JOEL SNELL/ OBITUARY
OBITUARY
Joel Charles Snell __ died of a short illness. Doris and Charles
Snell (parents) of Omaha preceded him in death. He left behind
Jennifer his wife of Cedar Rapids, Nathan
Snell of greater Los Angeles and Jason Snell of East Village,
Manhattan, New York, as well as Jan Berls of Kansas city, Mo
(sister) Judith Kampfe (sister) of Tulsa, and the late Reverend Jay
R. Snell of Wayne, Nebraska.
Professor Snell was an assistant instructor at Omaha, University,
Assistant Professor of Dana College, (Outstanding teacher) Blair
Nebraska and Professor of Social Sciences at Kirkwood College
(Outstanding Teacher). He was also a Research Fellow for the
Arlington Institute a Washington D.C ”think tank” and Associate
Editor of Psychology & Education: An Interdisciplinary Journal.
On sabbaticals, he was a technical writer and analyst for U.S,
Army Corps of Engineers, Transcentury Corporation, Dept. of
Labor, and Dept. Criminal Justice at the University of Nebraska-
Omaha.
In high school (Omaha Benson), he was outstanding history
student and won a 21 day trip to New England, Canada, and
Washington DC. He was able to visit the Soviet Embassy, White
House, United Nations, and Congress. He graduated on the honor
roll and his B.A, was awarded Omicron Delta Kappa at Omaha U.
and earned the Masters at Nebraska-Omaha. He was involved in
PhD studies from 1971 to 1976 at South Dakota State University.
He was selected for The Oxford Roundtable at Harris Manchester
College, Oxford, England and the World Forum at Vancouver,
British Columbia, Canada He is included in Who’s Who (Marquis)
for the United States and the Midwest. He is also a member nearly
20 other honoraries and a Fellow in 3 honorary societies here and
in England. In his undergraduate days, he was a Pi Kappa Alpha
and was elected as Vice President of the Junior and Senior Class.
He is the author of 300 or more refereed publications and 15 books
from publishers Simon & Schuster, Brock-Martin Publishers,
McGraw Hill, Dell Publishers, and the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers. He was on approximately 10 editorial boards or
reviewer for various other journals. He was a book reviewer for
both the Oxford and Harvard Press. He also was a textbook
reviewer for various educational publishers and a frequent
editorialist for THE GAZETTE over the years. He wrote the first
man-to-land future scenario for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
The Snell-Green Professor Index, Snell Educator Effective Index,
Snell-Allen Medical Rank Index and the Snell Life Cycle Curve.
He was one of the most published junior/community college
professors in the United States .Joel created the term “biochemical
sociology” that was later incorporated into social neuroscience.
He was a foster parent and surrogate father for Individual
Educational Plans for Grant Wood Area Education Agency. For 10
years he taped books for the Blind and won the Governor’s Award.
Joel belonged to the Greater Unitarian-Universalist Church of the
Larger Fellowship and the Unitarian-Universalist Christian
Association (Anglican tradition) Snell also attended local Roman
Catholic churches.
He enjoyed reading, walking in the state and federal parks like
Lake McBride, and authoring his blog socialvibes.net of which
there are over a 20,000 essays and reports. See joelsnell.com He
was outstanding professor at Kirkwood and won the SPIRIT award
as one of the all time top 5 professors at Dana College.
He loved going out to eat with his family and driving around the
woods. No receptions or services will be held. Joel was bi-racial
(Afro-Scandinavian)
