TWO alumnae of St. Scholastica’s College in Manila won international awards for their valuable contributions to their fields.

Dr. Inez Ponce de Leon was recognized as this year’s Distinguished Alumna of Purdue University Agricultural Sciences Education and Communication program.

De Leon specializes in science and risk communication and teaches courses in qualitative communication research methods, undergraduate thesis and science and risk communication.

Her research centers around the public understanding of risk, community responses to natural hazards, climate change communication, and constructs of nationalism in online discourse.

She also won awards, including the Avellana Professorial Chair for Communication and the School of Social Science’s Outstanding Scholarly Work Award for her research.

The awards presentation is scheduled on October 14.

Meanwhile, Rappler chief executive officer Maria Ressa will receive The Transatlantic Leadership Network’s Freedom of the Media Award for Explanatory Reporting for her “continuous efforts in safeguarding freedom of expression.”

Ressa will be awarded at the National Press Club in Washington, DC on September 17.

The TLN awards recognize superior enterprise reporting and production and place a premium on stories that impact society in the Public Service, Investigative Reporting, Explanatory Reporting, International Reporting, and Commentary and Criticism.