Focus publishes a column on a periodic basis that recognizes significant accomplishments of members of the Rutgers community. Faculty and staff who wish to be recognized for achievement, or those who would like to note the achievements of others, may submit a notice of their awards or honors through the Submit News form.

 

John Aiello, professor of psychology (NB), was named president of the American Psychological Association’s Division 34: Population and Environmental Psychology for 2005-06.

JoAnn Arnholt, dean of fraternity and sorority affairs (NB), is the recipient of the 2005 Spirit of Greek Bowling Green State University Award for her contributions within the field of fraternity and sorority advising following her time at Bowling Green. Arnholt served as the associate director of small group housing and Greek life at BGSU from 1989 to 1995.

Edward Arnold, professor of chemistry (NB), has been elected a fellow in the American Academy of Microbiology. The academy, the leadership group within the American Society for Microbiology, recognizes excellence, originality, and creativity in the microbiological sciences.

Gail Ashley, professor of geological sciences (NB), was awarded honorary membership in the Society for Sedimentary Geology) at the American Association of Petroleum Geologists/Society of Sedimentary Geologists annual meeting in April, held in Houston. The award is for professional accomplishments and outstanding service.

Frank Askin, School of Law-Newark professor, received a Rutgers University Human Dignity Award for his work in establishing the Minority Student Program and for helping to foster its mission for almost 40 years.

Robert Atkins, assistant professor at the College of Nursing (Newark), was awarded the Research Nurse of the Year award by the Concerned Black Nurses of Newark for his contributions to the improvement of New Jersey youths’ health. 

George Atwood, professor of psychology (NB), was honored with the International Society for the Psychological Treatment of Schizophrenia and Other Psychoses – United States Chapter Award.

Mark Baker, professor of linguistics (NB), is the recipient of an American Philosophical Society fellowship for research on “A Cross-Linguistic Theory of Agreement and Concord.”

Roger Balm, assistant instructor of geography (NB), participated in the 2006 NEH Summer Institute “Maya Worlds: On-Site in Chiapas, Guatemala, Honduras and Belize,” sponsored by the Community College Humanities Association and funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Herman Bennett, professor of history (NB), was awarded both a Fredrick Burkhardt Residential Fellowship for Recently Tenured Scholars by the American Council of Learned Societies and a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship. He will spend the year in residence at the Institute for Advanced Study, School of Historical Studies working on his project “An Early Modern Culture of Freedom: Black Christian Narratives in Absolutist New Spain, 1640-1750.”

Joan Bennett, professor of plant biology and pathology (NB), is the recipient of the Alice Evans Award from the American Society of Microbiology for her contributions to the advancement and participation of women in microbiology. Bennett serves as associate vice president and head of the Rutgers Office to Advance Women in Science and is a scientist scholar-in-residence at the Douglass Project.

Helen M. Berman, Board of Governors Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology (NB), received the M.J. Buerger Award from the American Crystallographic Association at the association’s annual national meeting in Honolulu in July. The award recognizes her lifetime work in the pioneering development of information services for the global community of researchers who produce and use structural data from large biological molecules. 

Lee Blessing, associate professor in the theater arts department, Mason Gross School of the Arts, received a Steinberg/American Theatre Critics Association New Play Award for his work “A Body of Water.” The prize, which includes a grant of $25, 000, is the highest cash award in American playwriting.

Jozsef Borocz, associate professor of sociology (NB), is the 2006 Immanuel Wallerstein Chair of the World Systems Analysis Research Group at the Centre for Ethics and Value Inquiry, Ghent University, Belgium.

David Brodzinsky, professor of psychology (NB) and director of the Foster Care Counseling Project, is a founding member of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute Senior Research Fellows Program, an unprecedented initiative that brings together a group of the country’s most distinguished adoption experts to share knowledge and improve adoption practice and policy.

Sherri-Ann Butterfield, assistant professor of sociology (Newark), was named National Social Science Research Council Fellow for the 2006-07 academic year. As part of her fellowship, Butterfield will travel to Great Britain to work on the National Science Foundation-funded “Children of Immigrants in Schools” project.

Esther Canty-Barnes, clinical professor (Newark) and director of the Special Education Clinic, was honored by the National Association of Women Judges (District III) in celebration of the accomplishments of women in the legal profession.

Susan Carroll, professor at the Center for American Women and Politics (NB), is the recipient of the 2006 Outstanding Professional Achievement Award, given by the Midwest Women’s Caucus for Political Science.

Art Chaovalitwongse, assistant professor of industrial and systems engineering (NB), received a 2006 Faculty Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation for his research and education on optimization and data mining approaches for epilepsy research. The award includes $400,000 in research funding over the next five years.

