Spring brings the annual Scholars Reception, recognizing the work of outstanding Saint Mary’s faculty. / Photo by Francis Tatem
Meet Saint Mary’s 2025 Faculty Award Winners and Provost’s Faculty Research Grant Recipients
On March 17, the annual Scholars Reception celebrated faculty for their outstanding teaching, scholarship, and service. Also announced were the recipients of the Provost’s Faculty Research Grant, supporting their advancement in vital research.
The annual Saint Mary’s Scholars Reception, held on the evening of Friday, March 17 at the Soda Center, brought together SMC faculty and leadership in a spirit of celebration, camaraderie, and recognition of academic excellence. The event honored faculty with awards for teaching, scholarship, and service, and also announced the recipients of the Provost’s Faculty Research Grant, which supports essential research across the College. Faculty awardees and grant recipients were selected by the Committee on Faculty Development and Scholarship.
Here are this year’s Faculty Award winners and recipients of the Provost’s Faculty Research Grant, along with descriptions of their projects. Read on—and scroll down for a look at the photo gallery.
Faculty Excellence Award Recipients
Photos by Richard Trinh
Advising and Mentorship Award | Hoang Vu, Psychology
Recognizes faculty members who embody the ideal of Lasallian care for students through conscientious and effective advising of students. The award honors an educator who has far exceeded the expectation of supporting students’ individualized academic planning, timely progress toward graduation, and personal success at Saint Mary’s and beyond. Professor Vu was selected for his energy, passion, and dedication to advising, for his range of expertise, and for his careful, consistent, responsive advising of students.
One graduate described Professor Vu as spending “countless hours fostering my curiosity about neuroscience and the role of biological and environmental factors in memory, guiding me toward helpful articles and resources. He has encouraged my ambition to pursue academic/internship opportunities, written countless recommendation letters, and helped me clearly envision my future as a competent and valuable contributor to the field of neuroscientific research.”
Inclusive Excellence, Justice, and Liberation Award | Institute for Latino and Latin American Studies, led by María Luisa Ruiz, World Languages and Cultures, and Myrna Santiago, History
Recognizes faculty members or teams who have demonstrated exceptional effort and intellectual leadership to promote and foster the Lasallian principles: respect for all persons, inclusive community, concern for the poor, and social justice, all embodied in their service, research, and/or teaching. The award recognizes impactful initiatives or projects that advance our commitment to inclusive excellence, justice, and liberation.
Since its establishment in 2016, the Institute for Latino and Latin American Studies has been a beacon of inclusivity, social justice, and academic excellence. Among other highlights, the Institute created the Brother Camillus Chávez ILaLS Student Award, established the Brother Camillus Chávez Book Collection, and sponsored a speaker series featuring distinguished scholars and thought leaders.
Early Career Scholarship & Service Award | Wan-Yi (Amy) Chu, Chemistry
Honors tenure-track faculty at an early point in their career who have excelled in scholarship or creative activity and demonstrated exemplary service to the College. Professor Chu’s research program consistently involves a large number of undergraduate students, and in the last year alone, she presented her work at the Green Chemistry & Engineering Conference and the American Chemical Society national meeting—where one of her student researchers also presented.
This past fall, Professor Chu was awarded a National Science Foundation grant. She also obtained funding from the HEDCO Foundation to support a solvent purification system, as well as funding from the American Chemical Society’s Petroleum Research Fund. Her campus-wide service includes participation in the Academic Senate, Committee on Faculty Development and Scholarship, and Program Assessment Advisory Board.
Teaching Excellence Award | Monique Lane, Leadership
Recognizes full-time faculty members who have demonstrated sustained exceptional teaching performance at the College. Associate Professor Lane, winner of this year’s award, has consistently demonstrated an unwavering commitment to teaching excellence and transformative education, fostering a collaborative and inclusive learning environment for both undergraduate and graduate students.
