The Women’s Resource Center has opened nominations for the Women of Excellence Luncheon. The deadline to nominate a female faculty or staff member or student is 5 p.m. on March 18.
The lunch is an opportunity to acknowledge the work that women at Eastern Michigan University do for the campus and community.
Three finalists will be selected for the award and all of the nominees will be recognized.
“We do have a number of student leaders on campus who were nominated and also women who had just done some really cool projects in the community or elsewhere in their lives that deserve recognition,” said Ellen Lassiter Collier, WRC program coordinator.
According to Collier, sometimes women do not want to brag about themselves so they minimize the work that they have put into a project.
“We want to take the opportunity to put people up on a pedestal when they may not be able to or [are not] comfortable to do that themselves,” Collier said.
Last year, 25 women were nominated. The winners were Elise Buggs, a staff member and director at Academic Success Partnerships; Judith Kullberg, a professor in the political science department; and Courtney Smith, an undergraduate student program coordinator at the VISION volunteer center.
Buggs started the Keys to Degrees program to help single mothers of one child earn a degree in three years.
Kullberg, an expert in international politics and Russian/Eastern European studies, has published research on government and politics.
Smith serves as the youth coordinator of the Task Force on Youth Homelessness with the National Association for the Education of Homeless Youth and Children in Detroit and Oakland County. She also serves as president of the Food Recovery Network at EMU, a national nonprofit organization.
Collier said that women on EMU’s campus impress her because of the variety of issues they care about and the dedication those issues are shown.
“People don’t just say ‘oh well this is important’ and that’s that,” Collier said. “People really do go above and beyond and try to make a difference. I think that that’s kind of a little microcosm of the entire society that we’re in.”
The lunch will be held at noon on April 2 in room 310 of the Student Center. Reserve a seat by contacting Collier atecollie1@emich.edu.
