MSU 2004 Distinguished Faculty Award recipients

Eight MSU professors received the Distinguished Faculty Award during the annual universitywide Awards Convocation on Tuesday, Feb. 10, bringing to 409 the number of faculty honored since the award was established in 1952.

They and 18 other award winners were honored at the convocation held in the Pasant Theatre of Wharton Center.

Each Distinguished Faculty Award recipient receives a stipend of $3,000. The award is presented in recognition of a comprehensive and sustained record of scholarly excellence in research and/or creative activities, instruction and outreach.

The Awards Convocation followed President Peter McPherson's State of the University speech.

Other awards included:

• Distinguished Academic Staff Awards, which carry a $2,500 stipend, given for extraordinary academic achievement, excellence and exceptional contributions.
• Teacher-Scholar Awards, which carry a $2,000 stipend, given for devotion to and skill in teaching and scholarly promise.
• MSU Alumni Club of Mid-Michigan Quality in Undergraduate Teaching Awards, which carry a $2,000 stipend, given for quality teaching and substantial continuing involvement in undergraduate education.
• Excellence-in-Teaching Citations, which carry a $1,000 stipend, given for meeting classroom responsibilities and for scholarly promise as a graduate assistant.

Raymond Brock

Raymond Brock
Department of Physics and Astronomy
College of Natural Science

Raymond Brock has established an international reputation for pioneering research into the fundamental constituents of matter. He is a leading member of a team working at the world’s most powerful particle accelerator, and he already occupies the role of elder statesman in the particle physics community. As a fellow of the American Physical Society, his advice is continually sought in a variety of prestigious appointments: as an independent panel member selected by the governor of Michigan; on program advisory committees at the U.S. Department of Energy, Fermilab, Los Alamos and Stanford University; and as a convener of a U.S.-European working group on particle accelerators. Brock’s extremely successful seven years as chairperson of the Department of Physics and Astronomy culminated in the department’s move into MSU's new Biomedical and Physical Sciences Building.

Despite his position as a leader in a specialized and esoteric scientific field, Brock is equally at home teaching undergraduates in liberal arts or integrative studies at MSU.

B. Alex Brown (right)

B. Alex Brown
Department of Physics and Astronomy
College of Natural Science

B. Alex Brown is one of the dozen most-often cited nuclear physicists in the world. His international reputation rests on his pioneering research into theoretical nuclear physics. He has made unique contributions to nuclear theory and its applications to the study of exotic nuclei, weak interactions in nuclei and nuclear astrophysics. During his two decades at MSU and the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory, Brown has worked diligently and successfully to foster collaborations between theory and experiment that make MSU’s nuclear physics group one of the strongest in the world. His more than 300 articles in peer-reviewed journals have attracted wide attention. The Humboldt Foundation has honored him with its Research Award for Senior U.S. Scientists, and he is a Fellow of the American Physical Society.

Brown has proven that he is capable of teaching any physics class at any level for any audience. He has contributed to the integrative studies concept at MSU since its inception. In addition, he has generously given of his time for outreach programs and partnerships and has written for the general public.

Roger J. Calantone

Roger J. Calantone
Department of Marketing and Supply Chain Management
Eli Broad College of Business

Roger J. Calantone is a leading scholar in marketing, especially in the area of new products/new technologies research. On average, he has received one best paper/article award in each of the past 10 years and has published more than 150 articles in the top refereed journals in his field.

Over the past two decades, Calantone has made a number of breakthroughs in studies on new product development and marketing research methodology. His November 2000 “Using Neural Networks to Predict New Product Success” (Journal of Marketing Research, ) broke new ground in research on product innovation and was voted as the most-cited paper in a conference of practicing new-product-development managers. Since joining MSU in 1991, Calantone has participated in 10 funded research projects that have attracted more than $2 million in outside funds. His ability to be productive while maintaining industry relationships allows him to bridge the rigor-relevance chasm. Working with industry provides him the real-life stories that make his classes memorable. Students call him an inspirational teacher and a warm, caring human being.

