Founding Members of The Alumnae of NU Continuing Education Program

Distinguished Alumnae Award Recipient, 1998

Presentation of the 1998 Distinguished Alumnae Award was unique in that it wasn't given to one outstanding alumna, but rather several alumnae who had taken the initiative to build on the Alumnae sponsored Woman's Day at Northwestern. - later known as NU Day. Women who attended the first NU Day in 1964 were so taken with the faculty presentations offered that day, they "clamored for more." Lecture options were increased, but in 1966 an attendee asked if there could be "classes like these throughout the year." Two years later, in the fall of 1968, two non-credit courses were offered - a seminar in literature and a multi professor survey course, Contagion in Revolution, that examined the causes of revolutions in societies.

Over the years the Alumnae Continuing Education Program grew to a "year round enterprise" with four courses during each of the 3 academic quarters. One of the first programs of its kind, it was recognized twice by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) with the Exceptional Achievement Award for "significant contributions to the advancement of American education." 

Nancy Dussault

Distinguished Alumnae Award Recipient, 1990

Bienen School Music ’57 BS

Award-winning Actress Dussault made her Broadway debut in 1960 in the hit musical, “Do Re Mi,” receiving a Tony nomination for Best Supporting or Featured Actress in a Musical in 1961. In 1964 and 1965, she appeared in the Broadway hit “Bajour,” receiving her second Tony nomination in 1965 for Best Female Musical Lead. Many other stage productions followed, including “Carousel,” “Peter Pan,” “Finian’s Rainbow,” “Fiorello!.” “On a Clear Day You Can See Forever,” “South Pacific,” and “Into The Woods.” She also was one of the first hosts of ABC-TV’s “Good America,” appearing alongside David Hartman at its premier on November 3, 1975. She returned to the stage in 1977 to star in the Sondheim musical, “Side by Side.” From 1980 to 1983 Dussault portrayed Ted Knight’s wife in the TV comedy “Too Close for Comfort in 1980. The show won a People’s Choice Award for Best New Television Comedy in 1981. She won an Emmy Award for “Cabaret Tonight,” a PBS special, and has appeared in TV specials and as a guest on TV talk shows. She started teaching musical theater at UCLA when she moved to Los Angeles to continue her theater career. In 1989 she released her first CD, “Heart and Soul,” a collection of cabaret songs.

Amanda Stathopoulos

Curriculum Innovation Award Recipient, 2017

Awardee Amanda Stathopoulos is the William A. Patterson Junior Chair of Transportation and an assistant professor in the civil and environmental engineering department in the McCormick School of Engineering. She works at the intersection of science and humanities and is a teaching fellow in Northwestern’s Searle Center for Advancing Learning and Teaching. Her course will focus on connecting students’ understanding of civil engineering with knowledge of current societal challenges. They will learn to identify problems in urban environments and customize engineering solutions for individual communities and cultures.

Engineering Possibilities: Decision Science in the Age of Smart Technologies

In her course, Amanda Stathopoulos invites civil and environmental engineering freshmen to develop a holistic understanding of potential options and outcomes of interventions in urban systems, specifically those in response to environmental, energy, health and mobility challenges. The goal of the course is to “prepare students to address the complexity of problems and engineering solutions with pervasive (and conflicting) impacts.”

The course will give students multiple perspectives on global problems while helping them understand how local conditions contribute to the success or failure of real-life engineering projects. Through a mixture of lectures, discussions with industry professionals and experts, in-class exercises and teamwork, students will be able to identify urban challenges, research and apply analysis tools and find relevant data and metrics to rank possible solutions with an understanding of implications and trade-offs.

“There is ample evidence that young engineers are eager for space and tools to reflect on the social impact of their work,” Stathopoulos notes.

Through teaching students how to evaluate technological, economic and policy implementations as well as the benefits, costs and trade-offs of competing solutions, Stathopoulos says she hopes this course will provide these opportunities for students in the beginning of their engineering courses, helping to increase critical thinking and engagement throughout their education.

The above is an excerpt from: Faculty given support to create innovative curriculum, Northwestern News, December 20, 2016 | By Kayla Stoner

The name of this award was changed in 2019 from Curriculum Development Award to Curriculum Innovation Award.

Jenny Halpern

Senior Woman's Award for Volunteer Service Recipient, 2017

Jenny, from Highland Park, Ill., a senior graduating this spring, is majoring in Human Development and Psychological Services, School of Education and Social Policy, with honors, Dean’s List, with a minor in Dance, School of Communication.

She became involved with Dance Marathon as a freshman, realizing then the power of the Northwestern community. She quotes a phrase, which has inspired her to stay so deeply involved in Dance Marathon: “What we do with our lives echoes in eternity.” The impact of those words is the reason she remained deeply involved in Dance Marathon throughout her years on campus, first as a dancer, then a committee member, and finally as Executive Director.  With this theme as her mantra, Jenny led the 20-person board in its two main duties: evaluating the 60 nonprofit applications requesting funding from Dance Marathon, selecting Gigi’s Playhouse as their primary beneficiary; and planning the committee work leading up to and during this year’s Dance Marathon, held March 3-5, which raised more funds than any former event of its kind.

Gigi’s Playhouse is a nationwide network of Down Syndrome Achievement Centers that promotes free programming to individuals of all ages, their families and communities, impacting two million people across the country. The network provides families a place to understand the diagnosis of Down Syndrome while celebrating their children’s achievements. Northwestern is the first college campus to promote Gigi’s Playhouse. As a leader of the NUDM community, Jenny worked to unite the campus in changing the way the world views Down Syndrome.

In addition to Dance Marathon, Jenny was a company member of Graffiti Dancers, which performs in various campus events. Her advisor, Adrian Bitton, Assistant Director for Leadership and Community Engagement notes, “With her love of Northwestern, ability to connect with others, and her strong sense of responsibility and leadership abilities, Jenny is very much deserving of this award.”

“Jenny, an excellent student, made time to devote herself to raising awareness for those with Down Syndrome, raising funds to help many children. She is a model for volunteer service on the Northwestern campus,” note Margo Brown and Julie McDowell, chairs of The Alumnae’s Senior Woman’s Service Award committee.