Monique Boudreaux didn’t know a thing about the subject. When a UCLA professor convinced her to take his introductory psychology class during her first semester in college, she decided to give it a shot.

“I was lucky to have a phenomenal teacher who motivated me and birthed an interest in psychology,” Boudreaux said. “It was amazing to me how you can study human behavior from a scientific perspective. I knew that’s what I wanted to do from then on.”

The rest, as they say, is history. She would become a psychology professor herself, eventually making her way to Nicholls this semester.

Through her experience and expertise in the field of psychology, Boudreaux also serves as an FBI consultant. She helps the agency solve cases dealing with missing children, including ways to find the child alive, the child’s remains and/or the criminal offender.

Boudreaux meets with eight other consultants around the nation three to four times a year in Quantico, Va. at the FBI Academy. She does most of her daily work and research at home when the FBI sends her resources and data through facsimile and telephone. The FBI sends limited information, excluding names.

“Sometimes [the work] comes in spurts, other times it gets kind of quiet for a while,” she said after she researched and coded more than 80 cases during her first week at Nicholls. “I don’t want names so I can be as objective as I can while I’m working on them.”

Boudreaux has helped solve hundreds of cases, but she was not involved with the recent Elizabeth Smart case that flooded the national media because she was on vacation. She couldn’t have been more pleased with the results, though.

“Whenever it comes out that way, and the child is found alive, you’re overjoyed,” she said. “Many times, you don’t truly expect it.”

Boudreaux’s journey to success was not an easy one as she spent years of extensive training and research. But she said she wouldn’t trade it for anything.

After earning her master’s degree in psychology from UCLA in 1993, Boudreaux aspired to pursue a doctorate degree.

One thing Boudreaux believes in the most is sharing the knowledge she has gained through her experiences.

Many of Boudreaux’s articles with tips on how to protect children from abductors have been published in several magazines and journals. Her most recent article will appear in Parenting Magazine soon. While the tips have been helpful to parents and caregivers, Boudreaux aspires to put all of her ideas and suggestions together in a book or two.

“Children are too young to protect themselves and can’t be responsible for recognizing what is dangerous or not,” she said. “It’s our job as caregivers to see that they are protected. We need to know what the risks are and how to prevent them from being in danger.”