2022: Dr. Jennifer Carson

Dr. Jennifer Carson has been honored for outstanding work in preventing the loss of human intelligence.

With scholarship and a 30-plus-year career that encompasses gerontology, dementia, long-term care, culture change, and leisure and aging, Dr. Carson has long envisioned and developed ways to address ageism and ableism and to improve the inclusion and well-being of elders, with a particular interest in persons living with dementia.

Dr. Carson serves as Project Director of the Dementia Friendly Nevada initiative and as Director of the Dementia Engagement, Education and Research (DEER) Program in the School of Public Health at the University of Nevada, Reno. In her role as Project Director, Dr. Carson spends much of her time working with tribal, rural, and urban communities across the state and teaching professional and family care partners as the author and facilitator of Bravo Zulu: Achieving Excellence in Relationship-Centered Care, a 12-hour dementia education program developed in partnership with the Nevada Department of Veterans Services.

In addition to sharing practical lifestyle strategies to prevent of the loss of cognitive function, Dr. Carson "encourages community members to value all of the qualities and expressions that make us human."

The Mensa Foundation’s Laura Joyner Award recognizes outstanding work, theoretical or applied, in education, literacy, or work with the gifted, or identifying threats to or preventing the loss of intelligence.