so we're now Penn West.
The ways that I try to. I'm lucky because I teach a really, I think, really fascinating course content to students who really want to learn. So I try to make it very meaningful for them in their own lives. I have them. It's mostly a read and do kind of approach. So if we're reading about a specific therapeutic technique, the assignment will be to go interview a friend attempting these techniques, whether it's, you know, changing. If we're looking at depression scales, I'll have them fill it out. If we're working with patients who might be anxious, I want them to practice the self care and the meditation. So it's, I think that keeps it very alive. I also use audio recordings. So rather than typing my response to their weekly posts, which get incredibly boring for all of us.
[00:27:32] Speaker B: I'm sure our scholars watching can relate to.
[00:27:35] Speaker A: Oh, I know they can. So I, I'll put in headphones and we have an ability to speak. And so I'll take a couple hours and I'll just, hey, Joe, read this paper and I really like what you said about this and I. So they hear my voice. I think it makes us more connected and more conversational and it takes a little longer, but I think that makes a difference to hear professor's voice, you know, really acknowledging you and really specifically referring what you did and encouraging you. So that I think students always find at the end of the semester it doesn't have. They're very appreciative of that effort. And it makes me feel like I more of a relationship with the students.
[00:28:13] Speaker B: Absolutely. And hopefully, you know, the same thing here, right? Like having some video audio to put names and faces and humanize the experience, right?
[00:28:23] Speaker A: Yes, absolutely.
[00:28:25] Speaker B: Now, Sheri, you've had a long career and I think we, you know, we summed up your experiences in a pretty quick way. And I'm no expert on anything in terms of trauma, in terms of working with offenders or victims, social work. My mother in law is a social worker. That's the extent of my experience here.
What are the questions that I did not think to ask on any of these topics? And you know, maybe they're questions that you get from your students or from mentees or past co workers that you want to have the floor to talk about this topic.
[00:29:02] Speaker A: I think the one thing that I would talk about a little bit is sort of what are some important qualities? Just, I mean, to be, to be a helper, to be in the healing professions or the helping professions. And you certainly have to have a lot of empathy.
And I think you develop more. I developed more. I was always, I think, a fairly empathic person, but I develop more of that over time. But you are, you're sitting with people who are very hurt many times. So you're sitting with a depressed teenager. You might be with an elderly person who is beginning to lose their faculties and know that they're, you know, kind of grasping to kind of keep it together. You're sitting with people who are grieving. So you have to have a lot of empathy. But you also have to have what I've heard described as contemplative detachment. So you also have to be able to let it go and be able to also take care of yourself and find joy. It can be. I work with very serious many hours with victims who had been terribly victimized. And it's brutal what has happened to them and it's brutal how they have their recovery and it can really sink your spirit.
So I think part of being successful and happy and satisfied in this field is also having that ability to keep things in perspective, to be able to attach to still find joy. There's certainly many successes in this work.
People get better. You know, people cope. People who've had terrible tragedies go on to live very happy and successful lives. So there's that as well. But I think that's something maybe it's important to mention as well.
[00:30:43] Speaker B: Awesome. Yeah. There, you know, our students probably could relate to a certain song from a Disney movie when they were kids about letting it go, right?
[00:30:54] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:30:54] Speaker B: Yes.
Well, I think that's really good to learn. And you know, you talked about working. One follow up question I have to that, you know, working with teenagers or the elderly, maybe folks who've been resorted to substances to deal with their trauma. Are there overarching strategies that work with everybody? And then are there some things that are best suited to specific types of victims that you're working with?
[00:31:25] Speaker A: I would say there's really not a general always approach, but we work now on trauma specific therapies and there are so many opportunities. And we're finding that cognitive behavioral therapy is very helpful, which is a way of changing our thinking really fast.
Concept being that our thinking, how we think determines how we feel and how we feel determines how we behave. So if I think I'm gonna fail in this social setting, no one's gonna like me. I'm not interesting. I'm gonna feel less optimistic, confident, I'm gonna take less chances.
And then when you, then you behave differently. So even with trauma working on changing those cognitions that the world isn't safe, bad things will always happen to me.
Anything bad could happen when my daughter leaves the house after my other daughter was killed in a car accident. So that in particular has been showing great promise in terms of working with trauma survivors to come to more of a more closure about the event.
[00:32:37] Speaker B: It's never closed, but the, the term that kind of came to mind when you're talking about that was like self fulfilling prophecy. Yes, right. Yeah, almost. Is that kind of a good way to sum that up?
[00:32:46] Speaker A: Very good way. Very good way to sum it up.
[00:32:48] Speaker B: Awesome. And then a final question on these topics.
How have you had any experience working with any of the animals that get brought in to assist victims? I've seen things about like courthouse dogs and sort that sort of thing to.
I think sometimes emotional support animals get mocked because sometimes people take that to an extreme. But obviously they're, you know, we bring in dogs here to shrier during like, you know, puppies and stuff because most people probably love the chance to play with some puppies. And I'm a Dog person or maybe it's a cat for you or something else. But what, how does that, what is the theory behind that, if you will?
