2019 Honorees Set a High Bar

President's Medal

The President's Medal recipient is selected from graduating seniors with the most distinguished academic record. This year's medalist earned a 3.99 GPA.

 Sarah L. Lindhartsen graduates with a bachelor of science degree in biomedical sciences. The 40-year-old mother of three went back to school in 2013 after her spouse passed away. Lindhartsen completed an associate's degree at Tacoma Community College before transferring to UW Tacoma. During her time on campus, Lindhartsen has worked as a student researcher in Dr. Marc Nahmani's neuroscience lab and plans to continue working in the lab during the summer. She also worked as a student assistant for the ACCESS in STEM program at UW Tacoma. She is currently enrolled in a one-year histology technician certificate program. Following completion of the program, Lindhartsen intends to work in a medical or research lab for a few years before returning to school to earn a Ph.D.

Student Speaker

Diana Sheila Algomeda Villada is never not busy. Algomeda Villada has been a peer advisor, ASUWT senator and the director of internal communications and affairs for ASUWT. She worked to create the First Gen Fellows program which helps first-generation students adapt and thrive in higher education. She was a 2018-19 Dressel Scholar and a recipient of a Rod Hagenbuch Gift of Service Award. Off-campus, Algomeda Villada served as a tutor for Highline Public Schools. On top of this, she works a regular job. The money she makes goes to help her mother, father and three siblings. Algomeda Villada recently completed an internship at Tacoma Community House where she helped immigrants and refugees find employment. Her bachelor of arts degree is in ethnic, gender and labor studies with global honors.

Dr. Michelle Montgomery, Assistant Professor, School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences, Social & Historical Division, connects research, teaching and service with a commitment to increasing collective knowledge of the histories, cultures and political struggles of Indigenous populations. Dr. Montgomery creates space for dialogue and the co-production of knowledge among organizations at the local, regional and national level. Among her long-term community partnerships, Dr. Montgomery serves as a committee member on The Living Breath of wǝɫǝbʔaltxʷ Indigenous Foods and Ecological Knowledge Symposia at UW in Seattle and the Indigenous Peoples Climate Change Working Group.

Distinguished Teaching Award

Dr. Anaid Yerena, Assistant Professor, Urban Studies, uses a strengths-based, individualized approach to learning. Her students engage in community projects that affect policy and practice in the region, in turn becoming influential in the community. She has a deep, ongoing commitment to professional development and pedagogy. She worked as an architect before she got her master's and Ph.D. at UC Irvine in 2015 and came to UW Tacoma in that year. Dr. Yerena's research examines housing policyand the role of locally-generated solutions to displacement and housing-affordabillity imbalances. She teaches courses in urban planning, housing and urban design, and has been instrumental in the creation of UW Tacoma's undergraduate urban design degree. Dr. Yerena has been honored in 2018 and 2019 at the UW Latinx Faculty Recognition Event.