Longtime director of the Multidisciplinary Center retires

At the end of July, Dr. Beverly Atkeson will retire from her position as the director of the College of Social Work’s Louise R. Goldhagen Evaluation and Consulting Center (The Multidisciplinary Center or MDC).  Dr. Atkeson joined the MDC in 1983 as a psychologist after serving as an assistant professor at the University of Georgia. She became the director of the MDC in 1996.

She was a vital part of the MDC as it grew and changed. The MDC saw an increase in the number of clients served, seeing increasingly complex referrals, offering more extensive school mental health services and teacher consultations to meet the needs of 20 school districts and expanding the training program for students in social work, clinical, counseling and school psychology as well as mental health counseling and arts and music therapy. In 2008, the MDC became an APA  accredited internship site for doctoral students in psychology attracting students from all over the United States.

Dr. Atkeson will be remembered for her leadership and ability to facilitate a healthy and supportive work environment. She saw the MDC through major changes and challenges over the years including several legislative budget cuts and resulting reductions in professional and support staff and the difficulty of securing permanent space to house the MDC.

According to Dr. Atkeson, she has always enjoyed providing supervision and training  for graduate students and providing evaluations for low income and rural children and working with their families and teachers to further their academic success. Although, in the past ten years her role changed to include increased administrative responsibilities, including working with the Florida Department of Education Bureau of Exceptional Education and Student Services to provide evaluation data of MDC activities.

Dr. Atkeson also highly valued her staff and students involved at the MDC. “Everyone is so dedicated to the mission of MDC and the children and families and schools that we serve,” Dr. Atkeson said. “It is such a positive, collaborative environment in which everyone is supportive of each other. It has truly been a pleasure to come to work every day.” She also appreciated the continuous support of the University and College of Social Work.

She looks forward to her retirement, spending more time with her husband and two daughters.

To learn more about the Multidisciplinary Center click here.