September 02, 1999
LAWRENCE -- The final four 1999 William T. Kemper Fellowship for Teaching Excellence awards, worth $5,000 each, have now been handed out to professors at the University of Kansas.
University and Commerce Bank officials have surprised a total of 20 professors in their classrooms or offices on KU's campuses in Lawrence, Overland Park, Kansas City, Kan., and Wichita to personally deliver the awards. The first of this year's awards was handed out the first day of classes Aug. 19 in Lawrence. The final award was given Tuesday at the KU Medical Center in Kansas City, Kan.
"KU has a great faculty," KU Chancellor Robert Hemenway said. "It is a privilege to be able to reward teaching and advising in such a meaningful way."
The final winners include three medical center faculty: Vincent H. Gattone II, professor of anatomy and cell biology; Anita L. Wingate, associate professor of nursing; and James L. Fishback, associate professor of pathology and laboratory medicine. A fourth winner, William H. Peery, associate professor of internal medicine, teaches at the KU School of Medicine-Wichita.
The W.T. Kemper Fellowships for Teaching Excellence recognize outstanding teachers and advisers at KU as determined by a seven-member selection committee. The committee's members include students, faculty and KU alumni. This is the third year in the five-year award program.
The William T. Kemper Foundation-Commerce Bank, Trustee, established a $250,000 fund for the program. The KU Endowment Association provided $250,000 in matching funds. Established in 1989 after Kemper's death, the foundation is dedicated to continuing his lifelong interest in improving the human condition and quality of life. The foundation supports Midwest communities and concentrates on initiatives in education, health and human services, civic improvements and the arts.
Biographies of this year's winners:
Ron Francisco, professor of political science and Russian and East European Studies. Francisco's recent array of courses taught includes surveys in comparative politics, research methods, political revolutions and politics of Western Europe.
Allen Ford, professor of business. He came to KU in 1979, and since that time has won nearly every school, university and professional teaching award extant. In 1996, he received the Ray M. Sommerfeld Outstanding Tax Educator Award, a national honor given to only five individuals since its inception.
James R. "Pete" Shortridge, professor of geography. He is acknowledged as one of the top academics in the broad field of American cultural and historical geography.
Sandra L. Albrecht, associate professor of sociology. Albrecht had a leadership role in the Women's Studies Program for several years. Her forthcoming book will deal with gender and labor militancy in the airline industry. She is the recipient of several teaching awards.
Ann Schofield, professor of American studies and women's studies. She has a national reputation for her work on women's and labor history, especially her research addressing the intersection of gender and work.
Renate R. Mai-Dalton, associate professor of business. Mai-Dalton founded the Multicultural Business Scholar Program in 1992 to provide pre-business and business students from underrepresented groups at the university with an academic and social environment that would improve their retention and graduation rates in the school.
Brenda K. Myles, associate professor of special education. She is recognized internationally for her work in the area of autism spectrum disorders and established the Autism/Asperger Syndrome Resource Center at KUMC.
Thomas J. Lewin, associate professor of history. As KU's only specialist in oral history, Lewin is frequently sought out as an adviser on special projects, both on campus and throughout the state. He has also been a key participant in KU's Master's of Historical Administration and Museum Studies Program.
Arlene L. Barry, associate professor of teaching and leadership. Barry has attained a national reputation for her work in the history of literacy and is looked to by other scholars in this field for her intellectual contributions.
Diana B. Carlin, professor of communication studies. She is an acknowledged authority in the field of political debates, has served on the Advisory Board Commission on Presidential Debates and has chaired the board of directors of the Kids Voting project in Kansas.
Stephen R. McAllister, associate professor of law. Formerly a clerk for a chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals and two Supreme Court justices in Washington, D.C., McAllister regularly offers a freshman honors tutorial on the Supreme Court and is a faculty adviser to the prestigious University Scholars Program.
Victor Bailey, professor of history. Before coming to KU in 1988, Bailey held academic posts at Oxford and Hull Universities in Britain and the University of Rochester, N.Y. His emergence as a leading figure in the field of socio-legal history of Britain in the 19th and 20th centuries was further demonstrated recently by the publication of his latest book, "'This Rash Act': Suicide Across the Life-Cycle in the Victorian City."
David S. Holmes, professor of psychology. Within the psychology department, Holmes' heavy teaching load accounts for almost 25 percent of the undergraduate credit hours. He is a master of the large lecture format; at minimum, 1,300 students a year take his psychology courses.
Jan Kozma, professor of French and Italian. She devised the Summer Language Institute in Florence, Italy, an intensive language experience intended to help students achieve the fluency needed to study Italian literature as a major.
Philip A. Schrodt, professor of political science. He specializes in teaching foreign policy decision-making, international conflict and crisis forecasting and quantitative international relations.
Norman A. Slade, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and curator of mammals at the Natural History Museum. A world-class ecologist, Slade often takes students to field sites so they can observe firsthand the ecological principles presented in his courses.
James L. Fishback, associate professor of pathology and laboratory medicine. He has been a leader at the medical center in using the World Wide Web for medical education. His major project, the Pathology Web site on Pulse, the medical center's Web site, currently consists of 10,000 pages and graphics.
Vincent H. Gattone II, professor of anatomy and cell biology. He is known for teaching efforts that extend well beyond the classroom. For example, he organized a program to ensure that first-year medical students were certified in basic life support within a few weeks of entering school.
Anita L. Wingate, associate professor and academic coordinator of nursing, earned her doctorate at KU. She teaches pathophysiology to undergraduate nursing students and has been cited for her innovative conversational style of classroom interactions.
William H. Peery, associate professor of internal medicine. He joined the faculty in 1976. He recently organized a massive new ambulatory medicine curriculum and is noted for his ability to combine the pathophysiological and clinical aspects of medicine.
Contact: Todd Cohen, University Relations, (785) 864-8858.