Honoring the 2026 Betsy Alden Award Recipients

Each year, Duke Service-Learning recognizes a student, faculty member, and community partner whose work reflects the core values of service-learning: meaningful partnership, critical reflection, and a commitment to community-engaged learning. 

The Betsy Alden Outstanding Service-Learning Awards honor individuals and partners who are not only participating in this work—but shaping what it can be. 

This year’s recipients include a graduating senior deeply engaged in community-based learning, a faculty member advancing equity through STEM education, and two community partners whose work reflects sustained, reciprocal collaboration. 

Student Award: Jacqueline Villanueva 

Growing up in Houston as a first-generation college student, Jacqueline Villanueva (Trinity '26) arrived at Duke with a deep understanding of what's at stake when communities lack access to education and healthcare — a question that sits at the heart of her major in Medical Sociology. Service-learning gave her a way to act on it. Since her sophomore year, she has taken a service-learning course nearly every semester—working with the Avila Center, El Centro Hispano, and Insight Colearning Center, and carpooling classmates to sites so that logistics wouldn’t be a barrier for anyone else.  

“I have yet to teach a student who matches Jackie’s commitment to service to the community,” wrote nominator Rebecca Ewing. 

Beyond her own placements, Jacqueline has drawn classmates in—helping them navigate sites, build confidence, and engage more meaningfully with the communities they serve. 

“Meaningful learning does not happen in isolation,” she reflected. “It happens through relationships, reflection, and engagement with the communities around us.” 

Faculty Award: Whitney McCoy 

Engineering Equity (EGR190/EDUC290S) looks different from most engineering courses. Duke students design hands-on STEM activities for Durham mothers and daughters—then facilitate them, reflect on them, and refine them. At the center of it all is Dr. Whitney McCoy, whose InventHers Institute has spent years building the kind of trust that makes the program work. 

Before the program launched, McCoy conducted stakeholder interviews and community asset mapping to understand what Durham families actually wanted—and has kept listening ever since. Engineering Equity is a service-learning course, meaning students don't just study these questions in the abstract; they work directly with Durham families each week, designing and facilitating hands-on STEM activities together. Her approach is rooted in listening and responsiveness. 

“Rather than imposing predetermined activities, she identified Durham families’ actual interests and barriers to STEM engagement,” her nominator wrote. 

The result: participating mothers report greater confidence in their own STEM identities, daughters show measurable gains in interest and self-efficacy, and families stay connected long after the program ends. 

Community Partner Awards 

Coach Curtis Walker – E.K. Powe Elementary 

Coach Curtis Walker has a theory about what makes a PE class work: relationships. Since 2023, the Health & Physical Education Specialist at E.K. Powe Elementary has partnered with Duke students through Partners for Success—and he has shaped the experience into something genuinely reciprocal. 

He matches volunteers to age groups based on what they want to practice—whether that’s pedagogy, facilitation, or just showing up. The kids notice.  

“When they have someone they really connect to who says ‘you can do it’—they really light up and come to life,” he said. 

Duke students agree: many continue volunteering in his gym long after a course requirement ends, and one reflected that Coach Walker “taught me a lot about teaching and how to be a good human.” 

The Town of Hillsborough 

Instructor Susie Post-Rust launched Small Town USA in 2007 expecting to rotate to a new town each spring. She never left Hillsborough. For nearly two decades, the town has been an extraordinary partner to her documentary photography course—not because of any single organization, but because of a community-wide culture of welcome. 

Three mayors have led the introductory tour. The Hillsborough Arts Council has hosted annual student print exhibits on the courthouse lawn, free of charge, for the full run of the course. Hillsborough Presbyterian Church grew community attendance from 20 to over 100 by opening its social hall to student presentations. When rising transportation costs threatened to end the course, Mayor Mark Bell didn’t accept that. He connected Post-Rust with the Tourism Development Authority, which provided $4,500 to keep the class running and accessible to all students regardless of means. 

As Post-Rust wrote, Hillsborough’s support represents not just a single collaboration, but “a culture of participation.” 

A Shared Commitment to Community 

Across their work, this year’s recipients share a common thread: a commitment to building relationships that extend beyond the classroom.