• Billy C. Hawkins, president of Talladega College in Alabama, received the Omega Century Award for Excellence at the centennial celebration of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity in Washington, D.C. Dr. Hawkins has been president at Talladega since 2008. Previously, he was president of Texas College.
Dr. Hawkins is a graduate of Ferris State University in Big Rapids, Michigan. He earned a master’s degree from Central Michigan University and a doctorate in educational administration at Michigan State University.
• Cynthia Downing, assistant director at the Office of Career Services at North Carolina A&T State University in Greensboro, was given the Campus Liaison of the Year Award at the National Urban League’s Black Executive Exchange Program Leadership Conference in Orlando.
• Willie Jennings, associate professor of theology and black church studies at the Duke University Divinity School, has been selected to receive the Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion from the American Academy of Religion. Professor Jennings will be honored at the academy’s annual meeting in San Francisco in November for this book The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race (Yale University Press, 2010).
Dr. Jennings is a graduate of Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He holds a master of divinity degree from Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California, and a Ph.D. from Duke University.
• Bea Awoniyi, assistant dean of students and director of the Student Disability Resource Center at Florida State University, received the Ronald E. Blosser Dedicated Service Award, the highest honored bestowed by the Association of Higher Education and Disability.
Below is a video of Dr. Awoniyi discussing her work:
