2019 H. Aldous Dixon Awards

Steven Nabor 

Senior Associate Vice President for Financial Services and CFO

Steven Nabor ’81 came to Weber State in 1977 as an overwhelmed, first-generation high school graduate. On his first day, he called a professor Dr. Staff because the course catalog listed classes with unassigned instructors as being taught by “staff.” It’s a mistake that still haunts Nabor, who eventually graduated cum laude in accounting, and shortly after, launched what would become an illustrious 35-year professional career at Weber State.

Nabor was hired as a staff auditor, but his formidable knowledge of finance and innovative approach to problem solving prompted a stream of promotions. At each new level of responsibility, from director of Internal Audit to controller to senior associate vice president for Financial Services to chief financial officer, Nabor was determined to cultivate a financial environment where teaching and learning could flourish.

Throughout his career, Nabor looked beyond existing policies to bring about changes that benefitted students. He introduced an every-other-week payroll schedule for student workers. He spearheaded an installment option for students struggling with tuition payments. During government shutdowns, Nabor helped deploy strategies to ease the burden placed on thousands of financial aid recipients.

Nabor also assisted in the design, financing and installation of Flaming W Rock, an iconic campus landmark.

Julie Rich

College of Social & Behavioral Sciences, Associate Dean and Professor of Geography

No one can accuse the associate dean of the College of Social & Behavioral Sciences, Julie Rich ’81, of being locked in an “ivory tower of academia.”

Rich, a geography professor and Weber State alumna who graduated cum laude in 1981, earned a master’s degree from the University of Utah and a Ph.D. from St. John’s College, a constituent college of England’s University of Oxford. 

Her collaborative teaching has garnered prestigious honors, including the Crystal Crest Master Teacher, Hemingway Faculty Excellence and John A. Lindquist awards. Rich consistently earns near-perfect student-evaluation scores. Her research and presentations are internationally acclaimed; her expert opinions on everything from climate change to sustainable construction to green mapping are sought after at home and abroad.

Rich’s crusade to enrich a student’s “Weber State experience” through service learning underscores her longtime association with the university. The Global Community Engaged Learning program, which Rich started, has benefitted more than 200 students, alumni and faculty, and countless indigenous people in Rwanda, Mozambique, Thailand, Peru, Uganda, and soon Fiji. 

Rich promotes undergraduate research. Many of her students assist her fieldwork, conduct lab experiments and present their findings at conferences. Rich helped supervise the recent renovation of the Social Science building, now named Lindquist Hall.

Since 1970, the WSU Alumni Association has presented the H. Aldous Dixon Award to outstanding faculty and staff. The award is given in memory of former President Dixon, who served as the school’s chief administrator in 1919-20 and from 1937 to 1953.