Christensen Honored

Friends and colleagues of Norman L. Christensen Jr., departing dean of the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences, are establishing a $1-million scholarship endowment in his name that will be used to provide scholarships for Nicholas School students.

The Christensen endowment, announced in April at a celebration for Christensen and the school’s tenth anniversary, recognizes “his extraordinary vision and leadership as founding dean of the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences and his far-reaching influences as an inspired teacher, mentor, and friend.”
Christensen, who spearheaded the creation of the Nicholas School in 1991 and was founding dean, will step down June 30. William L. Schlesinger Jr., James B. Duke Professor of Biogeochemistry, will succeed him.
The scholarships will be awarded as soon as the endowment begins generating income. Recipients are expected to be students in the school’s professional programs, the Master of Environment Management and the Master of Forestry.
“It is common for departing deans to be honored with a named professorship; however, the board of visitors felt so strongly about Norm’s devotion to the students that we decided a scholarship endowment would be a more meaningful way to honor him,” says Douglass F. Rohrman ’63, board chair.
At the school’s celebration, it also was announced that the executive committee of Duke’s board of trustees approved naming the students’ reading room on the first floor of the Levine Science Research Center the Norman L. Christensen Jr. Reading Room.