The School of Communication Sciences and Disorders is thrilled and honoured to announce the winners of both the newly established Distinguished Alumni Award for Professional Leadership and the Distinguished Alumni Award for Research Leadership.
The 2008 winner, as outlined in the enclosed pamphlet, of the Distinguished Alumni Award for Professional Leadership Ayala Hanen Manolson, (M.Sc. degree granted June 1973) has made a tremendous contribution to the speech-language pathology profession and to families of children with communication disorders throughout the course of her career. Her most notable accomplishment, the founding of the Hanen Centre, is well known across Canada and internationally.
The 2009 winner, as outlined in the enclosed pamphlet Distinugished Alumni Award for Research Leadership Martha Crago, with three degrees from McGill University, has a distnguished career as a researcher and academic administrator and is currently serving as Vice President (Research) at Dalhousie University. Dr. Crago has devoted herself to excellence in the education of graduate students, has published books on her work on the impact of culture and bilingualism on language use, development and disability, and has received special recognition for work with Aboriginal communities in northern Canada.
The 2010 winner, as outlined in the enclosed pamphlet, Distinguished Alumni Award for Professional Leadership, Karen Evans, (M.Sc.A. degree granted 1987) has contributed enormously in clinical settings for children as well as adults. Ms. Evans started the development of Karen's Cues, a widely used manual cuing system for supporting speech development, and created the Semantic Parsing method for developing sentence comprehension in children with specific language impairments.
The 2012 winner of the Distinguished Alumni Award for Professional Leadership, Sharon Fotheringham, has had a nationwide impact on the field of Speech-Language Pathology. In addition to her practice with both adults and children in Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Ontario, she was appointed as the first director of CASLPA in 1996. During her fifteen-year tenure with CASLPA, Mrs. Fotheringham developed competency profiles for professionals as well as standards for both clinical certification and University accreditation. She also negotiated agreements with international professional associations for mutual recognition with several countries, and played a leadership role in support of key CASLPA committees and in the preparation of several reports of national importance to the profession.
I know that you will agree that Ms. Manolson, Dr. Crago, Ms. Evans, and Ms. Fotheringham more than exemplify the standard of excellence that McGill University shares with its students, past, present and future.
How to Participate
This award program serves to celebrate our past as the foundation for our future. We hope that you will choose to participate in the award program by:
- Updating your contact information so that we can find you
- Apprising us and your fellow alumni of your accomplishments
- Nominating your fellow alumni or yourself for future awards
- Making a donation to sustain the Alumni Awards program.
How to Make a Donation
To make a donation to support the Distinguished Alumni Awards, please use the Online Giving form. Be sure to specify allocation code 04135 for the Distinguished Alumni Award for Professional Leadership, and allocation code 04136 for the Distinguished Alumni Award for Research Leadership, in the box called "Other" under "My Gift".
Alternately, donations can be made by calling toll-free 1-800-872-8431, specifying the School of Communication Sciences and Disorders and one of the allocation codes mentioned above. For more information about these awards please call 514-398-4137.