Eric Davis, professor of political science (NB), is the recipient of a 2005-06 AAUP Outstanding Faculty Research Award.

Christopher Dougherty, associate dean (Camden), has been elected president-elect of the Association for Continuing Higher Education, an organization dedicated to serving the entire spectrum of continuing higher education in the United States and internationally. 

Maurice J. Elias, professor of psychology (NB), was awarded the 2005 School Psychology Review Editorial Appreciation award by the National Association of School Psychologists for his contributions to the advancement of school and child-oriented psychology through leadership and service.

Allan Espiritu, assistant professor of fine arts (Camden), has had his work published in the PRINT magazine 2005 Regional Design Annual. His winning work features a collection of 300 different promotional packages on Espiritu’s own gallery exhibit of poster art highlighting lyrics from Madonna’s pop songs.

Douglas E. Eveleigh, professor of biochemistry and microbiology and Endowed Chair in of Applied Microbiology at School of Environmental and Biological Sciences (formerly Cook College), was presented the Waksman Award by the Theobald Smith Society, New Jersey Branch, at the society's spring meeting. He presented the Waksman Lecture, "Guns, Germs and Rutgers," at the meeting.

Rochel Gelman, professor of psychology (NB), has been selected to receive the Distinguished Scientific Contributions to Child Development Award from the Society for Research in Child Development. The award recognizes outstanding scientific contributions to the understanding of children's development. The society will present Gelman with the award at its March 2007 meeting in Boston.

Howard Gillette, professor of history (Camden) and director of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Center for the Humanities, received the Class of 1962 Presidential Public Service Award, a universitywide honor, for his leadership in planning and directing the center and for his lifelong commitment to revitalizing the city of Camden. Additionally, Gillette’s recent book, “Camden After the Fall: Decline and Renewal in a Post-Industrial City” (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005), was named a 2006 Honor Book by the New Jersey Council for the Humanities.

Daniel Hart, professor of psychology (Camden) and director of the Center for Children and Childhood Studies, is the winner of the Anna M. Sample Memorial Advocacy Award from the Community Planning and Advocacy Council.

Bill Hlubik, county agent for Agricultural and Resource Management Agents (NB), won first place with his team in the National Association of County Agricultural Agents’ annual Communications Awards video category for an episode of the “If Plants Could Talk” program, featuring a trip to Longwood Gardens.

Alison Isenberg, associate professor of history (NB), received a fellowship from the Stanford Research Institute of Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity and a research grant from the Fitch Foundation to spend academic year 2006-07 at Stanford pursuing her work on “second-hand cities.”

Lucille A. Joel, professor at the College of Nursing (Newark), has been elected president of the Board of Trustees of the Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools. 

Temma Kaplan, professor of history (NB), was awarded a senior fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies for 2006-07 for her project “Grotesque Humor:  Race, Sex and Colonialism in Trade Cards and the Satirical Press.”

Kenneth E. Kendall, professor of management at the School of Business-Camden, has been elected  president-elect, and then a one-year term as president, effective April 1, 2007, of the Decision Sciences Institute, an international professional association dedicated to advancing knowledge and improving instruction in all business and related disciplines. 

Dennis Kent, professor of geological sciences (NB), is the 2006 European Geosciences Union Peregrinus Medalist for his contributions and leadership in palaeomagnetism.

Arthur Klinghoffer, professor of political science (Camden) has received a Fulbright fellowship to teach human rights at the College of Law of the University of Goa in India for the 2006-07 academic year. 

Gabriel Kotliar, professor of physics and astronomy (NB), shared the 2006 Agilent Technologies Europhysics Prize for outstanding achievement in condensed matter physics. Considered one of the most prestigious physics prizes in Europe, the $41,000 award recognizes Kotliar and three colleagues from French and German institutions for the development and application of dynamical mean-field theory. The theory explains properties of materials that had previously been poorly understood and will promote advances in electronic, electrical, and materials engineering.

Dorothy Kozlowski, director of the Willets Health Center (NB), became president of the American College Health Association, an organization of nearly 1,000 institutions of higher education, with an additional 2,500 individual members dedicated to health promotion, advocacy, and leadership. 

Martin D. Kruskal, professor of mathematics (NB), was presented with the 2006 AMS Leroy P. Steele Prize, one of the highest distinctions in mathematics, by the American Mathematical Society for his paper on the theory of solitons, inverse scattering transforms, and nonlinear completely integrable systems. 

Howard Latin, professor, School of Law-Newark, spent the 2006 spring semester as the Distinguished Environmental Law Scholar at Lewis & Clark Law School.

Suzanne Lebsock, professor of history (NB), is the recipient of a 2006-07 fellowship from Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study to work on a documentary film on an interracial experiment in Virginia during the World War II era.

