UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Beth Van Horn, director of Penn State Cooperative Extension in Centre County, will receive the 1999 Pennsylvania Extension Home Economics Scholarship at the fall breakfast of the Pennsylvania Extension Association of Family and Consumer Sciences (PEAFCS), Nov. 17 at Toftrees Resort in State College.
The $1,000 scholarship, which honors professor emerita Helen Bell, provides financial assistance to an extension employee enrolled in a graduate program or taking graduate courses that will improve extension programs for Pennsylvania families.
Van Horn supervises all extension programming for the county, overseeing seven employees. As the county's family living agent, she focuses on such issues as food safety, family caregiving, nutrition, health and family strengths.
Van Horn will apply the scholarship funds to take a three-credit course, Cross Cultural Perspectives in Leadership, at the Hubert H. Humphrey Center for Citizenship and Democracy at the University of Minnesota. The course is part of her doctoral studies in agricultural and extension education.
Van Horn earned a bachelor's degree in home economics in 1977 and a master's degree in home economics education in 1982, both from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She also was certified by the National Council for Family Relations as a Family Life Educator in 1994 and as a ServSafe instructor in 1998.
"Building leadership skills is an important part of any professional education," Van Horn says. "Leadership education will make me more effective as an agent and will help me teach these skills to others."
In 1998, Van Horn collaborated with the State College Borough Health Department to offer the ServSafe food safety certification program in Centre County. The intensive 15-hour training was presented to 60 food-service providers. She also writes a popular food column for two area newspapers. Her columns have run in the Altoona Mirror for 10 years and in the Centre Daily Times for three years.
Van Horn joined Penn State in 1985 as an extension agent in Blair County. In 1991, she transferred to Centre County and was promoted to extension director in 1994. Before coming to Penn State, she worked as a teller at the National Bank of the Commonwealth from 1982 to 1985. She also worked as a substitute teacher for the Indiana County School District and the York County School District, and as a home economics teacher for the North Star School District from 1980 to 1981.
She received the Distinguished Service Award from the PEAFCS in 1996. She also served on Penn State's Commission for Women from 1994 to 1997. She has been a member of PEAFCS and the National Extension Association of Family and Consumer Sciences since 1985. She is a member of Epsilon Sigma Phi and the National Council on Family Relations. She also is a member of the State College Kiwanis Club, the Centre County Council of Human Services and the American Association of University Women.
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EDITORS: For more information, contact Beth Van Horn at 814-355-4897.
Contacts: John Wall jtw3@psu.edu 814-863-2719 814-865-1068 fax