Some connections are good. Some are even great. On rare occasions, things click like puzzle pieces falling into place. For Dr. Maureen O’Brien, Associate Professor of Psychology in the Rosa Deal School of Arts, CBU is one of those special connections. 

Before she was a highly regarded, beloved, award-winning professor, Dr. O’Brien was a transfer student. She arrived at CBU in 1991 for her sophomore year after spending a not-so-successful freshman year at a different school. Nearly instantaneously, she knew she had made the right choice. 

“When I think about CBU and describe what it feels like to me, the words I think of are ‘home’ and ‘family,’” said Dr. O’Brien. “I really just fell in love with it. The people, the teachers, everyone was so warm. The faculty knew my name, and I had never even had them before. CBU feels like a home. Everybody knows you and cares about you.”

O’Brien was a pre-law student at the school she attended her freshman year, but she also had taken general psychology and thought it was interesting. CBU didn’t offer pre-law, so she met with the psychology faculty and decided to declare psychology as her major. 

Most of her classmates wanted to work with patients as a counselor or clinical psychologist. O’Brien knew that path wasn’t for her but that she was still interested in the subject matter. Then, senior year, things once again fell into place. 

“Senior year, we took research methods and statistics,” Dr. O’Brien recalls. “I loved it. I loved to run stats and test hypotheses. I realized that I love doing this, but I didn’t know what to do with it. I reached out to my advisor, Dr. Beth Nelson, who said, ‘You could do what I do.’”

“I remember saying to her, ‘I want a real job,’ and she replied, ‘This is a real job.’ It was an epiphany. I had never thought about being a professor as a career,” said Dr. O’Brien. “She blew my mind.” 

After graduation, O’Brien completed a master’s degree in General Psychology at the University of Memphis and her doctorate in Social Psychology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. 

She dreamed of returning to CBU as a professor but knew the job market was tough. Her first teaching job was at Louisiana State University in Alexandria (LSUA). As a native of Southaven, Mississippi, Dr. O’Brien was frequently back in the Memphis area for holidays and always took time to visit CBU and keep in touch with her former professors. 

In her first year at LSUA, Dr. O’Brien attended a teaching conference where she ran into some CBU faculty. One professor, who was also a social psychologist, indicated she was going to be leaving and that there might be an opportunity. The following year, the job was posted and Dr. Nelson e-mailed to let her know. 

“I applied and interviewed for the position,” said Dr. O’Brien. “Conrad Brombach [a longtime CBU professor in behavioral sciences] called me at my office at LSUA and said they wanted to offer me the job. I think I cried. I started teaching at CBU in August 2005—my dream job. When I was in grad school, I figured I’d never get to teach at CBU. All the stars aligned. … First semester was like, wow, a lot of wow.”

This year, Dr. O’Brien received the CBU National Alumni Board Teaching Excellence Award. Fifteen pages of glowing recommendations from six different colleagues and former students were submitted on her behalf. 

“Maureen is genuinely excited about what she teaches, and she channels that passion into helping students develop not just content knowledge, but deeper thinking about how to ask and answer important questions about their lives and the society they live in,” wrote CBU alumna Dr. Caitlin Mills, Associate Professor, University of Minnesota, Chief of Research and Impact and co-founder of AugmentED. 

“She makes research relatable by anchoring it in students’ lives and interests. Her classes blend engaging instruction with hands-on activities, and she treats students as active researchers, not passive learners. Further, she provides detailed feedback, devotes one-on-one time to students, and masterfully balances support with challenge.”

One of the most personal and detailed recommendations was from Dr. Tracie Burke, Dr. O’Brien’s wife and CBU Professor Emeritus, “One Easter break I remember her sitting at the dining room table all day long for all five days writing individualized comments for every student on every page of every paper.”

Dr. Burke shared some additional comments about her wife and colleague whom she met at the teaching conference back when Dr. O’Brien was a first-year professor at LSUA! 

“It was truly a gift to work with Maureen for the past 20 years and daily witness her many contributions to our community,” said Dr. Burke. “Maureen says being a psychology professor at CBU is her dream job—and her dedication to her students and the university bear that out. She is always working to improve her classes—most recently by spending countless hours creating new online mastery exercises for her research and statistics students. Outside the classroom she is an advocate, ally, and loving mentor for her advisees, whom she insists share their every success with her. And finally (against my advice), she serves on a ridiculous number of committees each year. She is the consummate Lasallian, putting her love for CBU into action every single day, and I am so incredibly proud of her.”

Many congratulations to Dr. O’Brien on the CBU National Alumni Board Teaching Excellence Award!

Dr. O’Brien’s office is in the Rosa Deal School of Arts.