Boyd-Ford among Nebraska Women of Distinction

Valda Boyd-Ford, center, with UNMC Chancellor Harold M. Maurer, M.D., and Nebraska First Lady Sally Ganem.

Valda Boyd-Ford, UNMC director of Community and Multicultural Affairs, recently was honored as one of the three 2006 Nebraska Women of Distinction.

The Nebraska Commission on the Status of Women presented the award Aug. 25 at the State Capitol Rotunda. Nebraska First Lady Sally Ganem, wife of Gov. Dave Heineman, presented the awards.

In addition to Boyd-Ford, the other recipients were Mary Ethel Emanuel, author and public relations director for the Nebraska Travel and Tourism Division, and Dianne Seeman Lozier, corporate counsel for the Lozier Corporation, founding member of the Women’s Fund of Greater Omaha and an advocate against domestic violence.

More than 100 family and friends of the three recipients journeyed to Lincoln for the ceremony, including Boyd-Ford’s son, Alphonso, and sister and brother-in-law, Carlene and Larry Walker.

UNMC Chancellor Harold M. Maurer, M.D., attended, along with Rubens Pamies, M.D., vice chancellor for academic affairs and dean for graduate students, and his staff member, Brenda Bell, community outreach coordinator. Ward Chambers, M.D., executive director; Linda Cunningham, assistant director; and Wayne Houston and Aura Whitney-Jackson, community liaisons, represented Boyd-Ford’s Community Partnership division.

Each honoree had introductory remarks made by individuals who submitted nomination letters to the Nebraska Commission on the Status of Women. Boyd-Ford received introductory remarks from Tamicka Bradley, UNMC coordinator of community projects, Susan Langdon, former UNMC staff member of the School of Allied Health Professions and Walter Brooks, media specialist in the UNMC Department of Public Affairs.

Boyd-Ford came to Omaha in May 1997 as a faculty member of the Creighton University School of Nursing. She joined UNMC’s Community Partnership in September 2001. In less than a decade in Nebraska, she has established a national and international reputation as a diversity and multicultural education specialist, as well as creator of a wide array of community health programs targeting children, the elderly, women, immigrants, HIV/AIDS patients and any vulnerable person or group.