PULLMAN, Wash. — The College of Liberal Arts at Washington State University presented its annual achievement awards at a college ceremony today, May 1.
Graduating senior Lisa Anderson-Levy received the 1998 Distinguished Achievement Award for Students. Anderson-Levy, an anthropology major with French and Women’s Studies minors, is a Golden Key National Honor Society member, a Phi Beta Kappa Scholarship recipient, and has been on the President’s Honor Roll each semester while at WSU. She was chosen Outstanding Student in French two years. An emigre from Jamaica, Anderson-Levy served in the U.S. Air Force and attended Tacoma Community College before transferring to WSU in 1995. She is an intern with the WSU Diversity Education Office and a volunteer for the Museum of Anthropology.
The Distinguished Faculty Award went to Susan Armitage, professor of history and editor of “Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies.” An authority on western women’s history, Armitage was the first director of WSU’s Women’s Studies Program. She is co-editor of “The Women’s West” and “So Much To Be Done: Women Settlers on the Mining and Ranching Frontier” and co-author of a history textbook, “Out of Many.” She was Distinguished Fulbright Chair in American History at Moscow State University, Russia, in 1995, and a lecturer with the United States Information Agency in India and in Azerbaijan.
Seattle attorney Harold “Ole” Olsen received the Distinguished Alumnus Award. Olsen was formerly managing partner and is now counsel to Perkins Coie, the largest law firm in the Pacific Northwest. He is a 1942 WSU political science graduate and earned his law degree from Harvard Law School. He has served on the WSU Foundation Board of Trustees since 1985 and chaired it from 1986 to 1988. Olsen is a member and former president of the WSU Alumni Association. Olsen and his wife, Jeanne, are WSU Foundation Benefactors and Century II Club Members. They have received the Outstanding Service Award, the Weldon B. Gibson Distinguished Volunteer Award and the WSU Alumni Achievement Award.
Administrative manager Patricia Hawkins received the College Outstanding Staff Award. Hawkins was recognized for the quality, professionalism and efficiency of her work in the Department of History. She led the development of the department web site and of training programs on web design and university systems. She volunteers in faculty/staff and cancer research fundraising and organized the department’s Christmas Fund Drive for underprivileged children and families.
The William F. Mullen Excellence in Teaching Award went to psychology professor Thomas Brigham. Among his many accomplishments achieved during his 25 years service at WSU are the development of Psychology 106, a course that has become a national model for AIDS education, and the Excel Program. Excel addressed the problem of retaining minority students at WSU. The voluntary program supplemented regular academic courses with small discussion groups, training in self-management skills and contact with minority role models. Brigham also has served on the Undergraduate Studies Committee and as adviser for the Psychology Club and the WSU Dance Team.
A special award was created to recognize the outstanding service of College of Liberal Arts adviser and recruiter Isabel Miller. Miller came to WSU in 1979 as the principle undergraduate adviser in the sociology department. In the years since, she has made it her mission to know every aspect of student advising and admission. She represents the college at student recruitment and orientation activities. She also has served on the academic advising and reinstatement committees, scholarship and recruitment committees, and the college Recruitment and Retention Committee.
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