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About Me

Hello! My name is Dr. Alisa Chapman (a.k.a. "Dr. C."), and I am an Assistant Professor of Psychology at CCBC Catonsville. If you're reading this bio, that must mean that you're either extremely bored, or you're actually interested in finding out more about who I am and/or about the courses that I offer at CCBC on line and/or face to face. Either way, you've come to the right place!

Before I go on about myself, I feel compelled for some reason to mention that while I do, from time to time, enjoy watching a good ballet (among other forms of dance), that is not me in the picture above. I'm not even sure that I'd know how to handle skills like that..., but enough digression for now. I'll get more into my personal interests later. Now, where were we...? Yes, who am I? I guess the best way to answer that question is to first explain to you how I came to be.

I was born in the small "city" of Erie, Pennsylvania quite a few years ago (specific timing not important). My mother, a devoted wife, mother, daughter, sister, aunt, and preschool teacher, was already raising three sons, a husband, and dozens of other parents' three- to five-year-olds. While that would have probably sent the "average" human being right over the edge, my mother wanted more. She still wanted to fulfill her dream of having a little girl of her own..., and eventually she did.

I grew up admiring my mother's will to attend to the needs of everyone around her, but I also felt she spent too much time taking care of others and not enough time taking care of herself. Nevertheless, I wanted to be just like her. By the time I reached high school, I had it all figured out, or so I thought. I had finally uncovered the key to being successful at taking care of others while at the same time learning why and how I had developed this extreme desire in the first place--I would become a psychologist!

I left home at the age of 18 to begin my 11-year (yes, 11-year) journey to becoming a psychologist. The journey began at Hampton University, a historically black college located in Hampton, Virginia. While at Hampton, I was able to gain a new appreciation for the arts, especially music. I also learned what it truly meant to be "away" from home. I had fun, but I also experienced home sickness more than I care to remember. After two years of fulfilling most of my general requirements and a few basic psychology courses, financial circumstances led me back closer to home. I transferred to Penn State University, University Park Campus--home of "Joe Pa" and the "Nittany Lion." While there, I was able to complete my undergraduate requirements and earn a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology. I spent the next two years earning a Master's degree in Counseling Psychology at the University of Kentucky. It was there that I became interested in college basketball--Go Wildcats! I spent the next four years in College Station, Texas working toward my Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology at Texas A&M University. This was the furthest south I'd ever lived, and it will probably remain so. IT WAS HOT! But that didn't keep me from getting done what needed to be done. Oh, did I fail to mention that halfway through my doctoral program I "decided" to have a baby because I didn't think the pressures that I was already facing were enough...? :-| I must say that it was at that point in my life that I truly learned the meaning of the word "insanity". :-) On a more serious note, however, it was my daughter, Delise, and the whole experience of becoming a first-time mother that changed my life forever, but definitely for the better. Delise motivated me with each day that passed to be a positive example and to accomplish those goals in life that I had promised myself I would achieve. Instead of slowing me down, she gave me hope, strength, and reason to keep going and to never quit..., and I didn't. After leaving Texas, I moved back up north with my almost two-year-old daughter to complete my one-year internship assignment at the University of Delaware's Counseling Center in Newark, DE. At that point, I had only two more academic/career tasks to accomplish--complete my dissertation (ugh, the dreaded dissertation), and find a job.

Fortunately, after two months of interviewing, I received a "conditional" offer for a full-time position of Staff Psychologist at Frostburg State University's Counseling Center just as my internship experience was coming to an end. My journey of becoming a psychologist was just within reach, but there was still one condition--I had to successfully defend my dissertation. Amazingly, it didn't take long for things to end in triumph. In August of 2001, I became Dr. Alisa Renee Howze, just in time to officially accept the position of Staff Psychologist at Frostburg State University. My journey had finally come to an end, or had it....?

Just when I thought my life couldn't change any more drastically, in September of 2003, I got married and became Dr. Alisa Chapman, and within four months of getting married, I was extended the full-time position of Assistant Professor of Psychology at the Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC, as we know it). Newly married with a four-year-old daughter, I packed up the family and moved from Cumberland, MD to Baltimore. (Good-bye mountains!)

I have been teaching Psychology at CCBC for about three years now. I started this adventure back in January of '04, and I must say that the experience has been life altering. Through my course teachings, which, by the way, currently include Introduction to Psychology, Human Growth and Development, and Human Relations in a Culturally Diverse Society, I have been able to meet and converse with individuals from just about every walk of life. And yes, I have also adopted from my mother and incorporated into my teaching style the tendency to take care of everyone around me to the best of my ability. Interestingly, I no longer try to figure out the hows and whys of my actions because I have actually come to like that part of me. Go figure--I'm a psychologist by nature.

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