Jodi Pelkowski
Bill and Shelly Moore Faculty Fellow and Associate Professor
Economics Barton School of Business
It is an honor to reflect on the 25 years of service that my friend and colleague, Jodi Pelkowski, Bill and Shelley Moore Faculty Fellow, has given to Wichita State University. Her tenure at WSU came about because Jodi’s mentor at Kentucky was a friend of mine from grad school. Mark told her I was happy at WSU, and that she should check out the position here. Former Associate Professor and Dean Jim Clark and I were tasked with meeting Jodi and showing her around during her campus visit. Within five minutes, we were convinced that we needed to do whatever it took to get her to come to Wichita State. It helped that it was a beautiful, warm, sunny day when Jodi visited, and when she asked if it was always like this in Wichita in the winter, we lied and said yes.
Jodi quickly made her mark at WSU, achieving tenure and promotion within the requisite six years and winning a slew of awards ever since:
2006: WSU Excellence in Teaching Award
2006: Outstanding Nominee for the Academy for Effective Teaching and Research Excellence
2007 AND 2016: Graduate Instructor of the Year
2018: WSU Academy for Effective Teaching Award
2019: TAN Excellence in Undergraduate Advising Award
2022: Barton School of Business Undergraduate Instructor of the Year
What makes all this more amazing is that during this time she served as undergraduate coordinator for the economics major. This is an unpaid position which takes a lot of time and effort but does not count for much toward tenure and promotion. Economics did not have a student group, so she created Economists Anonymous to fill that void. Economists Anonymous is now an active student group with lots of members, events and projects. During her time as undergraduate coordinator, the number of students with economics as their major or minor greatly increased. She still spends a lot of time writing letters of recommendation, and her connections with Wichita area businesses help students get great internships while in school and good paying jobs after they graduate. Currently, Jodi is involved with a small team of students who meet on Saturdays to work on a project for Textron, which will certainly enhance their job prospects when they graduate.
Jodi is passionate about helping students. The Barton School of Business does not have a lot of honors courses, so Jodi regularly does extra work, again unpaid, to give students the option to have Econ 202 as an honors course. Last February, Jodi was asked to revive Beta Gamma Sigma, the business honorary society, which had basically been abandoned or years. Before the end of the school year, we were celebrating inductees at a banquet.
Jodi and her husband Pat have a licensed and insured liquor catering service called Shaken or Stirred. They are active in community events like Wine and Dine-Osaurs at Field Station: Dinosaurs in Derby and many WSU sporting events. Jodi therefore has instant credibility and can give many real-world, local examples of applying economic concepts to business.
Jodi is also a wonderful colleague. She has taught classes for me when I am attending conferences, given advice for handling problem students and generally been there for me, for other colleagues, and most importantly for students. She is indeed already a Bender of the Twig!
Jan Wolcutt
Senior Educator, Department of Economics