Shelly Clevenger

Dr. Shelly Clevenger (Photo: élan Studios)

The Office of the Provost named Associate Professor of Criminal Justice Shelly Clevenger the winner of the Stan and Sandy Rives Excellence in Undergraduate Education Award. She will be honored at the Faculty/Staff Appreciation Luncheon during The Founding Celebration at 11:30 a.m. on February 19 at the Bone Student Center.

Clevenger received bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in criminology from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She joined Illinois State University in 2012 as an assistant professor in Criminal Justice Sciences. An expert on the topics of sexual assault, intimate partner abuse, and cyber victimization, she considers herself an activist through her research.

Clevenger consistently enhances the quality of the undergraduate experience by giving students the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of others. She is an award-winning teacher, having won the University’s Teaching Initiative Award in 2016, the American Society of Criminology’s Teacher of the Year award from the Division of Critical Criminology in 2017, and the Division of Victimology’s Faculty Teacher of the Year in 2016.

Outside the classroom, Clevenger is known for her research. Clevenger is the author of the book Teaching Criminological Theory. She is the co-author of The Virtual Enemy: The Intersection between Intimate Partner Abuse, Technology, and Cybercrime as well as Understanding Victimology: An Active Learning Approach.

In 2016, Clevenger presented on the cyber victimization of survivors of sexual assault and intimate partner violence at the United Nations Women in New York City. She has also presented frequently throughout the state of Illinois. In 2017, she received Feminist Criminology’s Best Article of the Year award and in 2019, she was the recipient of the Robert Jerin Book Award from the American Society of Criminology’s Division of Victimology.