KATIE BOWLER YOUNG ’92

Katie Bowler Young received the 2021 Governor’s Award for Excellence, the highest honor given to a state employee for dedicated service to North Carolina and its citizens. Katie recently left her role as Senior Director for Global Partnership and Programs at University of North Carolina (UNC) Global to take a position at Duke University. She received the Outstanding Government Service award for leading the university’s pilot Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) program in 2020-21. COIL courses connect Carolina faculty and students with their counterparts at partner universities abroad. In the program’s first year, when options for students to obtain a global education by traveling were limited, more than 450 students enrolled in COIL courses with partners in 13 countries, and 41 faculty from numerous UNC schools and departments in the College of Arts & Sciences received curriculum development awards to introduce the COIL method in their undergraduate and graduate courses. The average cost of COIL courses to the university is under $300 per student — far less than the cost of studying abroad. Students in the COIL courses do not pay any additional tuition or fees, making the COIL approach genuinely accessible for all Carolina students and inclusive by design.

“I want to underscore how much I believe that my award is a reflection of the dedication and demanding work of the global partnership and programs team and the faculty we worked with to be able to make the program the success that it has become,” said Katie. She is grateful not only for her team in the Global Partnership and Programs office and the Office of the Vice Provost for Global Affairs, but also the network of faculty she built over her 13 years at the University, and shared, “Their creativity and care for students being able to continue having a global education, even at the onset of the pandemic, made it possible for this program to be as successful as it was in such a short period of time and in such a difficult period of time.”

The pandemic also was a time of great accomplishment for Katie, whose book, Enrique Alférez: Sculptor was published in 2020 (The Historic New Orleans Collection). Her book about the critically acclaimed sculptor (1901-1999) is the latest entry in the well-received Louisiana Artists Biography series. Katie also is author of Through Water with Ease (Louisiana Literature Press, 2019) and State Street (Bull City Press, 2009). Her poetry and prose have appeared in journals including the Southern Review, the Midwest Quarterly, the Carolina Quarterly, and Louisiana Literature. Her work often focuses on art, culture, and perspective. Among other honors, she has earned a Fulbright-Nehru International Education award and was a finalist for the Marble Faun Prize for Poetry.