The 2025 Lola Lopes Award for Undergraduate Student Advocacy has been awarded to Shaun Vecera, director of the University of Iowa Honors Program and professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences.  

The award recognizes administrators, staff, or faculty outside of their teaching role who serve as strong and effective advocates for undergraduate students and the undergraduate experience. Recipients are selected by a committee of staff, faculty, and a student.  

Vecera’s commitment to undergraduate students is evident both in his direct interactions with students and in his advocacy for improvements to resources, structures, and policies that affect student learning. His work has helped students become better learners, faculty become better teachers, and staff members improve their work supporting students. The campus-wide impact of his work is profound.

Between 2018 and 2021, Vecera worked with fellow members of the Path Forward Student Success Committee to envision and implement Learning at Iowa, a student success initiative that uses evidence-based strategies from cognitive science to promote effective learning. Since 2021 he has directed the program, integrating its strategies into campus systems and practices to ensure generations of students will benefit far into the future. Every new student is introduced during orientation to the “three Ms” of the Learning at Iowa framework—Mindset, Metacognition, and Memory—which encourage students to approach challenges as opportunities; to plan, monitor, and reflect on their learning; and to implement effective strategies for strengthening recall of the concepts they study. His team has presented more than 100 customized presentations to instructors, advisors, coaches, and others across campus to enhance the support they provide to students.

As director of the University of Iowa Honors Program, Vecera has worked to make the honors experience more purposeful and meaningful for students. New programmatic initiatives including Intro to Honors and the Honors Second Year Seminar help students develop a habit of reflection “early and often,” to thoughtfully make the most of the opportunities available to them during their undergraduate careers.

Vecera will receive a $1,000 honorarium and a certificate, and his name will be added to a plaque that will be displayed in the Admission Visitors Center.

The award is named in honor of Lola L. Lopes, former associate provost for undergraduate education and professor emerita of management and organizations in the Tippie College of Business.  Lopes served as interim executive vice president and provost during 2007-08.