Pennell Lauded for Community Engagement

Social work professor Joan Pennell was inducted into the Academy of Community Engagement Scholarship on Tuesday, October 7, at the Engagement Scholarship Consortium 2014 Meeting in Edmonton, Canada. She is one of the organization’s 14 inaugural members.

The academy’s mission is to recognize and promote high-quality scholarship that — in active collaboration with participating community partners — has a positive impact on complex societal needs and issues.

NC State’s Center for Family and Community Engagement, which Pennell directs, supports family engagement, youth and educational success and domestic violence prevention through partnerships with the N.C. Division of Social Services, N.C. Department of Public Instruction and U.S. Administration for Children and Families.

Pennell was a principal investigator for a Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, demonstration of family group conferencing in situations of child maltreatment and domestic violence. She was appointed to the National Crime Prevention Council in Canada, chaired its Youth Justice Committee and promoted collaborative social development strategies for crime prevention. She helped to found the first shelter for abused women and their children in Newfoundland and co-facilitated support groups working with abused women of European and Aboriginal descent.