The prestigious 2023 College of the Environment Dean’s Medalist award goes to our Program on the Environment student, Lillian Williamson, a double-major in Environmental Studies and Political Science. Lillian’s extraordinary academic and civic accomplishments include being named a Rhodes Scholarship finalist, a Mitchell scholarship semi-finalist, a Husky 100 student, and now, the Dean’s Medalist 2023 award! Lillian is the recipient of several University of Washington awards including, but not limited to the Husky Union Building Hall of Fame, Honors Pillow Scholar, Husky 100, and Robinson Center Mentor of the Year. She is a current member of the UW College of the Environment Strategic Plan committee, and in 2019, was invited to serve on the Washington State School Safety and Student Well-Being Youth Advisory council and soon thereafter became chair. Currently, she is serves as the Associated Students of the University of Washington (ASUW) Student Body Vice President. 

UW PoE Professor Kristi Straus writes: 

“Lillian’s early experience with the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction’s School Safety and Student Well Being Legislative Advisory Committee’s Youth Advisory Council taught her that investing her time and talent in political and legislative work can lead to valuable changes. Since 2019, Lillian has sought opportunities to improve policy at the city, state, and federal level. For example, Lillian is a Commissioner for the City of Seattle where she advises the Mayor and City Council about issues affecting the LGBTQ community, she is the Sub-group Lead on the Children and Youth Behavioral Health group for the Washington State Health Care Authority, she was a Lead volunteer on the Fur Free Washington campaign, and most recently, she served as a Congressional Intern for congresswoman Kim Schrier. Lillian is proud that in the 2022 Washington State Legislative Session, she collaborated on nine bills and provisos addressing issues she cares about: improving environmental regulation, addressing youth homelessness, and improving access to health care. When I talk with Lillian, she is most proud of the bills she has co-written that have passed and become law. In contrast, I am most impressed with Lillian when she talks about the work she has done to ban the fur industry in Washington State. 

 Lillian joined the #FurFreeWashington campaign when she learned about fur industry pollution damaging water quality in rural communities.  As a lead volunteer on this campaign, Lillian worked tirelessly to introduce a bill (HB 1718) in the state legislature to ban fur production in Washington.  She co-authored and promoted the petition to support the bill, managed the social media campaign, lobbied for the bill, and delivered testimony in support of the bill.  This bill, that Lillian spent so much time and effort on, did not pass.  Lillian inspires me when she talks about this bill because she doesn’t see this as a failure but instead as one step closer to the bill being passed, saying things like “the petition got 140,000 signatures!”, “we got much closer the second time than we did the first time” and “I can’t wait to try again to pass this legislation next year.”  This example so clearly demonstrates Lillian’s work ethic, tenacity, and commitment and could not better exemplify “Fail Forward”. I would be thrilled to have Lillian lead any important project that I wanted to move forward. I am confident that any project she is committed to will eventually succeed. 

In addition to the work and honors mentioned above, Lillian has extensive campus leadership experience. Currently, she is serving as the Associated Students of the University of Washington (ASUW) Student Body Vice President. In this role she acts as the Chief Internal Officer and Board of Directors Chief of Staff for UW Student government, supervising 75+ employees and overseeing a 1.4 million dollar budget.  Simultaneously, she is serving as the President of the Young Democrats of the University of Washington. Lillian is brilliant in the classroom, hard-working and tenacious in her policy/politics/and leadership positions at levels from the UW to the State, and is a passionate advocate for underserved communities.”