The winners of the Women of Achievement Award were announced Friday at the annual Women’s History Month Luncheon in the Cotillion Ballroom. This award is given every year to a faculty or staff member and a student who has made a difference on the Nicholls campus. The event is sponsored by the Center for Women and Government, and the awards are given out by the University Counseling Center. The guests ate while this year’s speaker, Rep. Karen Carter, spoke about women inspiring other women in government.

This year’s winners were Louise “Do” Bonin, associate director of athletics from New Iberia, and Marie Ory, mass communication senior from LaPlace. They were both nominated by peers and chosen by a panel of judges from across the state.

Bonin has been at Nicholls for the past 10 years and was the woman’s head basketball coach until January. She is also recognized by the NCAA as the Senior Women’s Administrator for Nicholls.

Bonin felt that this year’s theme, women inspiring hope and possibility, fits in very well with her philosophy about coaching, which she has done for the last 27 years.

“I was pleasantly surprised,” said Bonin. “It was an honor to just be nominated because there are some very talented, hard-working women on this campus that deserved this recognition.”

Bonin commented on her time at Nicholls by saying, “I fell in love Nicholls. I’ve been here 10 years, and I hope to finish out my career here.”

She says her proudest achievement has been what she has done with the women’s basketball team but does not want to take all the credit for their success since her arrival. She praises a great coaching staff and students willing to learn.

She is currently doing all she can to help the coaches by providing them with more resources and is also spearheading a fundraiser to help with men and women’s scholarships, but she mostly handles the day-to-day operations of the athletic department.

Ory is the editor of The Nicholls Worth and is a member of several committees on campus. She hopes to go to graduate school, and eventually become a newspaper adviser at the collegiate level.

She said winning the award was surreal. “I think anyone who is in a leadership position on campus contributes so much to their respective organizations and help advance the image of women on campus.”

Along with other accolades, Ory has received several awards and scholarships for her in-depth reporting on mold growing in Geaux Hall and is a two time Who’s Who among American Colleges and Universities honoree. But, she says that her most memorable awards were the ones voted on by the staff at The Nicholls Worth. “You go through a job like this, and leadership is lonely, but to be honored by a staff like that is awesome,” she said.

Ory’s career at the Nicholls Worth has allowed her the opportunity to interview the likes of Hoda Kotbe, Peter Max, and former governor Edwin Edwards, but she believes the greatest part of her job is the people that she gets to work with. “Each person that I have interviewed, worked under or worked with has helped shape me as a person, and through those meetings, I have become who I am today.