Janice McDonnell, assistant director at the Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences (NB), was selected to receive the 2006 James Centorino Award from the National Marine Educators Association for her contributions in promoting marine science education as a nonclassroom educator. 

Dan Morgenstern, director of the Rutgers Institute of Jazz Studies (Newark), received the Deems Taylor Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers for his book “Living With Jazz: A Reader.”

Lesley M. Morrow, professor of literacy at the Graduate School of Education (NB) and author of five books, has been inducted into the Reading Hall of Fame for her research contributions to the field of literacy.

Robert Moss, professor of chemistry and chemical biology (NB), received a two-year "creativity" award (2006-2008) from the National Science Foundation. The grant recognizes outstanding productivity and creativity in chemical research.  

Isabel Nazario, associate vice president for academic and public partnership arts and humanities (NB), was recognized by the New Jersey Hispanic Research and Information Center at the Newark Public Library for her volunteer work and community service.

Richard Novak, associate vice president for Continuous Education and Distance Learning (NB), has been elected president-elect of the University Continuing Education Association. The association assists institutions of higher learning and affiliated nonprofit organizations to increase access through educational programs and services.

Thomas Nozkowski, professor in the department of visual arts, Mason Gross School of the Arts (NB), was honored with the Award of Merit Medal for Painting from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. The annual award, which comes with a $10,000 prize, is given to one outstanding artist who represents painting, short story, sculpture, novels, poetry, or drama.

Ronaldo Parente, assistant professor of management at the School of Business- Camden, has been selected to receive the 2006 Sereia de Ouro Award, presented annually to four individuals who have contributed significantly to the economic and social development of the state of Ceara in Brazil. Parente was selected on the basis of his entrepreneurial work in Brazil and the United States, where he launched successful business ventures in tourism, construction, restaurants, and consulting prior to pursuing an academic career. 

Gayle Porter, associate professor of management at the School of Business-Camden, has been invited to join the editorial board of the international scholarly journal Human Relations, a prestigious distinction among management scholars at business schools around the world. 

Ilya Raskin, professor of plant science (NB), and David Ribnicky, research associate, are recipients of the 2005 Thomas Alva Edison Patent Award from the Research and Development Council of New Jersey in the Consumer/OTC category for their patent “Method for Treating Type 2 Diabetes with an Extract of Artemisia.” The extract influences insulin resistance, the underlying cause of type 2 diabetes.

Lydia Rodriguez, assistant dean of student affairs (Newark), was honored by the Sisterhood Advisory Committee of the Paul Robeson Campus Center Office of Student Life and Leadership for establishing a scholarship for Rutgers-Newark students and for her work with student organizations on campus. 

Linda J. Scheetz, assistant professor at the College of Nursing (Newark), was appointed assistant editor for research by the Journal of Emergency Nursing, an official journal of the Emergency Nurses Association that covers new developments in practice and trends in urgent care. She was also elected fellow of the Academy of Emergency Nursing. 

Marvin E. Schlaffer, 82, director of the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Rutgers, will be honored next month in Washington, D.C., as New Jersey’s Outstanding Older Worker for 2006 by Experience Works, the nation’s largest provider of training and employment services for older workers. The awards program seeks to remove barriers to employment and lessen negative stereotypes about older workers.

Kim Shienbaum, associate professor of political science (Camden), has been accepted as a 2006-07 Academic Fellow with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C. Shienbaum will participate in an educational program that focuses on the threat of terrorism to democracy.

Karen Small, associate director of the Bildner Center for the Study of Jewish Life (NB), was awarded the Honey and Maurice Axelrod Award from the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education and the Anti-Defamation League of New Jersey. 

Jacob Soll, associate professor of history (Camden) has been named the recipient of the 2005 Jacques Barzun Prize in Cultural History from the American Philosophy Society in recognition of his book “Publishing the Prince: History, Reading, and the Birth of Political Criticism.” He will receive the prize during the APS’s two-day meeting in San Francisco in November.

C. Vivian Stringer, Rutgers’ women’s basketball coach, has been named the Region 1 Coach of the Year. Stringer is now a finalist for the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association national Coach of the Year award. 

Paul Tractenberg, School of Law-Newark professor, was inducted by the Rutgers-Newark Graduate Department of Public Administration as an honorary member of Pi Alpha Alpha, the national society for public affairs and administration.

Wade Trappe, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering (NB), received a 2005 Best Paper Award from the IEEE Signal Processing Society for his paper “Anti-Collusion Fingerprinting for Multimedia,” which appeared in the IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing April 2003 (is this year correct?) issue. 

Gail Triner, associate professor of history (NB), received a Fulbright research grant for research in Brazil in 2007 on “Underground Riches: Subsoil Property Rights, the State and Economy in Brazilian History.”

