More than
you want to know about Richard Nelson
DICK NELSON grew up in Brockton,
Massachusetts as the sixth of eight children. During his childhood his family
moved several times within that city — more than once just a step ahead
of the rent collectors. He was a child of divorce and would have been a
latchkey child except that the tenements he lived in weren't generally locked.
He spent his junior and senior high years in a single parent family. (Perhaps
his upbringing was the modern-day equivalent of growing up in a log cabin.) It
wasn't the most advantageous background, but his mother, an irrepressible
optimist, helped him understand, as the rather hackneyed saying goes, that if
life hands you a lemon, it's time to make lemonade.
Dick attended Brockton High School until late
September of his senior year, then dropped out and enlisted in the army so that
he might later take advantage of the G. I. Bill later. He hoped his army stint
would give him an opportunity to travel abroad, but he spent all his time at
Fort Dix, New Jersey. He received
his GED certificate in 1950, his bachelor's degree in elementary education from
Boston
University in 1952, and his M.S. and
Ph.D. in counseling and guidance from Ohio University
in 1958 and 1962, respectively.
To serve the wanderlust that his military
service did not satisfy, Dick used elementary and middle school teaching as a
travel ticket. He taught a year each in Fairfield, Connecticut, and Torrance
California, then with the U. S. Army Department of Defense Schools in Japan and
with the U. S. Air Force DOD Schools in two different locations in Germany.
After two years of graduate study he taught for a year at the Ohio University
laboratory school. He also served
for a half year on the staff of a Ball State University counselor education
program in Germany and England; was a Fulbright Lecturer for a half year in
with the Ministry of Education in Cyprus; supervised Purdue University student
teachers for a semester in England; and participated in training of teachers in
polytechnics in Malaysia.
He served two years on the faculty of what is
now Towson
University in Maryland, one year on the staff of a NDEA funded Guidance
and Counseling Institute at Ohio State University,
and two years at Ball State University as laboratory school director of guidance and
assistant professor.
He joined the Purdue University counselor
education faculty in 1965, was promoted to associate professor in 1968, then to
professor in 1976, and was designated professor emeritus in 1997. Recognitions
during his career at Purdue University included receipt of the Indiana
Personnel and Guidance Association Outstanding Counselor Educator Award in
1973, the Ohio University Distinguished Graduate Award for Outstanding
Professional Achievement in 1982, and the Purdue University Robert L. Snodgrass
Scholar Award in both 1984-85 and 1994-95.
Upon Dick's retirement he received his most
treasured award, and the highest award conferred in Indiana; Governor Frank
O'Bannon named him Sagamore of the Wabash in 1997 for his career professional
achievements.
Dick has spent much of the time since the
early 1970s developing, refining, and applying the Choice Awareness system for
helping people to make better choices. The original impetus for the model came
from Transactional Analysis, but, observing over the years that TA seemed to
become more and more complex, he has made a concerted effort to maintain Choice
Awareness as a straightforward, easily-understood system for helping people
make more effective choices and build better relationships.
Dick's credits include the book, Guidance
and Counseling in the Elementary School
(Holt, Rinehart and Winston), and over three dozen articles and numerous
presentations on the topic of school guidance and counseling. On the topic of
Choice Awareness he has written more than a dozen articles and five books for
adult audiences: (1) Choice Awareness: An Innovative Guidance Process (with J. Bloom); (2) Choosing
a Better Way to Live; (3) Choice
Awareness: A Systematic Eclectic Counseling Theory; (4) On
the CREST: Growing through Effective Choices; and (5) Working
with Adolescents: Building Effective Communication and Choice-Making Skills (with C.
Dandeneau and M. Schrader). Items
numbered 1, 2, and 5 are no longer in print (email the author at stoptc@frontier.com) for further
information. He has made numerous
presentations on Choice Awareness to audiences of educators and various groups
such as Kiwanis and Rotary.
Dick also has written four novels for
children which contain Choice Awareness supplements: In
the Land of Choice and The
Magic of Choice for children ages 8 - 11, and The
Incident at Crystal Lake and Travis
and Trish for middle schoolers.
Informal discussions with other travelers to
Egypt, Israel, and Jordan resulted in Dick's involvement in the creation of a
new retirement community that now exists less than two miles from the Purdue
University campus. Dick is most pleased to have served as chair of the
initiating committee of University Place, a badly-needed and truly wonderful
contribution to the Purdue/Lafayette/West Lafayette community.
DICK NELSON is a well-rounded human
being--writer, teacher, husband of over 50 years, singer, sports fan, walker,
pastellist, an active church member, and observer of the human scene. To borrow
a line of poetry, "Write him as one who loves his fellow man," when
man is used generically.
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This page created and maintained
by Dick Nelson. Last updated
January 3, 2011