EDITOR’S NOTE — This is the third of four features on UNL faculty who received University of Nebraska systemwide honors. This UNL Today series began April 28 and continues to May 1.

A career dedicated to improving children’s development has earned Susan Sheridan the University of Nebraska’s highest honor for research.

Sheridan, a George Holmes University Professor of educational psychology and founding director of the Nebraska Center for Research on Children, Youth, Families and Schools, received the Outstanding Research and Creative Activity award.

Sheridan has spent more than 25 years developing intervention approaches that foster meaningful parent-child and family-school relationships, which her research has shown to enhance the long-term prospects of underserved children living in impoverished and rural settings. Given the collaborative nature of her work, Sheridan said she sees the ORCA award as a culmination of contributions from those within the academic community and across the state.

“The vast majority of my work has taken place in Nebraska homes, schools and communities,” said Sheridan. “Receiving this award reinforces for me the shared commitment to excellence that defines our university and our state. This kind of research cannot occur in a vacuum; it is all about the people, and this award is really for all of us. I have the best colleagues in the world, and from them I learn something new every single day.”

Sheridan is nationally recognized for developing Conjoint Behavioral Consultation, an approach designed to help teachers, parents and caregivers collaboratively identify children’s strengths and needs, develop effectual plans, and implement evidence-based strategies that address those needs.

“It is very important that the practices being introduced in schools and early childhood programs are research-based — that they have met the highest standards of rigor and demonstrated unequivocally positive effects,” Sheridan said. “Because our interventions are doing just that, it is encouraging to see that they are making their way into both scholarly literature and daily practices.”

Sheridan noted that seeing her research put into practice has served as a continual source of inspiration since she arrived at UNL in 1998.

“I love hearing about the people and the lives that are being impacted,” she said, “along with the excitement that parents and teachers share when their work together creates meaningful differences for kids.”