The university will shine the spotlight on its top student scholars, teachers, advisers and mentors at the annual Honors Day program April 27.
The program will be held this year in Hodgson Hall in UGA’s Performing Arts Center, beginning at 2 p.m. Undergraduate classes scheduled for sixth, seventh and eighth periods (1:25-4:25 p.m.) will not meet so students and faculty can attend.
Conrad Fink, a journalism professor who has won a number of teaching awards, will be the Honors Day speaker.
Several hundred students, including 52 First Honor Graduates (who have maintained perfect 4.0 grade point averages while at UGA) and students who rank in the top 5 percent of their schools and colleges, will be recognized for academic excellence. Other student honorees include recipients of top national scholarships and those elected to scholastic and leadership honor societies.
Honors Day also recognizes faculty members who are receiving awards for teaching excellence, faculty and staff who are being recognized as outstanding advisers and mentors, and graduate students who are receiving awards for teaching.
Five faculty members will be presented as new Josiah Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professors, UGA’s highest recognition of superior instruction at the undergraduate and graduate levels. This year’s Meigs Professors are E.M. (Woody) Beck, professor of sociology; Charles Bullock III, professor of political science; Marcus Fechheimer, professor of cellular biology; Carole Henry, associate professor of art; and Tricia Lootens, associate professor of English.
Recipients of the Richard B. Russell Award, which recognizes young faculty for outstanding teaching, will also be presented. They are Jeffrey D. Berejikian, associate professor of international affairs; Takoi Hamrita, associate professor of biological and agricultural engineering; and Rodney Mauricio, assistant professor of genetics.
In addition, two faculty who have been appointed to special professorships will be recognized. They are Susan Wessler, Regents Professor of Plant Biology, and Dan Coenen, University Professor of Law.
Fink, this year’s speaker, is the William S. Morris Professor of Newspaper Strategy and Management and director of the James M. Cox Jr. Institute for Newspaper Management Studies. A former Associated Press foreign correspondent and vice president, he has been on the faculty of the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication since 1982 and is author of nine books onjournalism.
Fink has been a Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor and last year received the Regents Award for Excellence in Teaching. He is a past Freedom Forum National Journalism Teacher of the Year.
The following faculty members will be recognized as outstanding teachers in the schools and colleges:
Franklin College of Arts and Sciences: Malcolm Adams, mathematics; E.M. Beck, sociology; George Contini, drama; Marcus Fechheimer, cellular biology; Carole Henry, art; Imi Hwangbo, art; Michael Kwass, history; Tricia Lootens, English; Rodney Mauricio, genetics; Barbara McCaskill, English; Carolyn Medine, religion; Larry Millard, art; Michelle Momany, plant biology; Richard Morrison, chemistry; Chandler Pike, statistics; Timothy Powell, English; Paul Schliekelman, statistics; David Zerkel, music;
College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences: David Berle, horticulture; Jeffrey Dorfman, agricultural and applied economics; Jack Houston, agricultural and applied economics; Keith Karnok, crop and soil sciences; David Knauft, horticulture; John Ricketts, agricultural leadership, education and communication; Tim Smalley, horticulture; Paul Thomas, horticulture; Sidney Thompson, biological and agricultural engineering; William Vencill, crop and soil sciences;
School of Law: Lonnie Brown Jr., C. Ronald Ellington, David Shipley;
College of Pharmacy: J. Warren Beach;
Warnell School of Forest Resources: Robert Warren, Rodney Will;
College of Education: Melisa Cahnmann, language and literacy education; John Dayton, lifelong education, administration and policy; Thomas Hebert, educational psychology and instructional technology; Gwynn Powell, counseling and human development services; Kathryn Roulston, lifelong education, administration and policy; Paul Schutz, educational psychology and instructional technology; Elizabeth St. Pierre, language and literacy education; Sally Zepeda, lifelong education, administration and policy;
Terry College of Business: Allen Amason, management; Benjamin Ayers, accounting; Linda Bamber, accounting; Debabroto Chatterjee, management information systems; Margaret Emmelhainz, marketing; Daniel Feldman, management; Harrison Hartman, economics; Mark Huber, management information systems; Charles Lankau, insurance, legal studies and real estate; James Linck, finance; David Mustard, economics; Marisa Pagnattaro, insurance, legal studies and real estate; Peter Shedd, insurance, legal studies and real estate; E. Daniel Smith, accounting;
Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication: Andy Kavoori, telecommunications; Peggy Kreshel, advertising and public relations;
College of Family and Consumer Sciences: Douglas Bachtel, housing and consumer economics; Ruth Harris, foods and nutrition; Karen Leonas, textiles, merchandising and interiors; Charlotte Wallinga, child and family development;
School of Social Work: Alberta Ellett, Stacey Kolomer, Vanessa Robinson-Dooley;
College of Environment and Design: Mark Hunter, ecology; David Spooner, environmental design;
School of Public and International Affairs: Hal Rainey, public administration and policy;
Division of Academic Enhancement: Molly Moran.
Several faculty members will be honored for teaching excellence in the Honors Program. The J. Hatten Howard Award, which recognizes faculty who exhibit special promise in teaching Honors courses during their first term as an Honors Program instructor, will be presented to Louise Benjamin, telecommunications, and Robert Hawman, geology. The Lothar Tresp Outstanding Honors Professor Award is given to Honors faculty based on course evaluations. This year’s recipients are Edward Azoff, mathematics; Gary Bertsch, international affairs; and Kenneth Gaver, accounting.
The Graduate School recognizes graduate teaching assistants for outstanding performance with the Excellence in Teaching Award. This year’s recipients are Elena Adell, Romance languages; Aimee Burgamy, art education; Eleanor Pardini, biology; Bhargavi Patham, cellular biology; and Anna Scott, agricultural and environmental sciences.
Winners of the university’s annual award to a faculty member and a staff member for excellence in academic advising and mentoring are Karl Espelie, professor of entomology, and Sharon Fletcher, an academic adviser in the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.
The university also recognizes outstanding efforts to involve undergraduate students in research with the Undergraduate Research Mentoring Award.
This year’s faculty recipients are Gary Barrett, ecology, and Sidney Kushner, genetics. The departmental recipient is the department of cellular biology.
Four faculty members have been chosen to participate in study in a second discipline, which allows tenured or tenure-track faculty to extend their scholarship by studying for an academic year in a field other than their own.
Participants are Luanne Lohr, agricultural and applied economics; David Newman, forest resources economics; Timothy Powell, English; and Ernest Tollner, biological and agricultural engineering.
Honors Day was started in 1930 by Chancellor S.V. Sanford to give recognition to UGA students for scholastic achievement.