Mike Arons and the Mike Arons Award

 Mike Arons

Mike Arons

Dr. Mike Arons, Professor of Psychology Emeritus, was honored by former students, faculty, and friends by the establishment of the Mike Arons Humanistic Psychology Scholarship at the University of West Georgia. The scholarship fund was established by former students Dr. Larry Schor, UWG associate professor of psychology, and Dr. John Buchanan, president of the Helios Foundation, to benefit a UWG graduate student majoring in psychology.

“Psychology can infuse its methodology with rich, humanistic insights and, as increasingly is the case in programs such as our own, can provoke fruitful research into human potentials for expanded consciousness. ” - Mike Arons, Founder of Department


Mike Arons Award

The scholarship will be awarded based on the following criteria:

  1. The recipient shall be a graduate student in the Masters program in psychology.
  2. The recipient shall demonstrate a working knowledge of major thinkers and the conceptual underpinnings of Humanistic Psychology.
  3. The recipient shall demonstrate creative ways of engaging psychological challenges, whether academic, professional, or personal in nature.
  4. The recipient shall demonstrate a willingness to exten his or her knowledge to social and cultural contexts

Please browse the Scholarship Portal to find additional scholarships for which you may qualify.

 

About Mike Arons and the Mike Arons Award

After a year establishing a humanistic program at the Prince of Wales College in Canada, Mike was asked by the psychology department at West Georgia to become its chair, and toinitiate a humanistic emphasis. Those who invited him really had no idea what they were in for—they simply understood the need to make the teaching of psychology relevant to real life experience. They dreamt of a psychology education that spoke to students' lives. Jim Thomas, then one of the department's faculty, had read Carl Rogers, Abe Maslow,and Arthur Combs. Through them, he saw an approach to psychology that embodied his dream. His persuasion won over his colleagues, and he called upon Maslow to suggest a new department chair, and Maslow nominated Mike.