How did you meet?

“We met in our master’s program; her last semester was my first semester. I was one of the two males in the program of over 30 women,” Jake said.

How long have you been married?

“Quite a few years…” Jake said.

“We’ve been married for eight years,” Nikki said.

Where did you go to graduate school?

“Radford University in Virginia,” Nikki said.

What attracted you to Grand Junction?

“It is difficult for two people in the same field, especially in academia to find jobs together. Mesa was a place where we both had the opportunity to be faculty members. We also love the outdoors,” Jake said.

What is your favorite aspect of teaching at CMU?

“I like developing one-on-one relationships with students. It’s small enough of an institution that you have a chance to really get to know students on a personal level and be a mentor, which is really rewarding,” Nikki said.

“I like working with students. We don’t have graduate students teaching our classes. I like the teaching aspect, the mentoring aspect, and the growth aspect. Mesa has grown a lot and we’ve had a lot of opportunity to grow. I’ve brought NAMI on campus and helped student services with mental health awareness. Being on the ground level of this growth and helping create a new university has been extremely rewarding,” Jake said.

What are the pros of working together?

“The main pro is that we can understand each other’s experiences, along with complementing each other’s specialities and being another resource,” Nikki said.

What are the cons of working together?

“Being called ‘Mr. Dr. Jones & Mrs. Dr. Jones’. A lot of times we get lumped together,” Jake said.

“There is definitely a loss of professional identity,” Nikki said.

Do you have children? How do you balance children and work?

“We have a three-year-old son and our daughter just turned one,” Nikki said.

“Understanding how much work the other has to do is the first step. Balancing between the clubs we advise and our classes is the second,” Jake said.

Are there any debates or arguments you have about a psychological concept?

“The one we constantly have is about political correctness,” Jake said.

“It shows that we have different foci. I focus on feminist issues and multicultural issues. I think it’s really important to think about the words we say and how we say them, without over marginalizing individuals,” Nikki said.

“I think it’s over-exaggerated, but we agree to disagree,” Jake said.

How do you differ in your teaching methods?

“It’s kind of hard because we’ve never seen the other one teach. I wouldn’t want him sitting in on one of my classes; it would make me nervous,” Nikki said.

“We are both very hands on. I am more cognitive focused on philosophy and that end of
psychology, where as she is more focused on the emotional side,” Jake said.

“Our students have told me that the main difference is he paces and moves around, where I stay stationary,” Nikki said.