CCPD Awards
The Center for Career and Professional Development is proud to announce our new annual awards program to recognize and celebrate the dedication of Western Carolina University faculty/staff, employer partners, and students. Career development doesn't happen in a vacuum, and we can all benefit from having a team of educators and advocates helping us along our career journeys. Our office is grateful to the many individuals providing resources, insights, and opportunities to our students and alumni as they identify, set, and achieve their career goals.
2021-2022 Awards
Campus Career Development Champions
This award recognizes Western Carolina University faculty and staff committed to the career development of their students. These individuals and/or departments devote extra time and energy to enhancing their students' professional and career growth through programming, events, one-on-one conversations, sharing opportunities, and more.
The 2021-2022 winners are:
Dr. Ericka Zimmerman for her proactive efforts to integrate career development into the curriculum as well as the personal time she dedicates to supporting her students in their career exploration. Dr. Zimmerman connects students with campus resources, professionals in their various fields of interest, and experts providing advice for students in their professional journey in a course she designed to allow intentional exploration of career interests within the healthcare field.
Geosciences and Natural Resources Department for developing curricular and co-curricular opportunities for career exploration and professional development, including guest speakers, mock interviews, and a camping/career exploration trip that connected students with potential employers and WCU alumni working in a variety of fields.
Employer Partner of the Year
The Center for Career and Professional Development works with employers across industries and geographic locations to promote WCU and cultivate opportunities for students. We are proud to have a roster of employers eager to recruit WCU students. This award is to recognize the efforts of those employers who have gone above and beyond typical recruitment strategies to connect with WCU.
This year we would like to recognize:
High Hampton and recruiter Joshua Casey for their innovative partnership with Western Carolina University. High Hampton has gone beyond recruitment events and into the classroom, providing guest presentations, internships, and field trips. They've partnered with WCU faculty and leadership to establish the High Hampton Educational Assistance Plan that provides students with the opportunity to earn tuition reimbursement in addition to an hourly wage.
DegreePlus Poster Presentation of the Year
DegreePlus is a campus-wide program that helps undergraduates build their choice of four transferable skills in leadership, cultural responsiveness, professionalism, and teamwork to enhance their academic work. The three-level extracurricular program culminates with a poster presentation in which the students reflect on how they applied the transferable skill through an academic or nonacademic experience of their choice. The poster presentation demonstrates their integration of the five learning outcomes of their chosen skill. This award recognizes exceptional learning and integration done by a student participant.
This year, DegreePlus recognizes:
Joslyn Stinson and her poster presentation Designing for Health in Response to Rural, Low-Income and/or Impoverished Western North Carolinian (WNC) Culture. Stinson’s poster presentation showcased how she applied the DegreePlus Cultural Responsiveness Skill’s five learning outcomes in the Design for Health (DfH) Initiative. DfH is an interdisciplinary service-learning based program in which WCU student leaders and faculty mentors work together outside the healthcare system to improve the health and well-being of local community members. Through her poster presentation, Stinson reflected on how she applied the transferable skill learning outcomes and the way this connects to her academic and professional journeys. Stinson will graduate in May with a B.S. in Interior Design. Her poster presentation received a perfect score by the evaluators.
Congratulations to the inaugural 2021-2022 winners!
We thank all faculty, staff, and employer partners for their engagement with the CCPD and their tireless efforts to help WCU students explore their options, build their skills, engage in impactful learning opportunities, and move with increasing confidence towards their next steps!
