President Trani presents awards for multicultural achievement

By Leila Ugincius and Leslie Nelson

Virginia Commonwealth University and VCU Health System members who have contributed significantly to multicultural relations and diversity have been recognized with presidential awards.

President Eugene P. Trani on Thursday honored the recipients at the annual Presidential Awards for Community Multicultural Enrichment (PACME) ceremony. Each year a PACME — and $500 — is awarded to an individual or organization in each of four groups: faculty, administrators, staff and students. In addition, one recipient earns the Riese-Melton Award, a capstone award that includes an additional $250.

Napoleon L. Peoples, Ph.D., director of the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs, opened the ceremony by saying the awards are paramount in promoting the VCU community’s greatest asset — its diversity.

“It means more than tolerating our differences,” he said. “It’s going beyond tolerance.”

Associate Professor Elizabeth Cramer, Ph.D., from the School of Social Work won the faculty award. Cramer’s research interests include domestic violence, lesbian and gay issues and group methods in social work practice. She serves on the advisory council for Women, Disabilities and the Justice System — a grant-funded project coordinated by the VCU Partnership for People with Disabilities. Cramer also received the Riese-Melton capstone award in part because she is a model for other faculty members, Trani said. 

R. McKenna Brown, Ph.D., director of the School of World Studies, earned the administrator award. In addition to having worked in Ecuador, Chile, Mexico and Spain, he received a Fulbright Lecturing Grant in 1998 to teach in Guatemala. Brown, whose research areas include studying the links between language and identity, is also an associate professor of Spanish.

The School of Nursing’s Association of Administrative Professionals, a group that spearheads the school’s annual community service campaign, received the staff award, which recognizes contributions that go above and beyond routine expectations. This year, the nursing school collected warm-weather apparel for Children’s Health Involving Parents, a nonprofit organization serving low-income families with children.

Los Angeles-native Shivani Shodhan, who co-directs the Intercultural Festival Planning Board, won this year’s student award. Shodhan, who is majoring in psychology with minors in biology and chemistry, will graduate next month. This summer she will begin her Master’s in Public Health Studies at the School of Public Health before attending the School of Medicine in 2007 under the university’s Guaranteed Admissions Program.

Shodhan demonstrated her dedication to multiculturalism by asking the audience to stand up and hold hands.

“This is diversity in action,” she said. “Everyone supporting each other and accepting each other.”

The PACMEs were created in 1994 to recognize and encourage those who promote civility, build community, establish effective cross-cultural initiatives, advocate for equity and nurture openness and inclusion within the university community.