Chief Operating Officer of Chemistry
and Biochemistry Receives 2008 Betsy Faught Award

Bobb Barile | April 14, 2008

Marjorie Hardy, chief operating officer of the department of chemistry and biochemistry, has been named the recipient of the 2008 Betsy Faught Award.  The award recognizes excellence and outstanding achievement in the management of general campus academic units. It also honors the memory of Betsy Faught, a department manager who adeptly and skillfully managed an academic program at UCSD for more than 20 years.  The award recipient is selected by a group of peers based on nominations from within the Academic Affairs units. 

Marjorie Hardy is the recipient of the 2008 Betsy Faught Award.

In 2006, Hardy, this year’s award recipient, assumed her current position in chemistry & biochemistry. In his nomination letter for the award, current Chair Robert Continetti said that Hardy arrived at a time when the department was suffering from significant deficits and a crisis in staff morale. “It was in this environment that Marjorie came to our rescue,” Continetti wrote.

After conducting an analysis of the department’s fiscal condition, Hardy proposed and gained approval for a number of measures that put chemistry & biochemistry on a solid road to financial recovery. And with Hardy’s guidance, the staff environment was rebuilt with a focus on strong work ethic and mutual respect. In the words of Physical Sciences Assistant Dean Barbara Seipel, Hardy possesses “a unique blend of extreme competency, good common sense, strength of character and an indefatigable commitment to her department and to the university.”

Hardy’s service to the campus began more than 30 years ago in the UCSD Alumni Association. Shortly thereafter, she was recruited to a program rep position in the department of theatre and she has remained with Academic Affairs Division ever since. Hardy worked her way up through the ranks in the Warren College Provost Office, the departments of music and physics and the San Diego Supercomputer Center, where she established the center’s business office as a part of UCSD. In 2001, Hardy obtained her first business officer position when she returned to the music department.

Beyond the departments in which she has worked, Hardy has an outstanding record of service to the campus. She currently serves as a member of the executive board of the Academic Business Administrators campus group and has a long history of service on ABA committees. She has also served on a number of important campus committees, including the Human Resources Advisory Team and the 2005 search committee for the dean of the Division of Arts & Humanities.

Hardy will be honored by the ABA at a special recognition ceremony April 16.