Dr. Mary Louise McBee Scholarship Sponsored by the Athens Area Psychological Association 

Purpose

To support the educational enrichment for women who exhibit leadership in a graduate program in psychology. 

Scholarship Eligibility/Criteria

Applicants must meet the following criteria:

1. Be a female (female identified) graduate student within the professional programs of psychology at The University of Georgia (Clinical Psychology, Counseling Psychology, and School Psychology)

2. Each professional psychology program will review potential applicants and determine a nominee who exhibits the characteristics of leadership, dedication to education/training, and the advancement of psychology and goodwill to the local community.

Scholarship Nomination and Announcement

The psychology programs at UGA will nominate and provide the name of a graduate student to AAPA by March of each year. The honorees will be announced and honored at the AAPA Annual Meeting in the Spring. The scholarship provides a one time monetary stipend.

The Louise McBee Scholarship honors Dr. McBee, vice president for academic affairs emerita of The University of Georgia. She earned a B.S. Degree from East Tennessee State University in 1946, her M.A. degree from Columbia University and a Ph.D. from Ohio State University. Her career in academe began with a year of high school teaching in Marion, Va., followed by 11 years at East Tennessee State University in a variety of posts, including Assistant Dean of Women and Dean of Women. McBee also taught English overseas in Rotterdam in a university preparatory high school for girls. She further served as Dean of Students and Professor of Psychology with World Campus Afloat on an around-the-world trip with a shipload of college students.

McBee came to the University of Georgia in the early 1960s and served for four years as the dean of women, a position that was later broadened and renamed the associate dean of student affairs. It was not common for women to be in senior leadership positions during that era, but McBee thrived and was widely admired. She went on to hold several other positions at UGA, including dean of student affairs, a job that placed her in an elite group of female administrators in higher education. At the time, she was one of four women in the United States holding top jobs in student personnel in schools with more than 10,000 students. In 1987, McBee was appointed interim vice president for academic affairs, becoming the university’s second-highest ranking official. She served in the position for a year before retiring in 1988.

From 1963 until her retirement in 1988, McBee was affiliated with The University of Georgia through positions as Associate Professor of Higher Education, Dean of Women, Associate Dean of Students, Dean of Students, Assistant Vice President for Instruction, Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, Senior Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, Acting Vice President for Academic Affairs, and Vice President for Academic Affairs. Among her scholarly works are four books she wrote or co-authored and numerous articles in refereed journals.

McBee's honors and awards include a Fulbright Grant to The Netherlands, University of Georgia Alumni Faculty Service Award, Athens Branch of the American Association of University Women "Influential Woman Award," The University of Georgia Blue Key Award, and Emory University/Wesley Woods Heroes, Saints and Legends Award. Among other accolades are the Athens Woman of the Year Award, Girl Scout Woman of Achievement Award, Abraham Baldwin Award of the Georgia Alumni Society, and the Athens Chamber of Commerce Athena Award.

Active in professional organizations, McBee counts among her memberships the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Women Deans, Administrators and Counselors, the American Association of University Women, and numerous honorary societies. She also served as National President of Alpha Lambda Delta Honor Society from 1982-1985.

McBee was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives in 1991 and served for 14 years, using her experiences at UGA to help set state policy in higher education. Among her many accomplishments in office, McBee was key to establishing the successful Governor’s Teaching Fellows Program. She also devoted herself to a bill that allowed teachers to count their unused sick leave as service creditable toward retirement.

McBee's service over the past three decades includes many of the major political and service agencies in her area ranging from the Red Cross Board to the Athens-Clarke County Charter Commission. Her current community service encompasses the Salvation Army Board, the Executive Advisory Council of the Athens Area Vocational Technical School, The University of Georgia College of Family and Consumer Sciences Board of Visitors, the Northeast Georgia Girl Scout Council Endowment Trust, the Lanier Gardens Advisory Board, the Athens Justice Project, the Board of Directors of the Georgia Museum of Natural History, the Foothills Area Health Education Center Board of Directors, trustee for the First United Methodist Church, and acting as a mentor at Clarke Middle School.

McBee has traveled extensively for pleasure and with church mission groups -- journeys that have taken her worldwide. Her most notable adventure, among many, occurred in the summer of 1988 when, as a member of the Georgia Expedition to Mt. Everest, McBee became the oldest woman at that time to have climbed to the base camp on the east face of Everest, some 18,000 feet. 

Watch Dr. McBee provide an oral history 2006 and oral history 2008   Honoring Dr. McBee at the annual Louise McBee lecture series 

Sources:

Skyler, Heather. "Portrait of Louise McBee Unveiled at Ceremony." UGA Columns, 28 Nov. 2018, https://news.uga.edu/portrait-louise-mcbee-unveiling/. Accessed 23 November 2019.  

ETSU National Alumni Association https://www.etsualumni.org/s/974/bp18/interior.aspx?sid=974&gid=1&pgid=1385. Accessed 23 November 2019.