Five Women Scholars Honored With Prestigious Awards

Karyn Tomczak, director of the dance program at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, North Carolina, has been selected to receive the 2014 Dance Teacher Award for Higher Education at the Dance Teacher Summit in New York City in August. The award will be presented by Dance Teacher magazine.

Tomczak was a Rockette at Radio City Music Hall for more than six years. She holds a master’s degree in dance education from Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York.

Marlene Salas-Provance, chair of the department of special education and communication disorders at New Mexico State University, has been selected to receive recognition for Outstanding Contributions in International Achievement from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association at the group’s national convention this fall.

Dr. Salas-Provance holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from New Mexico State University. She earned a second master’s degree in health care administration from the University of Missouri and a Ph.D. in speech-language pathology from the University of Illinois.

Cara Blue Adams, an assistant professor of creative writing at Coastal Carolina University in Conway, South Carolina, received the William Peden Prize, awarded for the best short story published in The Missouri Review. She was honored for the story “The Sea Latch.”

Adams is a graduate of Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. She earned a master of fine arts degree from the University of Arizona.

Marilyn Skrocki, associate professor of health sciences at Saginaw Valley State University in Michigan, received the 2014 Regent Distinguished Faculty Member Award from the Great Lakes Chapter of the American College of Healthcare Executives.

Professor Shrocki is a graduate of the Thomas M. Cooley Law School in Lansing, Michigan.

Carol Lorenzen, professor of meat science at the University of Missouri, received the Meats Research Award from the American Society of Animal Science. Her research focuses on laboratory techniques to predict beef tenderness.

Dr. Lorenzen has been on the faculty at the University of Missouri since 1991 and was promoted to full professor in 2011. She holds a Ph.D. in animal science from Texas A&M University.