American University of Paris Honors AUN President, Margee Ensign

The American University of Nigeria President, Dr. Margee Ensign, has been awarded an honorary doctorate by the American University of Paris.

At the ceremony in Paris, she shared the stage with Lisa Anderson, the President of the American University of Cairo, and Benjamin Millepied, Director, Paris Opera Ballet.

The honorees, says AUP, are distinguished individuals whose accomplishments are consistent with the university’s mission and core values, to recognize the recipient’s contributions to a specific field or to society in general.

President Ensign was cited for her leadership role in using education to promote peace, community development, and empowerment through a local platform, the Adamawa Peace Initiative (API), which she chairs.

The degree was presented to President Ensign in the French capital during the AUP Commencement on Tuesday, May 26. Citing the American University of Nigeria’s engagement with the refugees of northeast Nigeria, President Ensign used the occasion to urge the new graduates to find solutions to old, new, and unprecedented problems challenging the world today.

In Paris, Dr. Ensign was particularly acknowledged for undertaking humanitarian relief work in northeast Nigeria and for providing food aid to more than 270,000 internally displaced people sheltering with family members in Yola, the Adamawa State capital.

Dr. Ensign’s many laurels include the African Business Roundtable’s Distinguished Leadership Award for Educational Excellence in 2011; the African Leading University of the Year Award by African Leadership magazine in 2012; the Rotary International Paul Harris Fellowship in 2012; the Adamawa State Peace Ambassador Award also in 2012; and the African Leadership Award from the World Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility in 2014.

In 2015, the women’s wing of the Jama’atul Nasril Islam in Nigeria recognized her contributions to leadership, philanthropy, and the education of women and girls in northeast Nigeria.