UCS News:
Please see the release below and call or e-mail me at mwalker@ucschools.com with any questions.

Marie Griffin honored with top SHA teaching award

LOUISVILLE, KY (June 2006) - Sacred Heart Academy (SHA) recently announced that faculty member Marie Griffin is the 2006 recipient of the Loretto Peter Mudd Excellence in Teaching Award.

The Loretto P. Mudd Excellence in Teaching Award was established in 1999 in memory of Loretto Peter Mudd, a 1931 SHA graduate. Loretto Mudd also taught at Sacred Heart and was a nurse on the original staff of the Marian Home (the long-term nursing facility for Ursuline Sisters). The award honors a full-time or part-time SHA teacher who consistently reflects the Ursuline Core Values of reverence, leadership, community, and service and who demonstrates dedication to students' learning and their full human development.

Griffin, who was nominated by students, alumnae, colleagues, and parents, has been a Spanish teacher at Sacred Heart for four years. Nominators said of Griffin: "From her, I have learned about the passion of teaching;" "She treats everyone the same, no matter who they are or what they have done;" and "She is always so enthusiastic about every little thing, and can make even the most boring topic interesting."

Griffin is the faculty sponsor for the Community Awareness Club, Spanish Club, and Spanish Honor Society. In past years, she was the faculty sponsor for the Drama Club and Asian American Club. Griffin has been selected by the Crane House to participate in its 15th annual Summer Teaching in Asia program. In July, she will spend three weeks in China, where she will instruct teachers and students in conversational English and provide professional training for teachers of English. In 2004, Griffin was selected to study in Japan for three weeks as part of the Fulbright Memorial Fund Teacher Program.

* * *

Sacred Heart Academy ((SHA), founded in 1877, is a college preparatory secondary school for girls, and is the only Catholic high school in Kentucky to offer the International Baccalaureate program. Ninety-nine percent of SHA graduates attend hundreds of colleges and universities across the country, and the Academy has almost 9,000 alumnae worldwide. In addition to being a National Blue Ribbon School of Excellence, SHA celebrates more than 70 state athletic championship titles. In 2006, SHA students earned 9.2 million in college scholarships. http://www.sacredheartacad.com/