David Vanderbilt, professor of physics (NB), was honored with the 2006 Aneesur Rahman Prize for Computational Physics, an American Physical Society award, for developing principles to compute the basic properties of matter. Vanderbilt’s work has broad applications in physics, chemistry, materials science, electronics, and geology. 

Penny Venetis, clinical professor at the School of Law-Newark, was honored by the Coalition for Peace Action for her work on electronic voting machines.

Michael Wagers, executive director of the Rutgers-Newark Police Institute, is a recipient of the Project Safe Neighborhoods Achievement Award on behalf of the Police Institute’s Greater Newark Safer Cities Initiative for its strategy to prevent violent crime in Newark.  

Keith Wailoo, professor of history (NB), received a 2006-07 fellowship at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in Stanford, Calif..

Martin L. Yarmush, professor of biomedical engineering (NB), was inducted into the New Jersey High Tech Hall of Fame, which spotlights the high-tech achievements of business leaders, researchers, educators, and government officials.  

John Yau, assistant professor in the visual arts department, Mason Gross School of the Arts (NB), was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for poetry.

Emil Yuzbashyan, assistant professor of physics and astronomy (NB), received a Sloan Foundation research fellowship, which provides $45,000 in broad-based research funding over the next two years. Yuzbashyan is studying properties of matter at temperatures close to absolute zero - the point where all motion ceases. This understanding could promote powerful new computing and electronic technologies, such as quantum computing and superconductivity. 

The Honorable Patricia Juliano Scholarship, available to women who pursue studies in public policy and government affairs, has been established at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy (NB). The late Juliano was a Rutgers alumna, having earned a bachelor’s degree in political science.

Three university alumni were awarded the School of Engineering’s first “Medal of Excellence” for their major contributions to society or for having achieved notable positions in business, government, or education. Kevin J. Kennedy, chief executive officer of JDS Uniphase, who earned two master’s degrees and a doctoral degree in mechanical engineering in 1979, 1981, and 1982 was honored as alumnus of the year. Irwin M. Lachman, a retired senior research associate at Corning Inc.  who received his bachelor’s degree in ceramic engineering in 1952, was cited for lifetime achievement. David S. Kosson, professor and chair of the department of civil and environmental engineering and professor of chemical engineering at Vanderbilt University, who received his bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees in chemical and biochemical engineering in 1983, 1984, and 1986, was honored for achievement in academia. 

Several Camden faculty and staff received university and campus honors for their research, teaching, and service endeavors. Mary Bravo, associate professor of psychology, and Rajiv Gandhi, assistant professor of computer science, are recipients of the Provost’s Award for Teaching. John Gagliardi, professor of physics, was awarded the JoAnne Mower Endowed Prize in Teaching; Carol Singley, associate professor of English, the Rutgers Human Dignity Award; and Allen Woll, associate dean and professor of history, the Lindback Foundation Award for Distinguished Teaching.    

School of Business-Camden faculty and staff were acknowledged for their achievements in teaching, research, and service. Alok Baveja, associate professor of management, Julie Ruth, associate professor of marketing, and Ronald Kane and Diana Sandberg, both part-time lecturers at the school, were recognized for their teaching. Maureen Morrin, associate professor of marketing, and Chester Spell, associate professor of management, were cited for their research. Samantha Collier, director of external affairs, and Sam Rabinowitz, associate professor of management, were acknowledged for their service.    

Three School of Business-Camden faculty members are recipients of 2006 Leaders in Diversity Awards. Derek Avery, assistant professor of management, Carol Kaufman-Scarborough, professor of marketing, and Samuel Rabinowitz, associate professor of management, received the awards from Rutgers President Richard L. McCormick.

Several School of Law-Camden faculty and staff were selected by law students to receive honors. Sally Goldfarb, associate professor, was named Professor of the Year; Jack Sabatino, Adjunct of the Year; Damon Smith, assistant professor, New Professor of the Year; and Harriet Katz, clinical professor, Lawyering Professor of the Year. 

A team of marine scientists at Cook College and the Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences (NB) was honored with an award for groundbreaking interdisciplinary efforts that are changing the way humans interact with, use, and manage the world’s oceans. The Rutgers Coastal Ocean Observation Lab includes s the Operations Center, directed by Joshua Kohut, which provides environmental data that enables studies spanning biology and physics. Research is conducted by Scott Glenn, professor of physical oceanography; Oscar Schofield, associate professor of biological oceanography; and Robert Chant, assistant professor of coastal and estuarine dynamics.

Camden lecturers Stephen Alessandrini of mathematics and Thomas Knoche of urban studies were presented with the Sibyl Cohen Award for Excellence in Teaching, established to recognize the valuable contributions of part-time lecturers and adjunct faculty to the Rutgers-Camden experience.