2024 Outstanding Educator Award
Suzanne Zack '81
2024 OUTSTANDING EDUCATOR AWARD RECIPIENT
Suzanne Zack, affiliate professor of film and video production, is passionate about helping students and alumni succeed by building a culture of collaboration, education, and connection among students, faculty, alumni, and the professional community.
Zack earned a bachelor’s degree in arts and media in 1981 from Grand Valley where she discovered a love for video editing. For 30 years, she worked as a video editor for corporate, commercial, and broadcast companies while working with independent filmmakers to edit many award-winning documentaries and music videos. After earning an MFA from Temple University in 1995, Zack found her dream job teaching film and video production back at GVSU.
“Suzanne has helped connect me with influential mentors in the film community, many of whom are GVSU alumni, who helped me grow in my career and cultivated the community Grand Valley promised me when I first enrolled.”
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Former student of Suzanne Zack '81
In 2015, Zack co-founded the GVSU Film & Video Alumni Network to create opportunities for students, alumni, industry professionals, and media organizations to connect. The network has supported alumni and students through workshops, podcast episodes, networking events, mentoring programs, field trips, an alumni profile book, and more.
In 2020, Zack was awarded the Affiliate Faculty Excellence in Teaching Award and the Career Center Internship Advocate of the Year Award.
Zack says she benefited from the hands-on approach to education, culture of collaboration, connection to professional opportunities, and mentorship she received as a student at Grand Valley. She strives to bring these values to current students and alumni through her work in the classroom, as the program’s internship coordinator, and as the campus liaison for the Film and Video Alumni Network.