Alumni Awards

Scott Suchman

Kim Davalos, KD Photography

Lanikque Howard MSW’14, PhD’18

Majors: History, Political Science, International Public Affairs Program Analyst, U.S. State Department Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor Farha Tahir arrived on campus assuming that she’d go on to law school. But during a foreign policy class, she learned about an internship program that paired UW students with opportunities in the nation’s capital. Tahir joined one of the first cohorts of the program, now known as the Wisconsin in Washington Internship Program. She and three fellow interns founded an international development program that served the small island of Lingira in Uganda’s Lake Victoria, launching a farmers’ co-op, girls’ soccer team, women’s economic collaborative, and other initiatives. The project solidified Tahir’s passion for development work. After graduation, she worked at the Center for Strategic and International Studies as a research associate and then became a program officer at the National Democratic Institute, followed by the National Endowment for Democracy. She traveled extensively throughout sub-Saharan Africa and built especially close ties in Somalia, Malawi, and Tanzania. Tahir transitioned to the State Department, as a program analyst for the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, where she now oversees programs that support democracy around the world. “I have always felt that everyone deserves to be able to shape their lived reality, and that’s why I care about democracy,” she says. “The power of democracy is not something we can take for granted.” Farha Tahir ’09, MIPA’10

Major: Social Work Director, Office of Community Services, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services When Lanikque Howard was growing up, her mom worked two jobs but was never able to get ahead. Howard wanted to help families like hers, so she became the first in her family to graduate from high school and college and then went on to graduate studies in social work at UW–Madison. Howard joined the UW’s Institute for Research on Poverty (IRP) as a research assistant and worked closely with professor and then-IRP director Maria Cancian. When President Barack Obama tapped Cancian to lead the Administration for Children and Families, she chose Howard as a political appointee. Howard later become a senior programs administrator at First 5 Alameda County in California, a public initiative to help young children from birth to age five. In 2020, the Biden Administration asked her to return to federal service as the director of the Office of Community Services (OCS). “Every day, I see the vital role our programs play in helping to address persistent poverty and inequities,” she says. “I will not waver in my commitment to making a tangible difference in the lives of the people we serve.” During her tenure, the office’s budget has doubled and she has expanded its antipoverty programs from five to nine. She now provides leadership and oversight in distributing approximately $12 billion to support a wide range of initiatives aimed at alleviating poverty.

16 // FORWARD AWARD

WISCONSIN ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

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AWARD NAME // 17

Andy Manis