April 21, 2000
Contact: Linda Luckey, assistant to the dean for the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, (785) 864-3516.
LAWRENCE--Wichita native James E. Hesser was selected recently by the University of Kansas College of Liberal Arts and Sciences alumni club advisory board to receive the Alumni Distinguished Achievement Award, the highest alumni award the College bestows. Hesser was presented with the award April 18 at the KU Alumni Center.
Hesser graduated from KU in 1963 with a bachelor's degree in astronomy and received his master's and doctoral degrees in astrophysics from Princeton University. He has authored or coauthored more than 250 scientific publications and been a pioneer in using the Hubble Space Telescope to determine the ages of the outermost star clusters associated with the Milky Way galaxy.
Active in science education, Hesser has volunteered for the past 13 years with the Shapley Lectures program, sponsored by the American Astronomical Society, which brings speakers for two-day visits to colleges that do not offer a degree in astronomy. He also has made about 25 presentations per year for the past decade at elementary schools throughout British Columbia in conjunction with the "Scientists in the Schools" program.
Hesser spent nine years as a staff member at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile, which serves as the U.S. National Science Foundation's primary facility for astronomical research in the southern hemisphere. In 1977, Hesser joined the staff of the Dominion Astronomical Observatory in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada's national observatory for optical astronomy, becoming director in 1986.
The Alumni Distinguished Achievement Award was first given in 1997 to Nancy Kassebaum and Clyde Toland. Past recipients also include Arthur F. McClure and Martha Peterson.