Two faculty members and one staff in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have been selected to receive the annual departmental awards for the 2016-2017 academic year. The Teaching Effectiveness Award was given to Associate Professor, Dr. Peter Collins. The Departmental Research Award was given to Assistant Professor, Dr. Martin Thuo, and the Departmental Service Award was given to Systems Support Specialist, Benjamin Cory Johns.
These three award recipients were nominated by the department Honors and Awards committee and selected by the department chair and the associate chairs. They have received a plaque and a monetary prize.
Departmental Research Award
The Departmental Research Award is given to a faculty member to recognize outstanding achievement in research or scholarship and is intended to recognize research that has led to industrial applications, initiated the study of new topics that were subsequently pursued by investigators at other institutions, directly improved classroom teaching, or brought particular recognition to the department.
“Martin Thuo has done excellent work in research, including the mentoring of his graduate students. He also had groundbreaking discoveries, including the cold solder research,” said Associate Chair and University Professor, Dr. Larry Genalo.
Teaching Effectiveness Award
The Teaching Effectiveness Award is given to recognize outstanding teaching performance in the classroom. Evidence of outstanding teaching performance may be shown by the following things: the development of innovative teaching techniques or methodology, courses taught with numbers of students and mean student evaluations, laboratory manuals written or laboratory exercises developed, teaching proposals funded or submitted, textbooks written, and effective application of information technology in the classroom.
“Pete Collins has done excellent work in teaching, including the creation and teaching of a metals processing class. He is also teaching the graduate transmission electron microscopy class and transforming it to align with facilities at the Sensitive Instrument Facility at Ames Laboratory,” said Dr. Genalo.
Departmental Service Award
The Departmental Service Award is given to any full-time employee in the department and is given to recognize superior service. This award is intended to recognize those activities and commitments not directly related to teaching and research that normally go without recognition. This may include such activities as advising, recruiting, alumni and industrial interactions, and committee leadership and service. The award is intended to recognize what could be called excellent department citizenship.
“Benjamin Cory Johns has done excellent service in IT for the department. He keeps a myriad of educational computing equipment and software humming, and yet finds time to help faculty, staff, and students with problems and questions,” said Dr. Genalo.