UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The concept and challenge of building successful teams has been a focus of Janet Scanlon for decades. It started during the Penn State graduate’s years of volunteering with Penn State Extension, continued during her family’s time in Florida where she worked in community education, inspired her doctoral thesis, and was a focus of her career as a teacher and principal in the State College Area School District.
When the opportunity arose to create an award recognizing research teams in the College of Agricultural Sciences, Scanlon found it aligned with her background, interests and philanthropic priorities. The Dennis and Janet Scanlon Integrated Team Research Award will recognize an integrated research and outreach faculty team within the College of Agricultural Sciences that demonstrates innovation in translating research to be shared and used through activities leading to partnerships and collaboration within the college and beyond.
“The generous support of Janet Scanlon represents an essential part of our effort to recognize the outstanding contributions of our faculty,” said Blair Siegfried, associate dean for research and graduate education in the college and director of the Pennsylvania Agricultural Experiment Station. “Integrated research and extension activities are critical to the mission of our college and provide a mechanism whereby our science immediately informs our recommendations that promote agricultural production and a safe and nutritious food supply while, at the same time, protecting our natural resources. We are extremely grateful to Janet Scanlon for the opportunity to recognize the integrated work of our faculty.”
This award is part of a group of five proposed new awards from the Office for Research and Graduate Education designed to recognize excellence and innovation in the college, as well as address pressing and emerging critical issues facing agriculture, the environment and society.
As a 1966 graduate the College of Education with a degree in elementary and kindergarten education, Scanlon met her late husband, Dennis, who majored in agricultural education, when they were third-year students at Penn State working in the Johnston Commons dining hall in the East Halls housing complex.
After graduating and during the early years of their marriage as they started a family, they lived in Ebensburg where Dennis was an agricultural education teacher and where she became involved in the Cambria County office of Penn State Extension, particularly with its outreach to young families. After 11 years, the family moved as Dennis pursued further education and followed job opportunities at places including The Ohio State University and the University of Florida, where Scanlon worked with the local school district’s Community Education Office to develop a community-based outreach program for parents of deaf children.
When they eventually landed back in State College with Dennis working in the college’s former Department of Agricultural and Extension Education in the college, he encouraged Scanlon to pursue her doctorate.
“I received my Ph.D. in community systems planning and development from the College of Health and Human Development and became very committed to the concept of planned changed, team building, what makes it work and what kind of leadership it takes,” Scanlon said. “Basically, I studied why some teams survive and why others do not.”
During that time, Scanlon was also a sixth-grade teacher in the State College Area School District. After she earned her doctorate, her husband once again encouraged her to continue her education.
“I was only 12 credits shy of earning a qualification to be a principal,” Scanlon said. “While I never thought I’d want to be a principal, Dennis encouraged me nonetheless, and I went back to school part-time. No sooner did I earn my certification than the principal at the school left, and I was asked to step in as a part-time principal, part-time teacher, which entered me into the world of leadership. Eventually I became the full-time principal but served two schools, yet another challenge in leadership and team building.”
Scanlon’s background in building teams would prove to be vital in her role as principal. Fairmount Elementary was closed and Easterly Parkway was rebuilt, requiring her to work to blend the faculties and families of the two different schools into one.
“My dissertation helped me learn a lot about planned change and how human beings have to work together,” Scanlon said. “I learned that it takes a strong and committed leader to not simply lead but facilitate, and how people need reinforcement and encouragement to be cooperative.”
Scanlon is looking forward to learning about the teams that receive the Dennis and Janet Scanlon Integrated Team Research Award.
“I hope, on their way to earning the award, that the teams focus on how they get to their end goal,” she said. “I hope it provides incentive to not just reach what they’re shooting for, but to understand the advantage of working as a team, to control and modify behaviors that can be detrimental to the process and to learn from the entire experience.”
She also said she's excited to be able to once again support Penn State and the College of Agricultural Sciences, as she and Dennis previously established two undergraduate scholarships.
“I give to the University because everything we are as a family, as educators, as citizens and as human beings was influenced by Penn State and the teachers and the people we met and worked with through the years,” Scanlon said. “When we went to college, neither of us expected to go beyond our undergraduate degrees, but here we are. We met pulling hot dishes from the end of the dishwashing machine in the dining hall and made a good team then and for 50 more years. I hope the teams who receive this award recognize that someone who valued teamwork made it possible.”
Donors like Scanlon advance the University’s historic land-grant mission to serve and lead. Through philanthropy, alumni and friends are helping students to join the Penn State family and prepare for lifelong success; driving research, outreach and economic development that grow our shared strength and readiness for the future; and increasing the University’s impact for families, patients, and communities across the Commonwealth and around the world. Learn more by visiting raise.psu.edu.