USU Names Diversity Award Recipients
Utah State University will honor five people with its annual Diversity Awards, which recognize people for significant contributions to affirmative action, equal opportunity and diversify on campus and in communities served by USU.
Joyce Kinkead, Beth Foley, Jer Pin Chong, Eduardo Ortiz and Dean W. Quayle will receive awards during a ceremony later in the fall. University President Stan Albrecht will present the awards.
Joyce Kinkead, Beth Foley, Jer Pin Chong, Eduardo Ortiz and Dean W. Quayle will receive awards during a ceremony later in the fall. University President Stan Albrecht will present the awards.
Joyce Kinkead
Kinkead is recognized in the category of administrator. She is an associate vice president for research and professor of English. Selected accomplishments include:
- She has been a constant force in supporting various programs to enhance opportunities for women including the Women’s Studies, the Women’s Center and the Women and Gender Research Institute (WGRI).
- She personally worked to provide funding for the Utah State Allies on Campus program.
- She has been instrumental in promoting hands on learning for students through procuring funding for such programs as student participation in Undergraduate Research Day at the State Capitol in Salt Lake City and a new undergraduate Research Fellows program. As a result of her efforts, USU has had more students in recent years presenting at the Council on Undergraduate Research Posters on the Hill in Washington, D.C., than any other university or college.
- Kinkead has played a major role in funding and supporting two specific programs for minority and women populations: The Multicultural Student Research Program provided scholarships and fellowships to 17 undergraduate minority students (Native American, Hispanic and African American) in the sciences; the Multicultural Scholars program provided opportunities for 13 ethnic minority and women students.
- She recently championed the establishment of the GLBTA (Gay, Lesbian, Bi-Sexual, Transgender and Allies) Service Center.
Beth Foley
Foley is department head and associate professor in the Communicative Disorders and Deaf Education Department in the Emma Eccles Jones College of Education and Human Services. She will be honored in the category of faculty. Selected accomplishments include:
- Her area of expertise is Augmentative Communication. This means she designs communication systems for children and adults who do not have verbal or manual (ASL) language. Locally, she takes students into the community to solicit requests for communication devices and adapted equipments. She has established an Assistive Technology Lab and Loaning Library to meet the needs of the local community.
- She works both locally with organizations such as Cache Employment and Training Center and internationally with Gabriel House, an orphanage in Mexico, to change the lives of individuals with speech and language deficits so they can take their rightful place in society.
- She has secured funding for the development of a USU Distance Education associate’s degree in General Studies for the Hadley School for the Blind. This is the first distance education for the Blind that has been developed in the world.
- She has also secured funding for a preschool at USU to serve children with hearing loss as well as a distance delivery of Sign Language so Hearing Impaired adults can obtain an education through a distance delivery system.
- She has been instrumental in securing funding for a Distance Education second bachelor’s degree and a master’s outreach degree in Speech Language Pathology that has brought students from all over the world and all walks of life into USU as both undergraduate and graduate students.
Jer Pin Chong
Jer Pin is a research associate with the Wildland Resources Department in the College of Natural Resources. He will receive the award in the staff category. Highlights of his nomination include:
- Jer Pin is from Malaysia and completed his master’s degree at USU and has been working as a research associate in the same lab he worked as a student. He is receiving this award not for his major accomplishments but for the little things he does on a day-to-day basis to encourage understanding and appreciation of different cultures, backgrounds and peoples. He was nominated by his supervisor and several co-workers.
- He has helped those he works with to understand the Malaysian culture by bringing food and other items to work and sharing their significance in his life. He has also been open and very enthusiastic about learning about United States, Utah and Cache Valley cultures.
- He has accepted assignments to host students who are considering coming to USU. One particular student was from the Umatilla Indian Tribe in Oregon. Not only did Jer Pin share his love for USU and Cache Valley with this prospective student, he also took the time to learn of her culture and background. They even shared aspects of each other’s languages and learned some basic expressions important to each person.
- He has been willing to work with others outside the lab to share his language, culture and interests. In return he only asks to be able to better understand their language, culture and interests. One nominator said “Jer Pin is promoting cultural diversity on campus in ways that are not usually recognized.”
- He participates in events sponsored by the International Student organization and enthusiastically promotes the many events sponsored by these various organizations.
Eduardo Ortiz
Ortiz is working on his Ph.D. in Sociology at USU and is employed on a graduate assistantship with the Early Intervention Research Institute (EIRI) at the Center for Persons with Disabilities. He will receive the award in the student category. Highlights of his nomination include:
- As part of his work and educational experience, Ortiz has performed admirably in numerous multicultural-related projects. A few of them include: a project using a community based approach to understanding and addressing health disparities in the Latino community; a research project focused on increasing the early language and literacy skills, in Spanish and English, of young children birth through kindergarten, in bilingual, predominately Spanish-speaking families; a project looking at the use of family stories to increase language and literacy skills in young Latino children and in children with disabilities; his dissertation is focused on better understanding the impact of family differences in different low-income ethnic groups.
- In addition to the above activities, Ortiz has committed himself to serving the community with an emphasis on Latinos in the community. Some of these volunteer activities include: working with the Bridger School (which has a very high percentage of Latino children); organizing meetings of Latino families to discuss school involvement and home educational activities; providing support to the parent school liaisons who work with Latino parents; and organizing and hosting a meeting between the Logan School District Superintendent and Latino parents at the Bridger School.
- During the ICE raids of December 2006, he worked with the school to help identify impacted families to get them help and raised funds to meet family needs.
- He is a volunteer with USU Extension and works on the GED skills and computer literacy program.
- His nominator wrote: “In my career, I have never encountered an individual, student or professional, who is so dedicated to diversity in practice. He goes beyond talk to tireless action. His commitment is outstanding and I am humbled by the extent of his activities.”
Dean W. Quayle
Quayle is the Diversity Award recipient in the community category. Some of his accomplishments include:
- A charter member of the Cache Community Connections, a voluntary interfaith and civic group formed after Sept. 11, 2001, he served as the chair for several years and has since managed the group’s finances.
- As the LDS Public Affairs Officer for the Logan area, he was instrumental in getting CCC recognized with a public service award from the LDS church.
- He has personally arranged meetings between area clergy of many faiths and Deseret Industries so all who are in need, whatever their religious affiliation, may receive assistance in the form of clothing and household goods.
- He has been active in helping plan and carry out a variety of programs of interest to the whole community such as the Concert and Lecture Series at the Logan Tabernacle. Additionally, he worked on grant proposals that help pay for advertising and printed programs for the series.
- He has also been deeply involved in Cache Celebrates, an all-day, all-evening program of activities for New Year’s Eve.
- He has been working toward developing stronger relationships among the various ethnic communities in Cache Valley and has been diligently studying Spanish.
The 15th Annual Diversity Awards ceremony will be Friday, Nov. 21, at 3:20 p.m. in the Taggart Student Center Sunburst Lounge at Utah State University. This presentation will be in conjunction with Diversity Week activities sponsored by the Associated Students of Utah State University. Activities on this day include a Cultural Showcase prior to the presentation and Mr. and Ms. International competition and a dance that evening.
For information about the awards and/or the award ceremony, call the USU Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Office at 435-797-1266.
Writer: Tim Vitale, 435-797-1346, tim.vitale@usu.edu
Contact: Dave Ottley, 435-797-1266
Contact: Dave Ottley, 435-797-1266
Utah State University will present the 15th Annual Diversity Awards Friday, Nov. 21.
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