FROM THE NEST | SUMMER 2024 | 33 RECOGNITION DIVERSITY & INCLUSION Lehigh’s Office of Development and Alumni Relations earned the 2024 Alumni Association Inclusive Excellence Award from Insight Into Diversity magazine, the largest and oldest diversity and inclusion publication in higher education. Lehigh was featured, along with 31 other recipients, in the June 2024 issue of the magazine. The university has been recognized previously by the publication. For five consecutive years, Lehigh has earned the Higher Education Excellence in Diversity (HEED) Award. “Lehigh is passionately committed to serving all of its community and ensuring that every student has the opportunity to take advantage of everything that Lehigh has to offer,” said Reginald Jennings ’70, a member of the Lehigh University Alumni Association (LUAA) Board of Directors and former BALANCE chair. “The university has put in place a breadth of infrastructure to ensure that this occurs.” Lehigh launched a Diversity, Inclusion and Equity Strategic Plan that outlined goals and actions the administration will take to create a more diverse community where all feel valued, opinions can be expressed freely, and all are treated equitably. Several affinity programs bring together alumni with common cultures and backgrounds, including Lehigh Asian Alumni Network (LAAN), Black and Latinx Alumni Network for Community and Equity (BALANCE), and Lehigh Alumni Pride Association (LAPA). CENTER FOR ETHICS SPEAKER The Independent Solar Panel Breakthrough Promises Record Efficiency With New Quantum Material Lehigh researchers have discovered a new material that could radically improve the efficiency of next-generation solar panels. “This work represents a significant leap forward in our understanding and development of sustainable energy solutions,” said Chinedu Ekuma, assistant professor of physics. NPR In U.S., Over 100,000 Await Organ Transplants. Are Pig Organs the Solution? Health policy professor Michael Gusmano joins NPR’s “Consider This” to discuss the ethics of xenotransplantation. “If we’re going to move forward, I would prefer the FDA authorize a first in human clinical trial,” he suggests. STAT Nursing Home Owners Might Obscure Some of Their Profits, New Study Shows A new study co-authored by Andrew Olenski, assistant professor of economics, shows that some nursing homes are shunting the majority of their profits off of their own books and into less visible corners of their owners’ pockets. The practice makes the nursing homes look poorer than they really are, the study’s authors wrote. Lehigh Faculty in the Media “Democracy is conversation. It is compromise. It’s a series of very subtle and very challenging social skills across ideological differences.” —David Brooks, New York Times columnist and PBS NewsHour commentator, delivered the 2024 Hagerman Lecture hosted by Lehigh’s Center for Ethics. CHRISTA NEU / HOLLY FASCHING '26
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