As we wrap up the calendar year—oh, and what a year it was—we’d like to take this month’s ECP Corner entry as an opportunity to tell you about some exciting changes happening to the ECP Committee. These changes include welcoming a new member and an incoming Chair and Associate Chair (with our current Co-Chairs stepping back into committee membership roles) for 2021. We’ll also each take a moment to briefly describe what we hope to accomplish in our roles on the ECP Committee in the coming year, so look out for some exciting things happening in the coming months! 

Before we each describe what we hope to accomplish on the committee next year, we’d like to take a moment to highlight the ECP Committee’s newest member: Courtney Gosnell. We were overwhelmed by both the number and the quality of applicants, but Courtney’s application blew us away even more than the rest. Although we were only able to accept one new member this year, we want to note that the ECP Committee will be recruiting two members in November 2021 and another member the year after! If you are interested in joining this wonderful team and helping your fellow ECPs, please consider applying next year! 

Courtney is in her fifth year as an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Pace University. Courtney first became involved with the Society for the Teaching of Psychology in 2017 when she attended the annual conference in San Antonio and was selected to participate in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning writing workshop. Under the mentorship of Dr. Regan Gurung, she developed two SOTL project proposals. She presented this SOTL research at 2019’s Annual Conference on Teaching in Denver, CO. She has published SOTL manuscripts, including in journals such as Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology. We are excited about the SOTL experience that Courtney will bring to the ECP Committee. 

In her application, Courtney also expressed a passion for supporting others’ professional development, a passion we believe will translate well to her role in the ECP Committee. For example, she was a mentor in this year’s Speed Mentoring event at Virtual ACT. During her two years as a professor at the United States Military Academy, she helped lead faculty summer training events to help prepare new instructors to teach Introduction to Psychology (many of the new instructors were military faculty with no prior teaching experience). She is excited to have the opportunity to help provide resources, guidance, and social and networking opportunities to fellow ECPs. 

And this only scratches the surface as to why Courtney is such a wonderful fit for the ECP Committee! We are so excited to have her join us! 

Each of your current ECP Committee members would now like to tell you a little bit about what we hope to accomplish in each of our roles next year, starting with Molly, our 2021 ECP Chair, and Janet, our 2021 Associate Chair: 

Molly: As the incoming chair, I think my most important role will be wrangling and supporting all of the fabulous ideas the other members have for ECP Committee initiatives! I’d love to explore ways to take the success of the ACT ECP programming and spread it out over the year, especially now that we have all had crash courses in virtual events; to consider how to document/archive/publish the work we do so that it is available for years to come; and most importantly, to carry on the legacy of the ECP Committee being a warm, collegial, and welcoming space for all members of STP.

Janet: I would like for the ECP Committee to host a summer book club and course development accountability group. One of the most important parts of STP and ACT is the networking we are able to do. Since we didn’t have an in-person conference this year, it may be nice for a group of ECPs to virtually ‘gather’ to share knowledge, pedagogy tips, and best practices as we prepare for a new semester.

Daniel: In the coming year, I hope to overhaul the ECP page on STP’s website. Did you even know that the ECP Committee had a website? We do! At https://teachpsych.org/ecp, we link you to resources relevant to ECPs, such as ECP-focused awards, journal articles relevant to ECPs, a compendium of scales for use in the scholarship of teaching and learning (made by the ECP Committee in previous years), and more! My major focus for the coming year, as mentioned, will be to expand on this page, which is already such a nice resource for fellow ECPs. I want to build on the resources already available, as well as simply tidy up, update, and reformat the resources that are already there. (We also have another page, https://teachpsych.org/ECP-Corner, where we post these columns every month, but that’s already beautiful and doesn’t require any updates.)  

Karenna: I hope to build off the success we had at ACT 2019 in Denver where I organized our ECP Reception. Of course, this would be dependent on an in-person ACT occurring in Pittsburgh next year (if safe enough for STP to host!). We had such a great time celebrating all that we learned at ACT with other ECPs the evening the conference ended. All were welcome (including non-ECPs!) so please be on the lookout for our social events at ACT and other conferences (virtual or otherwise).  I also would like for us to celebrate ECPs who read our newsletters and engage with us on social media by hosting giveaways.

Albee: Specifically, in terms of professional development, I would like to search and promote more opportunities for ECP members of STP to be included in psychology-related forums such as with Psi Chi or SPSP. In terms of social media, an idea to promote ECP presence is to post an ECPs in Action article once every quarter, highlighting the work of an ECP member of STP (i.e., how students benefit from the ECP's teaching, scholarship, and service). Lastly, I would like to assist in building a network of ECPs (which is increasingly important as the pandemic continues). The STP ECP Committee may be able to host virtual social hours for the wider ECP/STP community during the winter and summer months. 

Have more questions?

For our monthly column, we want to research and answer questions that mean the most to you as an early career psychologist. If you have a question, chances are you are not the only one! Fill out the quick and simple form at https://goo.gl/forms/LiPmPmgyq2VNyKGy1 and your question may be featured in an upcoming column!

Best,

Your STP Early Career Psychologists Committee

Karenna Malavanti, Ph.D.

Albee Mendoza, Ph.D.

Molly Metz, Ph.D.

Janet Peters, Ph.D.

Daniel Storage, Ph.D.