91�ԹϺ�����

Chancellor's Award for Advancing Equity

Cynthia Cooper, Associate Professor, Molecular Biosciences

Since joining 91�ԹϺ����� in 2008, Cynthia Cooper has contributed to university life in multiple ways. She teaches, runs a lab and does research on the relationship of pigmentation to human diseases. In addition, she has led work to strengthen the diversity of the sciences program and build an equitable environment that fosters success for everyone. She participates in the decision-making process to ensure equity in everything from building design to teaching. As her colleagues and students become more diverse, she wants to make sure they feel heard and valued.

Her own story as a Black woman in the sciences is inspiring to students interested in the biological sciences. She encourages young people, regardless of who they are, that going into a STEM field is achievable.

Cooper has a storied reputation as a generous mentor, and the proof is that when funding has run out, many students have stayed in her lab as volunteers. She welcomes high school students and undergraduates into her lab. She supports them however she can—“always reminding them that they can do and achieve anything they want if they are willing to work hard to do so,” she said.

Cooper co-founded the 91�ԹϺ����� Black Indigenous People of Color Fellowship Fund and serves as faculty advisor for a student club. Her door is always open, and her warm, welcoming personality fosters teamwork. She enjoys sharing her work with the university and the community—to remind them, as she says, “that people of color (and of all backgrounds) are doing and achieving amazing things!”

Chancellor’s Award for Research Excellence

Ed Hagen, Professor of Anthropology, College of Arts and Sciences

Scholarship in anthropology is richer and deeper because of Ed Hagen. A leader in introducing mental health research into biological anthropology, he directs 91�ԹϺ�����’s Bioanthropology Lab. He focuses on topics that have been largely neglected by other biological anthropologists—the use of tobacco, cannabis and other drugs, depression and suicide—all of which can cause enormous harm to the health and well-being of many people.

Hagen and his collaborators have developed an extensive evolutionary framework for human drug use that challenges conventional thinking. His research has shown that popular recreational plant drugs are acutely toxic—a perspective that can explain some patterns in drug use that have not been understood. His vast and varied research interests also extend to the study of suicide, leadership, the microbiome, gossip, music and dance.

Hagen’s studies appear widely in prestigious journals, and his publications have been cited by other scholars some 6,000 times. His work is international, ranging from the Venezuelan and Ecuadorian Amazon to the Central African Republic. In being able to conduct research so expansively, Hagen said, “I feel like I’m very lucky. All of these projects have been very interesting to me.”

Hagen received his bachelor’s degree in mathematics before going on to earn master’s and Ph.D. degrees in anthropology. Before joining 91�ԹϺ����� in 2007, he taught and did research in Germany and in California. While in Germany, he learned of the position at 91�ԹϺ�����. “The anthropology department at WSU is one of few in the country that specializes in evolutionary approaches to human behavior,” he said. “I was very attracted to that.”

Chancellor’s Award for Service to 91�ԹϺ�����

Lynn Valenter, Vice President of Finance and Treasurer, Reed College

When you admire daffodils blooming on campus or snowflakes glistening on campus banners, thank Lynn Valenter. In more than 20 years at 91�ԹϺ�����, she made countless positive contributions to university operations. She joined the university as facilities and auxiliary services manager in 1997, was promoted to director of finance and operations in 1999, then to vice chancellor in 2005. She also served as interim chancellor for two years, from 2010 to 2012. In 2021, she joined Reed College in Portland as vice president of finance and treasurer but continued to serve 91�ԹϺ����� by consulting on a new budget model and staffing transitions.

Active both on behalf of the institution and as a community member, Valenter participated in numerous county initiatives around long-term and district planning and other technical development issues. She helped the university accomplish its highest priorities, serving as liaison to Clark County on campus growth plans. She oversaw the development of an updated master plan. She was instrumental in making the new Life Sciences Building, now under construction, a reality. As a self-described “wonky” individual with financial expertise, she provides insight to community processes that enhance the perspectives of other participants.

Both directly and indirectly, Valenter has helped her staff and countless others succeed. She volunteers with Winter Hospitality Overflow, an organization devoted to help those in need during winter’s coldest months, and serves on several local and national boards. In 2016, Valenter was honored by the Portland Business Journal’s Women of Influence in the nonprofit category, and in 2019 she received the Iris Award as a woman of achievement in the Vancouver community.

Chancellor’s Award for Student Achievement

Zoe Minden, B.S., Electrical Engineering

One of her professors calls Zoe Minden “a role model for women in the engineering program.” And no wonder. Her 3.93 GPA attests to the seriousness with which she approaches the subject. She also completed the challenging requirements for a Certificate in Renewable Energy. “She excels in all the projects she undertakes, and actively participates in all classes. She is also always earnest to learn science and new technologies,” said Professor Feng Zhao, who nominated her for the award.

Minden often has a leadership role in her academic projects. During the pandemic, for example, she did research with Zhao’s group. “Her research results were the essential part of a peer-reviewed paper we published later on in a prestigious journal,” Zhao said.

Minden was involved with the Office of Student Involvement throughout her four years at 91�ԹϺ�����, as well as student government and campus clubs, notably the IEEE student club, an association for future engineers. Over the years, she served as president, secretary and treasurer of the club. She hosted study groups through the IEEE club to engage students and connect with the community.

Minden grew up in the Vancouver area and enrolled at 91�ԹϺ����� right out of high school. She chose it in part because of the engineering program and in part because her mother was in one of the university’s first graduating classes. She was married in May to Andrew Templin, a 2021 91�ԹϺ����� graduate, and has just begun her master’s degree program in electrical engineering at 91�ԹϺ�����.

Students’ Award for Teaching Excellence

Carol Siegel, Professor of English and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies

The road to college teaching was long and winding for Siegel, who began as a landscape gardening construction major in community college. She switched to humanities and had decided to get her teaching credentials when her professors urged her to go on for her Ph.D. She joined 91�ԹϺ����� as one of two professors hired to create a humanities program on the Vancouver campus in 1990. It was a good decision. In 2021, Siegel received the systemwide Distinguished Faculty Award from WSU’s College of Arts and Sciences.

Siegel deeply respects her students and their growing minds, and in turn, they respect her, calling her, for example, “my favorite English professor at any school” and “one of the best women’s studies professors I’ve ever had.”

Siegel’s wry voice and lack of pomposity are especially endearing to students. Introducing herself on her WSU faculty web page, she writes: “I continue amusing myself and, I hope, others by teaching a variety of college classes. In all seriousness, as I can frequently be heard shouting in the halls, working with students is often the only thing that I truly enjoy about being a professor. But then again, sometimes I enjoy it all.”

Her students return the compliment. “She is consistently responsive in her communications, flexible in how she assesses a student's fulfillment of the course requirements, and she loves to engage in conversation about things that make students think both inside and outside class material,” one student nominator wrote. “These points speak to the abundant care and compassion she has for all who take her classes.”