According to her colleagues, Professor Lane’s teaching philosophy is rooted in the values of shared inquiry and collaborative knowledge-building for intellectual and social transformation that extends beyond the classroom. She approaches her classes in the most humanizing way, working alongside students to identify and address growth areas in leadership and research while fostering more equitable, justice-centered scholarship and practice. Her innovative teaching techniques, including digital tools like podcasting and low-tech games like “Whiteopoly,” make learning engaging and impactful.
Faculty Service Award | Helga Lenart-Cheng, World Languages and Cultures
Recognizes a faculty member for exemplary service in a leadership capacity to the College and/or the community that brings credit to the College in areas beyond teaching and research. Her colleagues noted that Professor Lenart-Cheng has demonstrated extraordinary service to Saint Mary’s through a range of roles throughout her tenure—and specifically over the past seven years as Director of the Honors Program. Her leadership and dedication have resulted in significant initiatives and innovations in the areas of student recruitment, community building, academic experience, and post-graduation success.
Professor Lenart-Cheng’s achievements include the creation of a direct admission pathway for student into the Honors Program; development of a resource of information about top Honors programs at other colleges and universities from which to draw best practices; and the establishment of a “Living Learning Community” for Honors students to foster a stronger sense of community. She also spearheaded the creation of a dedicated Honors study space, lounge, and outside terrace to support community building, events, and recruitment, as well as other community-building tools for Honors students.
Outstanding Scholar Award | Matthew Zapruder, Creative Writing
Recognizes tenured faculty who have excelled in scholarship or creative activity, evidenced by their peer-reviewed publications, other scholarly and creative activities, and/or success in securing external funds for their research.
Professor Zapruder has authored six collections of poetry and two books of prose, steadily expanding his body of work and the scope of his artistic vision over a career spanning three decades. His prose book, Why Poetry (2017), teaches readers how to rediscover the joy and mystery of reading poetry, while his hybrid memoir, The Story of a Poem (2023), juxtaposes his development as a father and husband with the crafting of a poem during the pandemic. His most recent book of poetry, I Love Hearing Your Dreams (2024), arrived to critical acclaim last October.
With each publication, the accolades and reach of Professor Zapruder’s artistic work grows stronger, say his colleagues. For his most recent memoir, he was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award, one of the literary community’s most prestigious awards. Respect for his writing among peers is evident in his recent service to the field as editor of the Poetry Column for the New York Times Magazine and editor of the Best American Poetry 2022. His poetry has even been adapted and performed by composers in Carnegie Hall.
Provost’s Faculty Research Grant Recipients
The Provost’s Faculty Research Grants advance the scholarly and creative activity of the Saint Mary’s faculty. Grant funds serve as an investment in this important aspect of faculty work, a significant contribution to our campus community, and to the future of Saint Mary’s College. Grants are supported by endowment funds identified for promoting academic excellence.
The Faculty Research Grant Recipients for 2025-2026 are:
- Jennifer Heung | Great Expectations: Global Chinatowns, Cultural Transformation, and China’s Soft Power, which aims to investigate the relationship between China's “soft power” initiatives and the evolving identities of these urban spaces in London and Sydney.
- Emily Klein | Every Day is Like Survival: Feminist Performance, Emergency Culture & the Absurd, a book project that explores the resurgence of absurdism in contemporary performance and its reimagining by feminist cultural producers.
- Akilah Reynolds | Capturing Critical Moments in Strong Black Womanhood, which seeks to understand critical moments in Black women's lives and how these junctures influence their relationship with the strong Black woman schema, a cultural survival mechanism involving resilience in the face of adversity.
- Michal Strahilevitz | The Relationship Between a Sustainable Planet and Personal Well-Being, a book project that aims to explore the intertwined relationship between environmental sustainability and individual and collective well-being.
Congratulations to all of our Scholars Reception award winners and grant recipients!
2025 Scholars Reception in Photos
Photos by Richard Trinh
