The smell of coffee, the sight of beaming students and parents, and the verbal praises of faculty members for their students’ perseverance and outstanding work all pointed to one fact: We were so glad to have our annual awards ceremony in person once again after a 2-year COVID-induced hiatus. It was our last chance to use the University Club as it is currently conceived, since the Club will be moving out of the Indiana Memorial Union this summer. In this warm setting, Ruth N. Halls Professor Oana Panaïté, who has been department chair since January 1, 2020, was finally able to host our annual ceremony in person. The list of awards is below.
The Department is very grateful to its alumni who support our awards with their donations, either to specific, named funds or to the French and Italian Enrichment Fund at the IU Foundation. Especially during these difficult pandemic times, awards mean so much to our students who always amaze us with their skills and passion for Italian, French, and Francophone cultures.
We also take this opportunity to congratulate students who graduated with BA, MA, or PhD degrees this year after slogging through pandemic-induced Zoom classes (as students and/or as Associate Instructors). Nine French majors and three Italian majors graduated in Spring or Summer 2022, while five students earned their MA degrees, and four students completed the PhD (or will do so this summer). Despite a difficult job market for faculty positions, two of our new PhD graduates will begin full-time faculty jobs in Fall 2022: Victoria Lagrange at Kennesaw State University in Georgia (in media studies) and Cristina Robu at St. Lawrence University (New York). Laura Demsey has already been employed for a year as a teaching associate professor at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill), as was reported in these pages last year.
The College of Arts