Charlotte Shoup Olsen
Title/Academic Rank:
Professor and Extension Specialist, School of Family Studies and Human Services
Departments & Academic Units:
Contact Info:
343N Justin Hall
(785) 532-5773 or (785) 532-1948
Areas of Specialization:
- Marriage and couple relationships
- Stepfamilies
- Cultural and family diversity
- Family communication and its role in sustaining family well-being
Education:
- B.S. in home economics vocational education, Kansas State University (1969)
- M.S. in family and child cevelopment, Kansas State University (1979)
- Ph.D. in curriculum and instruction, Kansas State University (1993)
Short Biography:
Charlotte Shoup Olsen has been an Extension Specialist at Kansas State University since 1993. Her primary role as an Extension specialist is to prepare research-based family strengthening programs for county/district Extension faculty to implement in their communities. Among Olsen’s more prominent Extension programs that she has created in collaboration with others are CoupleTALK, Stepping Stones for Stepfamilies, Family Change, Helping Farm Families Succeed in Business, and Women Managing the Farm. Recent programming efforts include a marriage curriculum that she co-authored specifically for Latino families and an online course to help professionals understand military family resilience. She was one of the original members of a working group on Extension relationship education that has evolved into the National Extension Relationship and Marital Extension Network of which she is on the executive team. Her background as a former Peace Corps volunteer in Africa and other diversity work informs her approach to being a family systems specialist. Olsen received her Ph.D. from Kansas State University and is a certified family life educator through the National Council on Family Relations.