[00:33:32] Speaker A: You know, I have very little experience. You know, 40 years ago we weren't doing those things. But I certainly am very supportive. My mother was in a nursing home with dementia for many years. And every Tuesday this little dog would come in and lay in bed with her and she loved it. So I mean, obviously it's connecting. It's a non verbal kind of affection. It sort of increases your. All the good brain chemicals. Petting dogs, all of that is, you know, sort of proven to kind of bring the happy chemicals into your brain. So I think it's wonderful. I know a lot of students who have done equine therapy internships, so they're getting kids or high schoolers on horses to build their confidence, to build their connection, to build their skills.
And I love that you guys are doing that at Shrier's. That must be a wonderful puppy day.
[00:34:19] Speaker B: It is. And one of our colleagues here brings her.
Husky is a certified dog and Ace comes in periodically. So we love when we get the pop up that Ace is coming in today.
[00:34:32] Speaker A: Oh, good. Now that's tremendous. Wonderful.
[00:34:36] Speaker B: You know, being a scholar is stressful, right? You take on these additional courses, additional requirements. So nice way to de stress.
[00:34:44] Speaker A: Absolutely. Very nice.
[00:34:46] Speaker B: Now, Cher, you've had a pretty cool career. Thank you. You've made some lasting impacts in Vermont. But what would you say? And hopefully a lot of impacts on the folks that you've worked with individually as well. But what would you say is your biggest success to date?
[00:35:01] Speaker A: I would say nearing the end of my time at Corrections, I was awarded the Criminal Justice Professional of the Year. And what was so great about that is normally it would go to more of a victim friendly organization. So it might go to Victim Services or it might go to a DA who was doing wonderful work supporting victims through the court process. And Corrections was really seen by the victim services community as sort of the evil dungeon, you know, the black box. What happens in there? And so because not just my work, but because the whole organization, I think, became much more open to serving victims as well. It was a real honor for me and for all the staff that worked hard and all the change agents and supporters I had in terms of making that change in Corrections. That was a real thrill.
[00:35:53] Speaker B: That's awesome. And that's a nice way to like really recognize a holistic career, I think.
[00:36:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I've been very, I've been very, very lucky.
[00:36:04] Speaker B: Excellent. But Sometimes luck turns bad. So what would you say is the biggest transformational learning moment that you had in your career, mistake that you made, and most importantly, what you learned from that to enhance your skill set?
[00:36:19] Speaker A: You know, I have a very simple.
I did have a very simple example. So when I was a very young social worker, I was working on the trauma unit at the University of Pittsburgh Medical center, and I had a busy caseload, and it was a Friday, and someone was sick, and so I had her caseload. And we're trying to get everything done. And we had pagers at that time. Not so many little pagers that beeped, and we'd have to call the number back in the old ages, stone ages of communications. And I had to help a patient I had never met. He was going to be discharged, so I went into the room. He was an orthopedic surgeon. He was there with his girlfriend. He had fallen off a horse and broken his pelvis. And that was a very serious, long recovery kind of injury. Obviously, a lot of bed rest and all kinds of things. And I literally complained about how busy I was. I looked annoyed. I was like, oh, I'm so overwhelmed. I mean, I'm embarrassed now that I did that. But apparently I just felt like my day was going a lot worse than his.
And he called my supervisor, and he should have, and he wasn't trying to get me fired. He wasn't irate about it, but he let her know how that affected him, and she was very supportive about it. But I learned my. Like, I've never done that again. It was just. It's so simple. But that was something that was very embarrassing, and I felt terrible about it, and I don't think I've ever done that, made my issues more important than someone that I was working with. So that's my little tiny moment. But it's a very profound lesson for me that is.
[00:37:58] Speaker B: That is very profound. And especially if you're in. Whether helping or customer service or sales or anything like that, like, you are allowed to have those feelings and to be stressed. But maybe where. Where and who do you share that with? Right? Like, maybe don't share that with your patient or your customer.
[00:38:15] Speaker A: Exactly, Exactly.
[00:38:17] Speaker B: Very, very good point there. And clearly it stuck with you. If you're, you know, 30 years later.
[00:38:23] Speaker A: 35 years ago, and I still remember it. And I'm also, you know, I. I sort of expect all. I really like good customer services. Well, like, I think people in that role should be very polite and helpful as well. So I like when I see that and certainly notice when I don't receive that.
[00:38:40] Speaker B: Yep. You know, it's almost like it blends in when you, when you. Until you don't. Until you don't have it right now, one thing we haven't talked about a lot and I'd love to hear your thoughts on, especially in a field you know, you're. You're teaching, you've been in supervisory roles, is mentorship. And that's the whole point of this podcast, is mentorship. So what advice do you have for students as they both seek out mentorship in their career in social work specifically, but also just generally, and then also as they mentor those behind them, even current students?
What are things you've learned in this space that you think is helpful?
