News & Events

March 27, 2019

The Austin Peay chapter of the Psi Chi International Honors Society (https://www.psichi.org/ ) inducted 17 new student members during a candlelight ceremony at the Tanglewood House in Clarksville, TN.  This year’s inductees joined a particularly impressive group of students who have run such an impactful program of events that they were invited to submit a description of their activities to the newest issue of Eye on Psi Chi, a quarterly publication with a readership of nearly 200,000 students, alumni, and faculty.  See pages 52-53 of the summer issue: https://cdn.ymaws.com/www.psichi.org/resource/resmgr/eye_pdf/23-4_summer19eye-web.pdf

Among these new inductees was an individual who was singled out by the students for having made a significant contribution to the club’s success since they began their work with the organization last fall. Cissy Mandrell, Academic Assistant to the Chair in the Department of Psychological Science and Counseling, has given the students of Psi Chi-Psychology Club her support, advice, and time; all in addition to being the only academic assistant in a department of 18 faculty and more than 600 students in a given semester.  Since joining the department in 2016, Cissy has risen to the challenge of managing a quickly-growing department, gracefully fielding a varied set of demands while still making time for students.

As the first honorary member the APSU chapter of Psi Chi has ever inducted, Cissy was recognized by the student leaders because “the Psychology Department is like a family, and every family has that one person who holds the others together. Cissy has supported us when we’ve had questions, when we needed advice, when faculty members annoyed us [sic], and every other time we needed her. We are grateful for all that she does and are so happy that she agreed to join us tonight” (Roxanne Hallisey, President for ’18 – ’19 academic year).