PULLMAN, Wash. – Paula Groves Price, associate dean for diversity and international programs in the College of Education at WSU Pullman, will receive the Washington State University 2016 Faculty Diversity Award at the Celebrating Excellence Recognition Banquet on March 25 in Pullman.
The banquet is part of WSU’s annual Showcase celebration of faculty, staff and student excellence. Reservations are required for the banquet and may be made at http://formtool.wsu.edu/events/Signup/index.castle?formid=1 by March 18.
The award recognizes distinctive and outstanding teaching, research, creative work, service and/or outreach by faculty that advances diversity in the university and the communities it serves. To learn more about the award, see http://faculty.wsu.edu/awards/faculty-diversity-award/.
Price’s work and service share a common theme of equity and social justice aimed at solving problems of access and inequality in schools and society. She publishes research in the areas of cultural studies and teacher education around concepts that people need to understand to work successfully in a diverse society.
A year ago, her elementary education students developed an integrated curriculum in social studies in which they explored concepts of diversity with second graders. The project was so successful that the local school district requested it be expanded through high school. In the future, the project will include a visit by her classes and 18 elementary school teachers to the Nez Perce reservation to learn about indigenous understandings of history, place and science.
Price co-founded and directs the week-long, summer Coeur d’Alene Tribe Leadership Development Camp at WSU. The camp allows tribal teens to explore their cultural identity while developing leadership, resiliency and academic skills. It has become a recruitment tool for higher education and teaching.
Price has published more than 25 articles and made 70 conference presentations. She is editor in chief of the Western Journal of Black Studies and a recipient of a WSU Hui-Rogers Faculty Fellowship in Diversity Education as well as a WSU Women of Color Faculty of the Year Award. She is a mentor in the WSU minority student athlete program, serves on the Provost’s Diversity Advisory Committee and is on the Steering Committee for the new Multicultural Student Center at WSU Pullman. She received the 2011 WSU Martin Luther King Jr. Distinguished Service Award. Learn more about her at https://education.wsu.edu/pgroves/.
Showcase also includes the Distinguished Faculty Address on March 24, the Academic Showcase display of faculty, staff and student work on March 25 and other events. See http://showcase.wsu.edu/schedule/ for details.