[00:39:19] Speaker A: I've been super lucky. I've had wonderful mentors. My dissertation chair was a lifelong. Has been a career long mentor. I had a. Some supervisors in corrections that I had a lot to learn about how corrections work, and they were very patient and really made sure that I had the grounding and many months to kind of just learn how the system works before I really begin to develop the plan for how to increase victim services.
In terms of finding mentors, look for any. Who do you like, who's exciting when you see someone acting or behaving a certain way that you think, oh, I really want to be that. Surround yourself with the best, the brightest, the most helpful, the most enthusiastic people, ask a lot of questions, use them as role models, and that can happen any place.
And so I would just say be very.
Look around for people that you think, wow, I like what she has, or I like how he manages his life. And I think it can make a huge difference in terms of learning and friendship and someone to advise you and care about your career. So.
And in terms of mentee, when you're mentoring, you know, mostly I think a lot of it's leading by example, by encouraging, by giving, you know, feedback, recognizing strengths and also noticing and helping to remediate weaknesses that you see. That's also been a really wonderful part of my career in terms of helping students and advising students and being mentors in many ways for students coming into my field.
[00:40:54] Speaker B: Awesome. I think that's really good advice there, Sheri.
Now, you mentioned your dissertation advisor from Pitt, but are there any professors or friends from your Penn State days that you want to give a shout out to?
[00:41:07] Speaker A: I would like to say hello to my three best friends, Mary Naglock from the class of 83, Denise Demure and Sandy Miller.
[00:41:17] Speaker B: Awesome.
Now as we're wrapping up our time, we've given so much advice here, like just really packed it in. Sherry. But what's a final piece of advice that you want to share with our scholars? To make sure that they make the most of their time in the Honors College, just like you did.
[00:41:35] Speaker A: Well, like every, you know, I'm probably grandma age to most of the students that are currently in the program. So like every grandmom and as they put down your phone, it's such a beautiful experience. There's so much to see, there's so much to engage with, and it goes very fast. And I would just say, you know, experience, be present, you know, look for every opportunity, make friends, meet people that are different from you. It's such a beautiful opportunity to grow and develop. And that would be my best advice, is to just really pay attention and engage as much as you can and enjoy the beautiful chance you have to be in a scholars program and to be learning and to have so much support around you.
[00:42:21] Speaker B: Excellent. Now, don't put the phone down until you're done with this episode because we still have a few questions here for Sherry. But then put it down and enjoy Beautiful University park or whichever campus you were at, or if you're back at home on break, enjoy that.
Now, Sheri, if a scholar wanted to connect with you, learn more about social work, working with victims of crime and trauma, informed practices, how can they reach out to you?
[00:42:46] Speaker A: I'm on Facebook and it's under simply Sherry Burnett.
So I'm happy to have anybody reach out anytime. If you friend request me, I'll accept your request and happy to chat with people that way or over the phone. Any way that I can be helpful if students have questions or want to discuss their career paths or a future in the helping fields.
[00:43:07] Speaker B: Awesome. Now for the hardest hitting question of our time here together. Sherry, if you were a flavor of Berkey Creamery ice cream, which would you be? And most importantly, why would you be that flavor?
[00:43:20] Speaker A: I'll have to go with the happy, happy, joy, joy.
[00:43:23] Speaker B: Oh, that's a less common one.
[00:43:25] Speaker A: Oh, really?
[00:43:26] Speaker B: I want to hear what's your what? Why would you be that one?
[00:43:29] Speaker A: I think that's just because where I am in life, I mean, I'm in my early 60s and I've had a very lucky, fortunate career.
I think in your 20s, 30s, you're really pursuing. You're very focused on your career, on getting someone, on achieving goals, and you have the family time where you're focused on raising a family. And when you hit about my age, everything's set. And I've been lucky enough to look back with a lot of fondness on my work. And it's just a very free. I'm still teaching online, but I just have a lot of freedom. I'm not, I don't have any more huge ambitions, you know, and I'm just finding myself enjoying, you know, Virginia and my family. And it's just a very, it is a time for me. It's a very happy, joyous time.
[00:44:16] Speaker B: That is a beautiful reason for that flavor. I love that.
[00:44:19] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:44:21] Speaker B: So thank you, Sheri, for joining us and sharing all of your tremendous insights. And I know there's whole courses and academic programs and what we talked about today, we just scratched the surface, but I really appreciate it. And before I let you have the last word today, scholars, if you're watching the video version, be sure to subscribe like the video, leave us a comment. You know the drill. And if you're engaging with the audio version, you know, be sure to follow us on whichever podcast app that you're using and leave a rating. Now that that spiel is over. Thank you again, Sherry. I will let you have the final word today.
[00:44:52] Speaker A: I just want to thank you for a really beautiful interview. I felt you're very easy to talk to and I'm so glad to share what I can. It was really an honor to be asked to do this and just wishing every all the students a wonderful, successful career and again, take advantage of everything you have there in Happy Valley and at Penn State and wishing you all much, much success and.
