WSU President’s Award for Leadership
In April, I was honored to receive the WSU President’s Awards for Leadership.
Over 350 people were nominated for the award in 2022. My nominators were Jessica Perone from the WSU Center for Civic Engagement and the Director of DTC, Dr. Kim Christen. Their nominatio letter said:
Ruth Gregory’s teaching, service, and creative discoveries, in addition to her commitment to student success and equity, are immeasurable assets to Washington State University (WSU). Ruth has been collaborating with the Center for Civic Engagement (CCE) for many years for support with integrating service-learning into numerous courses and provide various levels of collaboration and resources to support the success of the service-learning component of the classes she is teaching. Ruth is passionate about outreach and engagement and embraces bold thinking to serve the needs and elevate the strengths of campus and community both locally and statewide. Ruth’s work with undergraduate students through internships, service-learning projects, the AmeriCorps program, and in her role as Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Digital Technology and Culture program demonstrate civic engagement is central to the public purpose of higher education and essential to the WSU student experience, empowering students to become active citizens in a democratic society. She provides a variety of transformative learning experiences for students to be agents of positive social change while deepening their professional, academic, and personal skills. These learning experiences provide the students opportunities to challenge their own assumptions, values, and biases. Through Ruth’s leadership, students practice professional communication, gain networking skills, give and receive feedback, grow their confidence, and develop a deeper sense of self-efficacy. These opportunities inspire and lead students to deepen their commitment to civic issues.
Thank you to Jessica and Kim for nominating me for this award. I am truly appreciative and excited that I have such amazing colleagues.