Notable Honors for Four Women at Major Universities

Doris Ching, interim chancellor of the West Oahu campus of the University of Hawaii, has had an award named in her honor by NAPSA: Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education. The Doris Michiko Ching Award for Excellence as a Student Affairs Professional will honor an individual “whose outstanding commitment to the profession includes development of programs that address the needs of students, creation of a campus environment that promotes student learning and development, and support of and active engagement in NASPA.” President Ching was the first woman of color to be elected chair of the NASPA board of directors and chair of the NASPA Foundation board.

Before becoming interim president of the West Oahu campus, Dr. Ching was vice president for student affairs emerita for the University of Hawaii System. Dr. Ching earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in secondary education at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. She holds an educational doctorate from Arizona State University.

Kimberlé W. Crenshaw, a professor of law at Columbia University and a professor of law at the University of California, Los Angeles, will receive the Outstanding Scholar Award from the Fellows of the American Bar Foundation. Professor Crenshaw is the author of many books including Say Her Name: Resisting Police Brutality Against Black Women (African American Policy Forum, 2015).

Professor Crenshaw is a graduate of Cornell University and Harvard Law School. She earned a master’s degree in law at the University of Wisconsin.

Diane K. Newman, professor of biology and geobiology at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena has been selected to receive the Award in Molecular Biology from the National Science Foundation. Professor Newman was honored for her “discovery of microbial mechanisms underlying geologic processes” and for “launching the field of molecular geomicrobiology.” Dr. Newman will be honored with the award and a $25,000 prize at the annual meeting of the National Science Foundation this May in Washington.

Professor Newman is a graduate of Stanford University and holds a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Brené Brown, a research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, is having an endowed chair named in her honor at the university. The Brené Brown Endowed Chair in the Graduate College of Social Work is being established with a $2 million grant from the Huffington Foundation.

Professor Brown is the author of three bestselling books Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead (Avery, 2012), The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are (Hazelden, 2010) and Rising Strong: The Reckoning, the Rumble, the Revolution (Spiegel & Grau, 2015). She is a graduate of the University of Texas and holds a master’s degree and a doctorate in social work from the University of Houston.