May 07, 2012
Top Women in Business Award
Dr. Alina Camacho-Gingerich was honored by the Queens Courier and Queens Business at their
10th Annual Top Women in Business Award Dinner for her
leadership role in Queens. The ceremony took place at Terrace on
the Park on April 25, 2012. Over seven hundred people
attended the event.
The women honored have distinguished and prominent careers in
different professions and businesses. At this event, where each
honoree received a beautiful trophy, a previous honoree, Claire
Shulman, received a Lifetime Achievement Award.
Dr. Alina Camacho-Gingerich is Chair of the Committee on Latin
American and Caribbean Studies (CLACS) and tenured Professor in the
Department of Languages and Literatures at St. John’s University,
New York. The
multidisciplinary center she leads, CLACS, is composed of faculty,
students and administrators, scholars from all disciplines and
schools of the University, whose interdisciplinary research,
teaching, and professional involvement demonstrate a serious
commitment to the study of Latin America, the Caribbean, and
Latinos in the United States.. As Chair of CLACS, Dr.
Camacho-Gingerich has organized and chaired many multidisciplinary
symposia, conferences, workshops, and lectures, and has helped
promote joint academic programs and research projects with
universities abroad and diplomatic missions in New York City. In addition, CLACS works
closely with various New York City communities and organizations,
and has led a series of projects in support of the low-income
families and individuals that live in those communities, regardless
of ethnic background.
Under Dr. Camacho-Gingerich’s leadership, CLACS has received
several foundation and city grants to help the less fortunate among
us. Including the most recent grant from NYC Department of Youth
and Community Development in Adult Literacy, a three–year grant to
teach adults of all ethnic backgrounds basic education and GED
preparatory classes.
CLACS recent publication, The Immigrant Experience in New York
City: A Resource Guide is the result of one of those funded
projects. Dr.
Camacho-Gingerich is on the board of several academic and community
organizations, including the Queens Museum of Art.
Dr. Camacho-Gingerich, a leading scholar on Latin American
literature and civilization, is the author of numerous
multidisciplinary studies and has been the recipient of many
national and international awards and professional recognitions,
among them: Recognized as one of the 2006 Distinguished Latino
Women by El Diario/La Prensa; the 2002 First Outstanding Latino
Faculty Award; 2000 Faculty Outstanding Achievement Award, and 2000
Woman of Distinction Award, by St. John’s University; one of 20 Prominent Women
Making Their Mark (together with, among others, Claire Shulman,
Mariah Carey, Donna Karan, Rosie O’Donnell) by Newsday, in a
special edition during 2000 Women’s History Month; awarded the Simón Bolívar
Medal (La Paz,
Bolivia, 1993), one of the highest honors a Latin American nation
bestows; recipient of Doctoral Andrew Mellon Fellowship; and
recipient of several St. John’s Faculty Merit Awards for
outstanding research and publications.