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Union alumna Marlise Austin is presented the Acorn Award by Secretary of State Trey Grayson. |
Union Alumna Earns Acorn Award
Marlisa R. Austin, a graduate of Union College’s master’s program in education, has earned a high honor for her work in higher education.
The Council on Postsecondary Education announced the winners of this year’s Acorn and OAK awards Monday afternoon, following an awards luncheon during the 2008 Governor’s Conference on Postsecondary Education Trusteeship in Lexington.
The Acorn Award is presented by the Kentucky Advocates for Higher Education. The award recognizes outstanding faculty at Kentucky’s colleges and universities and includes a $5,000 honorarium. Recipients are chosen based on their reasons for selecting college teaching as a profession, their philosophy of teaching and their professional achievements.
Governor Steve Beshear delivered the keynote address at the luncheon, while Secretary of State Trey Grayson presented the awards.
Austin is a professor of English at Jefferson Community and Technical College (JCTC) in Louisville. After graduating from Southeast Community College, she went on to earn a bachelor’s degree in English education at the University of Kentucky. Austin completed her master’s degree at Union before returning to Southeast to teach full time in developmental English and work in the college’s GED and adult literacy programs.
Austin has been with JCTC since 2003, where she currently chairs the English and developmental writing programs. She has led various efforts at JCTC in professional development, assessment and developmental writing. Austin has also taken active leadership roles at the state and national levels through presentations at national conferences and positions with state and regional groups dedicated to developmental education.
In 2006, Austin was awarded the KCTCS New Horizons System Award of Excellence, the single-highest honor the system gives a faculty member.
One of the three OAK Award winners also has a connection to Union. James C. Klotter, Kentucky State Historian and professor of history at Georgetown College, earned an honorary doctorate from Union in 1998. The OAK Award is presented to alumni of Kentucky colleges and universities who have achieved national stature and who demonstrate an attachment to their alma mater and Kentucky.
