HartlepNicholas Hartlep, of Bloomington, Ill., will be recognized by Winona State University with the Distinguished Young Alumni Award Friday, Sept. 25, as a part of the university’s Homecoming celebration.

Nicholas Hartlep graduated from Winona State University in 2006 with a bachelor’s degree in elementary education and a minor in Spanish. Hartlep was named to Kappa Delta Pi and Golden Key honor societies, the National Society of Collegiate Scholars, and was a member of the men’s cross-country team and student senate. He worked as a substitute teacher in the Winona and Lewiston-Altura school districts before being accepted as a fellow into Winona State’s Graduate Induction Program, earning a master’s degree in education in 2008. He then began working in the Milwaukee Public Schools while working toward his Ph.D. in urban education at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Hartlep received an Advanced Opportunity Program Fellowship and was named an Outstanding Doctoral Student at UW-Milwaukee. Hartlep currently serves as an Assistant Professor of Educational Foundations at Illinois State University, and in 2015 was a University Research Initiative Award Recipient. Hartlep’s mother-in-law, Patricia Cichosz, works in the Graduate Office at Winona State.