Carl Davidson

Carl Davidson
Department of Economics
College of Social Science

Carl Davidson is an economic theorist who has made an impressive mark in his profession by extending standard economic models to increase their relevance and applicability to solving real-world problems. His contributions include analyses of the effects of international trade on unemployment, optimal unemployment insurance, cartel stability and the effects of research and development subsidies on economic growth. His most sustained interest has been in developing better models for analyzing unemployment and job creation in the global economy. His collaborative work has significantly advanced the understanding of relationships between unemployment and international trade and has provided insights into the appropriate design of unemployment compensation schemes. He is sought as a consultant by the U.S. Department of Labor, and his papers appear in the leading economics journals and frequently on graduate reading lists at top universities.

Students say Davidson’s clarity of thought and intellectual rigor makes him an outstanding teacher and mentor at all levels.

John R. Deller Jr. (left)

John R. Deller Jr.
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
College of Engineering

John R. Deller Jr. is among the most recognized and respected scholars of speech processing and adaptive signal processing worldwide. He is the author or co-author of four textbooks, two of which have become classics in the field. One, a pioneering book on speech processing, “was widely used throughout the community and was the only book of its type available for some time,” according to a highly respected scholar in the field. Collaboratively, he has brought international recognition to MSU through a multimillion dollar research grant from the National Science Foundation's Digital Library Initiative to establish the National Gallery of the Spoken Word, a fully searchable online database of spoken-word collections spanning the 20th century.

In 1997, Deller became a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). He is also the recipient of IEEE's Millennium Medal, Signal Processing Society Meritorious Service Award and Signal Processing Best Paper Award. He has advised 35 graduate theses, most at the doctoral level, and has developed graduate and undergraduate courses at MSU.

Michael J. Leahy

Michael J. Leahy
Department of Counseling, Educational Psychology and Special Education
College of Education

Michael J. Leahy is often recognized as one of the most prolific and influential scholars in rehabilitation counseling today. His research has defined the scope of practice for the discipline and laid the foundation for the national credentialing examination and accreditation standards applied to graduate programs in rehabilitation counseling. Leahy's leadership has made a tangible mark on the College of Education, where he established the Office of Rehabilitation and Disability Studies as an umbrella for the master's and doctoral programs, continuing education and outreach, and collaborative research. He also founded a consortium that annually brings together doctoral students and faculty from MSU, Pennsylvania State University and the University of Iowa for cooperative learning and projects, one of which was a unique online seminar shared by the three schools. His numerous national honors include the prestigious American Counseling Association Research Award.

As an educator, Leahy is praised by students for his stimulating classes and mentoring, as well as for the lifelong relationships that often follow graduation.

Richard W. Merritt

Richard W. Merritt
Department of Entomology
College of Agriculture and Natural Resources

Richard W. Merritt, one of only eight officially certified forensic entomologists in North America, conducts research in the biology and ecology of aquatic invertebrates, their roles in organic matter cycling and species of medical importance. He is dedicated to transforming fundamental research into technology that benefits society. Examples include his integrated stable fly management program for Mackinac Island and numerous mosquito and black fly control initiatives and Lyme disease projects.

Merritt is the author of An Introduction to the Aquatic Insects of North America, frequently referred to as the bible of aquatic entomology. His forensic entomology course titled “Bugs and Bodies” is renowned, and his students find positions throughout the world as respected scientists, teachers and outreach specialists. Merritt's own outreach contributions include programs for communities and consultation to government and industry. He is in great demand by the legal profession for his expertise in forensic entomology and is valued for his thorough assessment of forensic entomology evidence in high-profile homicide cases.

Walter Verdehr

Walter Verdehr
School of Music
College of Arts and Letters

Walter Verdehr, an internationally acclaimed violinist, has performed in major performance venues throughout the world. The Vienna Express describes him as “a perfect violinist with beautiful blossoming tone and noble musicality.” As co-founder and co-leader of the Verdehr Trio, Verdehr helped create a new chamber music medium, the violin-clarinet-piano trio. The Verdehr Trio has commissioned more than 160 compositions by many of the most prominent American and European composers of our time, including Pulitzer Prize winners. To date, this monumental project has been documented in 15 CDs, “The Making of a Medium TV Series,” and a parallel series of published musical scores. Australia's preeminent composer Peter Sculthorpe said, “I know of no musician anywhere who has made such a contribution to chamber music. This is an enduring legacy.”

A seasoned and perceptive artist-teacher, Verdehr has attracted talented students to MSU's School of Music from many parts of the world and served as a judge of international violin competitions.

Copyright 2001 Michigan State University Division of University Relations.