Linda Grant is awarded staff emerita by UAA Chancellor Sean Parnell and Provost Denise Runge during a ceremony for commencement honorees held in UAA’s Fine Arts Building, December 2021.
The rank of Staff Emerita was conferred upon Linda Grant during ceremonies earlier this month. This high honor is in recognition of her distinguished career at UAA’s Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER), and was recommended by her colleagues with the concurrence of the Chancellor’s Cabinet.
“Heroic and gracious efforts” capped Linda’s 30-year career at ISER, said former director Ralph Townsend. Her tenure at the Institute was a long arc of professional growth leading up to 2020, when she stepped up to cover the work of two positions in the midst of a pandemic.
For a research institute, proper fiscal management is a complex but critical function. Linda started as an Administrative Clerk in 1990, but early in her career she demonstrated significant skills in fiscal management. By the time she retired, she was a Fiscal Professional 3 with complete responsibility for managing both pre-award and post-award functions for ISER. “The development of her career is truly remarkable,” said Townsend. “As ISER’s external funding was expanding, it required increasingly sophisticated fiscal management of those grants and contracts. Linda sought national training that led to becoming a Certified Research Administrator in 2014. At the time, she was one of only three at UAA to earn that certification.”
Rosyland Frazier, Senior Research Professional, said Linda “continually demonstrated her ability to work with diverse individuals in private and public entities through the many and diverse contractual arrangements that fund ISER projects. She responded to the numerous and varied requests and anticipated future administrative and fiscal needs, identified potential problems, and proposed and implemented solutions.”
“In addition to being an exceptional professional at ISER, Linda also was a kind and caring colleague who made sure that the needs of faculty and staff were met, especially when we needed extra support,” said Diane Hirshberg, now ISER’s Interim Director. “She was the grandma to every new baby or puppy that joined the ISER family and was truly a big reason why ISER has been such a lovely place to work for so many years.”
Celesta Richardson worked with Linda for a number of years and noted that she was also a gifted pianist who shared her talents with the community. She accompanied soloists, choirs, and congregational music at weekly services and special events, and served as music director for her church for two decades. “Just as Linda served the people of ISER for many years, she has also contributed to the Anchorage community. She has done all this quietly and consistently, yet with passion and excellence. Her extraordinary service to the UAA community and the local Anchorage community is truly worthy of the recognition of Staff Emeritus.”
Lexi Hill, ISER’s former Associate Director, wrote that, “UAA’s mission is to transform lives through teaching, research, community engagement and creative expression. ISER researchers can’t do that transformative work without the administrative and fiscal support that lets them spend their time, ‘getting on with the work’. For 30 years, for nine directors and dozens of faculty and staff researchers, Linda Grant was a key part of that support.”
“I was completely surprised, overwhelmed and humbled when I learned that I was receiving the rank of Staff Emerita,” Linda said. “Thank you so much to Ralph Townsend and my other colleagues who took the time to write letters of nomination on my behalf. I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”
