School of Learning & Teaching Honors Outstanding Education & Learning Graduates

Professor Anita Zijdemans-Boudreau, director of the School of Learning and Teaching Forest Grove Programs in Pacific University's College of Education, paid tribute to senior education and learning majors at the 2022 Undergraduate Awards Ceremony.

"To our Ed & Learning capstones — nice work on figuring out how to get into schools to collect data during a pandemic!" she said. "To those of you who are coming back to complete your teacher licensure program, we’ll be ready for you and are excited you have decided to stay on with us.

"To our Ed & Learning licensure candidates — pursuing licensure as an undergraduate is an extremely difficult undertaking. Doing this in a pandemic, well let’s just say that I’m amazed that you are still standing! Congratulations to those of you who have already been offered teaching positions!"

She said she hoped seniors had come to recognize: the importance of internalized lifelong learning, personal awareness, and self-care; the value of diversity; and the belief that education is a human rights issue.

"May we all be reminded today of our privilege of having had access to formal education and achieved this extremely important developmental milestone," she said.