The College of Education ranks 183 in the 2024 U.S. News & World Report’s Best Education Schools, moving up 19 spots from last year.
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Several faculty, alumni and current students of the Department of Counseling and Higher Education were honored at the recent American College Personnel Association conference in Chicago.
- Lee Cravens, Ed.D. Higher Education, ’23: Burns B. Crookston Doctoral Research Award from ACPA’s Commission for Faculty and Graduate Programs. (This is the second consecutive year that an NIU graduate student has won this award, following Valronica Scales last year.)
- Freda Kpodo, second-year master’s student: Convention Scholarship from ACPA’s Commission for Global Dimensions of Student Development.
- Gudrun Nyunt: Excellence in International Research Award from ACPA’s Commission for Global Dimensions of Student Development.
- Quortne R. Hutchings: Tracy Davis Emerging Research Award from ACPA’s Coalition for Men and Masculinities and 30 under 40 from ACPA’s Pan-African Network.
- Alexus Hughes, first-year master’s student: Convention-Flat Rate Scholarship from ACPA’s Graduate Students and New Professionals Community of Practice.
- Carlos Fonesca, first-year master’s student: Convention Scholarship from ACPA’s Coalition for Men and Masculinities.
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Quortne R. Hutchings, assistant professor in the Department of Counseling and Higher Education, received the Article of The Year award from the Queer Studies Special Interest Group (SIG) of American Educational Research Association.
Hutchings was honored for “Blackness Preferred, Queerness Deferred: Navigating Sense of Belonging in Black Male Initiative and Men of Color Mentorship Programs,” published Feb. 24, 2023, in the International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education.
“Dr. Hutchings research addresses a major gap in the men and masculinities literature; that is, the void of queer and gender non-conforming identities. This article explores men of color and Black male initiatives, particularly examining the ways these spaces are often hostile towards queer men and gender non-binary students,” the nominator wrote.
“Dr. Hutchings interrogates these spaces using queer of color critique and other critical frameworks, unearthing findings that suggest that these spaces cultivate racial identity formation yet leave sexual and gender identity unexamined,” the nomination continued. “Dr. Hutchings employs multiple critical qualitative methods, including phenomenology, arts-based research and collaborative autoethnography, and the way Dr. Hutchings weaves all these methods together gives way to new methodological possibilities.”
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Cindy York, an associate professor in the Department of Education Technology, Research and Assessment (ETRA), received the 2023-24 Bob Lane Faculty Advocacy Award from the NIU Faculty Senate.
The award recognizes special service to the faculty.
York was nominated for the award by Hal Hinderliter, ETRA’s coordinator of general education courses.
She received her plaque, which will be displayed in the Holmes Student Center, from Faculty Senate President Ben Creed during the March 27 meeting.
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