Continuing a Legacy of Giving: Wendy L. Olson Fellowship Enhancement Endowment for Public Service in Landscape Architecture

Wendy L. Olson lived her life as a pioneer of sorts. In 1977, she became one of the first women to do field work for the N.C. Agricultural Extension Service. She was induced to apply to the College of Design for the master’s program by Professor Art Rice of the Department of Landscape Architecture. In 1990, Olson earned her master’s degree in landscape architecture. She achieved great success as a landscape architect and an environmental advocate. Olson was a registered landscape architect, a certified professional in erosion and sedimentation control, an avid gardener and a lifelong environmentalist.

Olson gave of her time and talent by volunteering for many organizations and serving on the Triangle Greenways Council, Hillsborough Parks and Recreation Board and the Hillsborough Planning Board. She was well known for her advocacy of the River Walk, a concept from her master’s thesis on the origins, present use and future prospects for Hillsborough’s historic path and walkways. As a founding member of Walkable Hillsborough, which promotes pedestrian access from residential areas to significant community sites, Olson chartered an outlet for her ideas such as the greenway along the Eno River from Occoneechee Mountain to Hillsborough Historic District. Tragically in April 2004, Olson was fatally injured in an automobile accident.

In December 2005, Olson’s husband Brian Dodge endowed the Wendy L. Olson Fellowship Enhancement Endowment for Public Service in Landscape Architecture. With Dodge’s gift of $216,000, the Olson Fellowship is a testament to Olson’s dedication to not only the profession of landscape architecture, but to the importance of giving back through public service to the community.

By creating this endowment, Dodge is honoring his wife’s work and her belief that we must all share the gifts that we are given and use them to make the environment and our communities better. “I hope that this endowment helps some promising students find their own lifelong path of environmental advocacy and good citizenship. The knowledge that you have made a difference in the community, and that you can continue to make life better for many others is a powerful reward. I want many others to experience this like Wendy and I did while we were together,” says Dodge.

The income from the Olson Fellowship will award at least one annual fellowship for a graduate student enrolled in the College of Design’s Landscape Architecture Department. The Olson Fellowship will provide funds for the student to start or complete a public service project that protects or enhances the environment. Preference will be given to projects undertaken on the behalf of local governments, public agencies and non-profit or charitable organizations. “This gift not only secures the memory of a special person, it is a call to conscience of the importance of a designer’s voice as an environmental advocate. It will foster generations of landscape architects committed to design process as citizenship,” says Dean Marvin J. Malecha.

Dodge’s gift is the first endowed fellowship of its type received by the college. Landscape architecture students will reap the benefit of Dodge’s generosity for years to come. Additional gifts may be made to this endowment in Wendy Olson’s memory. For more information, contact Director of Development Carla Abramczyk at carla_abramczyk@ncsu.edu or 919.513.4310.

Brian Dodge (center) with Olson Fellowship recipients Kristen Ford (left) and Caitlin Sloop (right).