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Cynthia Pellock is an educator committed to promoting career opportunities for individuals and building a workforce that supports Pennsylvania communities. Her path has been a career of leading public service and higher education programs that enable individuals to identify their personal talents, learn new skills, and open doors to successful adulthood. As a member of the faculty at Penn State's University Park campus, Dr. Pellock is Teaching Professor of Workforce Education and Development and the Director of a program to plan and conduct professional development for Pennsylvania career and technical educators. In addition, she represented Penn State on executive committees of three national organizations leading the study of career and technical education. She is an advocate of CTE as a valuable school curriculum that provides students with experiences to make career decisions, equips students with job-entry skills they can use right after high school graduation, and can give students advanced placement status in post-secondary education.

Before coming to Penn State, Dr. Pellock was the Director of the Upward Bound Program and Assistant Professor in Academic Support Services at Clarion University of Pennsylvania. In that position, she planned and conducted programming intended to prepare secondary school students to be successful academically, to make informed career plans, and to enroll in appropriate post-secondary education programs. Earlier in her career, Cynthia was an assistant administrator at the Schuylkill County Area Agency on Aging, the first Director of the Schuylkill County Retired Senior Volunteer Program, a social worker in a residential treatment center for adolescents, and a swimming instructor and lifeguard at the North Schuylkill natatorium.

Throughout her career, Dr. Pellock has been awarded approximately $13 million in grants for universities and public organizations. She was an invited speaker at education conferences in South Korea and Jamaica, published in national and international journals, and was named 2008 Outstanding Career and Technical Educator by the PA Association for Career and Technical Education.

Cynthia is a 1976 North Schuylkill graduate. She holds a B.A. in Sociology/Social Welfare from Bloomsburg State College (now Bloomsburg University/Commonwealth University of PA), a M.S.W. with a concentration in community organization from the University of Maryland at Baltimore, and a Ph.D. in Workforce Education and Development from The Pennsylvania State University. Cynthia is proud to be a daughter of the late John and Sophie Pellock of Frackville who, through their examples, taught her about integrity, work, initiative, faith, and service to others.