Daniel I. Linzer Award for Faculty Excellence in Diversity and Equity

Jennifer Lackey

Professor of Philosophy

Jennifer Lackey is recognized for her “indefatigable commitment to and innovative leadership” of the Northwestern Prison Education program (NPEP), which made history in 2023 when incarcerated students inside Stateville Correctional Center were the first in U.S. history to be conferred a bachelor’s degree from a top ten university.

Lackey has worked tirelessly with colleagues and administrators at Northwestern as well as officials within the correctional system to create a program that offers as many as 10 classes per quarter at Stateville and Logan Correctional Center for Women. The program has helped NPEP students to transform their lives.

Marcelo Vinces

Associate Professor of Instruction in Molecular Biosciences, Weinberg College Adviser

Marcelo Vinces is recognized for his dedicated and expansive work to promote equity and inclusion for students across the college.

As a college adviser in Weinberg, Vinces not only supports his own advisees and has increased the capacity of the entire advising office to foster inclusion, but he also works with various offices and organizations across campus, including promoting underrepresented students in STEM.

He has devoted himself to fostering inclusion for all students, most notably including first-generation, lower-income, DACA, LGBTQ and Latinx students, through his mentorship, participation in public discussion forums, committee work and service as faculty advisor to Graduate Out in STEM (GoSTEM) and as co-adviser for Northwestern's chapter of the Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS).