Having accrued over 25 years of expertise as a tenured professor, Lynda Henley Walters, PhD, was bestowed with the eminent title of a professor emerita in 2008. She had taught human development and family science on behalf of the College of Family and Consumer Sciences for the University of Georgia since 1982, and concurrently served as the aforementioned college’s associate dean. Throughout her career, she has taught various courses in adolescent development and research methodology. Before her appointment to the staff of the University of Georgia, she lectured at the University of Guelph in Canada. Additionally, Dr. Walters found success as a staff development specialist for the Cooperative Education Service Agency in Atlanta.
Extensively studying adolescent development, families and the law, Dr. Walters has likewise researched the cross-national study of families. She has documented her findings in various scholarly journals, including the Journal of Adolescence and Health Communication. In 2001, one of Dr. Walters’ articles notably received a Top Three Paper Award from the International Communications Association.
Dr. Walters received a Bachelor of Science in Christian education at the Presbyterian School of Education in 1964. She later acquired a Master of Science in early childhood education at Oklahoma State University in 1972, and a PhD in child and family development at the University of Georgia in 1978. To remain aware of developments in her field, Dr. Walters has been an active member of the International Sociological Association, the European Sociological Association and the Society of Research Adolescence. She is a member and past president of the National Council on Family Relations as well.
Since 1985, Dr. Walters has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the recent Friend of Lodz University Medal in Poland in 2015. Other accolades to her credit include a University of Georgia Teaching Award in 1985 and 1990, a College of Family and Consumer Sciences Alumna Association Award in 1996, and an American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences Commemorative Lecturer Award in 1999. A celebrated Marquis listee, Dr. Walters has been featured in several editions of Who’s Who in America, and Who’s Who in the South and Southwest.
Dr. Walters is most proud of her graduate students and their success, and they gave her credit for it. Her time at the University of Lodz was also a high honor was a highlight. Dr. Walters would like to be remembered by others as someone who believed that every person is special in their own way. What motivates her is her curiosity and wanting to make a difference; it is a drive. For example, she hears a problem in the community, and she thinks to herself to get together with others so they can think together and solve a problem; her desire is to make a difference.
The advice that Dr. Walters can offer the next generation or others aspiring to work in her profession would be to be patient with the learning process, which includes experience, books and everything else. However, you cannot know everything at once. Therefore, you just acquire what you know over time, which is important, and let yourself take the time to actually get it. For some people, that is faster than others. One of the best things in life is to have patience, including with yourself. Additionally, be patient with others that you are trying to bring with you.
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To complete the information on the Medal awarded to Lynda by the University of Lodz, here are some details about her cooperation with sociologists from Lodz. I met her in 1991 when she organized a working group meeting to develop a research project to compare the young families in the USA with families in Georgia, the USSR, Russia, and Poland. In addition to comparative studies, the project’s idea was to visit young families in each country by members of the international research team. In 1992 the research team met in Lodz. Lynda with Patsy Skeen and Nancy Hollet arrived for the first time in Poland. She told me that we should contact us by e-mail, which in Poland was not in everyday use at that time. Thanks to her suggestion, a year later, I, as one of the first researchers, got access to the Internet at the University of Lodz. It enabled me to work with the research team, headed by Lynda, more effectively and apply successfully for a grant to the EU Program. It opened up opportunities for me to lead the European research teams of which Lynda was a crucial member. The most profound was the project ‘PROFIT – Policy responses to overcome the factors in the intergenerational transmission of inequality’ (2004-2007), funded under the EU’s FP6, in which Lynda was a member of the Advisory Council. The project covered eight countries, members of the European Union.
Lynda also conducted regular and occasional classes for students of sociology and social work. Thanks to her initiative, doctoral students from Łódź had the opportunity to participate in Athens in meeting doctoral students and exchanging views on the topic of their doctoral dissertations.
Lynda is my best friend and I am proud that I had opportunity to work with her.
Wielislawa Warzywoda-Kruszynska, former head of the Institute of Sociology, Lodz University, Poland