Elizabeth Lewis Pardoe Appointed to Director of Office of Fellowships

EVANSTON, Ill. --- Elizabeth “Beth” Lewis Pardoe, senior associate director of the Office of Fellowships at Northwestern University, will succeed current director Sara Vaux when she retires Aug. 31, 2016.

Pardoe first joined the Office of Fellowships in September 2006 and was quickly promoted to associate director and then senior associate director, reflecting her substantial talents in cultivating students’ interests and connecting them to resources that develop them as engaged citizens of the world. 

To her appointment as director, Pardoe brings a deep commitment to the university, knowledge of the Evanston community and understanding of national and international educational opportunities. 

Pardoe truly bleeds purple. She grew up in Evanston with a faculty father, was a high school debate member in The Cherubs, a Northwestern-based summer debate program for outstanding high school students, and returned to Northwestern for her undergraduate degree in history. She honed her interests in the development of culturally diverse educational institutions during a summer ethnographic field study in Arizona about the educational experiences of Navajo students and a junior year abroad in Germany.  A precursor to the undergraduate research grant allowed Pardoe to conduct senior thesis research in Philadelphia, which later evolved into her doctoral dissertation.

In addition to her roles on planning and selection committees for the National Association of Fellowship Advisors and the Marshall Scholarship, Pardoe has taught in the American Studies Program and in the history department at Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. Additionally, she serves as a fellow of Shepard Residential College, an adviser to the social service organization Alpha Phi Omega and secretary of Phi Beta Kappa’s East Central District. She also sits on the Board of Directors for The Alumnae of Northwestern University, an all-volunteer group of women that has given more than $7.5 million in fellowships, scholarships and awards to faculty and students during the past 100 years.

“Beth has an outstanding set of knowledge, skills and experiences that position her to lead the Office of Fellowships,” said Ronald Braeutigam, associate provost for undergraduate education. “I look forward to working with her and to continuing to build upon the substantial successes of the office under Sara Vaux’s leadership.”

Pardoe completed two masters degrees as a Marshall Scholar at the University of Cambridge and earned her PhD at Princeton University, supported by dissertation fellowships at the University of Pennsylvania’s McNeil Center for Early American Studies and Princeton’s Center for Human Values.  Her scholarship on religious and ethnic diversity in Reformation Europe and colonial North America has appeared in German and American publications.  In addition, she is a regular contributor to the Inside Higher Ed Blog, University of Venus.  Each May, Pardoe, her husband and their two sons enjoy hosting Northwestern’s British Scholarships Garden Party at their Evanston home.