A writing professor who coaches English teachers around the world, two well-traveled study abroad students and a graduate student from Belarus will be recognized for their efforts to foster global awareness and understanding at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
CU-Boulder's Office of International Education will bestow its first Global Citizens Awards on all four to mark International Education Week Nov. 13-17. An awards ceremony will be held Nov. 15 from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. in the lobby of the ATLAS building.
This year's winners are senior instructor Anne Bliss; housing and dining services employee Liza Hensleigh; undergraduate student Katherine Bruch; and Belarusian graduate student and instructor Galina Siarheichyk.
Anne Bliss
Bliss, a Fulbright fellow who has taught in the university's writing and rhetoric program for more than 20 years, has been named campus global citizen of the year for her efforts to share best-of-practice classroom methodologies with English teachers in remote regions of the world. Her recognition also stems from her work with CU-Boulder international students seeking to perfect their English.
"I love communication. I don't care in what language. I can talk with my hands and feet anywhere in the world," said Bliss, who has traveled to Chile's Atacama desert and China's Shaanxi province to instruct English as a second language, or ESL, teachers and to counsel universities.
At CU-Boulder, Bliss has watched her students excel in college and launch rewarding careers in science, technology and business because of their grasp of the English language.
"It's the English. It's your class. I hear things like that," Bliss said. "I think I've given some people keys to a good life."
Liza Hensleigh
For her part, Hensleigh, a Fort Collins native who graduated in 2005 with degrees in women's studies and international affairs, studied in Nicaragua and in East Africa, where she took classes on social justice and the political histories of her host countries.
She is being recognized for her contributions to the Smith Hall International Program, or SHIP, a program for first-year students interested in global issues.
One of Hensleigh's goals is to work for an international organization devoted to preventing sexual violence against women in the world's conflict zones. For now, she volunteers for Moving to End Sexual Assault, a Boulder crisis and information hotline.
"Everyone is so interconnected with other people around the globe in ways they may or may not realize," Hensleigh said. "Human rights just strikes me as the most important thing in the world. That's why I feel so passionate about it. It's absolutely my driving force at all times."
Katherine Bruch
Bruch, a junior from Greeley majoring in anthropology and linguistics, has been named study abroad student of the year. While in China last summer, she studied traditional East Asian philosophy toward the human body and how that correlates with diet, exercise and medicine.
She also spent an academic year in Ankara, Turkey, where she took a course taught by Turkish sociology Professor Yakin Ert眉rk, a United Nations special rapporteur at the forefront of ending violence against women around the globe. Bruch also is a SHIP mentor.
"Going to China and Turkey really made me realize how diverse the world is, and how there are so many different ways of living," Bruch said. "Learning other languages gives you different ways to think about the world."
Galina Siarheichyk
Meanwhile, Siarheichyk has been named international student of the year. The Belarus-born graduate student of Polish heritage is working on a doctorate in comparative literature and teaches CU-Boulder students to think critically about the culture, literature and history of the Russian language and the countries in which it is spoken.
Siarheichyk has worked as an on-campus ambassador, and has organized cultural festivals and other events, including a 2005 conference on the lasting fallout from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine. This year she is working to bring a Polish film festival to Colorado.
She also serves as a volunteer translator for the Polish community in Colorado, working closely with the Polish Consulate in Los Angeles and Poland's honorary consul in Colorado, Tomasz Skotnicki.
Siarheichyk said she believes strongly in a "sense of respect for human dignity," and tries to deliver that message to her CU-Boulder students.
"I want to set an example, and I want to bring in some diversity and improve cultural understanding," she said. "I think that in my classes I bring a positive attitude first and foremost. I believe in my students' ability to perform at their best, even when they don't believe in that."
The Global Citizens Awards are planned to be given annually.
For more information about CU-Boulder's International Education Week events visit