Terrie Sultan, director and curator of Blaffer Gallery, received international recognition for “Chuck Close Prints: Process and Collaboration,” a national exhibition she organized. The gallery received the International Association of Art Critics’ second-place award for Best Monographic Show Nationally. The exhibition will complete its national tour by 2007. This is the second prize for an exhibition organized by Sultan. “Bob Knox: Non-Fiction Paintings” won the association’s USA award for Best Show of an Emerging/Under-known Artist. Sultan has organized more than 40 exhibitions and publications since joining UH. She is the recipient of France’s Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters, which is awarded biannually to recognize eminent artists, writers and others who have contributed significantly to furthering the arts.

The Campus Recreation and Wellness Center received the Award of Project Excellence from the Association of General Contractors, which selected the facility as the best college and university building constructed in the Gulf Coast and southern Texas region in the past two years. The center also received the Texas Masonry Council’s 2004 Golden Trowel Award for excellence in design among publicly funded buildings.

The Cullen College of Engineering was awarded a $1 million National Institute of Justice grant to develop advanced technologies for police vehicles to enhance officers’ crimefighting capabilities. The UH Police Department was selected to receive two of these vehicles this winter, making it the mobile test bed for this law enforcement technology.

The Houston–Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation, led by UH, received a five-year, $5 million National Science Foundation grant.

The Institute for Molecular Design for the Keck Center for Computational and Structural Biology was awarded a $2.8 million National Institutes of Health grant for bionano training and research.

The UH Law Center and Baylor College of Medicine will offer a MD/JD dual degree, beginning fall 2005.

The Edythe Bates Old Moores Opera Center released its first professional CD, “Casanova’s Homecoming.”

UH has joined the effort to build the high-speed Lonestar Education and Research Network for the state’s higher education institutions and to construct the Texas Internet Grid for Research and Education.

Alumni

Ruth Munson (’54) created the image of the Marine Band that adorned the official invitation to all White House holiday parties.

Margaret Spellings (’79) was confirmed as the eighth U.S. secretary of education.

Faculty/Staff

Rigoberto Advincula, associate professor of chemistry, and Kurt Krause, associate professor of biology and biochemistry, were two of only 12 researchers from the Gulf Coast region invited to attend the National Academies Keck Futures Initiative conference — “Designing Nanostructures at the Interface Between Biomedical and Physical Systems.”

Rodolfo Casparius, a senior lecturer and program director in the Conrad N. Hilton College of Hotel and Restaurant Management, completed his 1,000th weekly column with the Los Angeles newspaper, La Opinion.

Juanita Copley, associate professor of education, served as an editor of “Showcasing Mathematics for the Young Child,” a book that won a 2004 Apex Award of Excellence from The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. The book received the award for its design, editorial content and overall communication excellence.

Sandy Frieden, executive director of distance education for the UH System, was elected to the U.S. Distance Learning Association Board of Directors.

Michelle Michot Foss, executive director for the Institute for Energy, Law & Enterprise, has been named to the Energy Magazine and Television’s board of advisers.

Gerson David, professor emeritus of social work, and Jerald W. Strickland, interim senior vice chancellor for academic affairs and interim senior vice president for academic affairs and provost, received the 2004 National Award from the Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge, Houston chapter. The award honors organizations and individuals whose positive words or deeds promote U.S. heritage.

UH received a $1.1 million grant from the National Science Foundation to fund a project to create the first nanopatterned medium recording at the scale of one terabyte per square inch. Researchers also will explore the physical limits of magnetic data storage in units only four nanometers in size. Dmitri Litvinov, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, and Jack Wolfe, professor of electrical and computer engineering, are co-principal investigators.

Steven Mintz, John and Rebecca Moores Professor of History, was elected co-chair of the Council on Contemporary Families. Mintz also received the R.R. Hawkins Award for the most outstanding scholarly work of 2004 from the Association of American Publishers for his book, “Huck’s Raft: A History of American Childhood.” He also has been selected to receive the Organization of American Historians’ 2005 Merle Curti Award for the book. The award recognizes the best book in social, intellectual, and/or cultural history.

Mamie Moy, professor of chemistry and director of the Center for Science and Mathematics Applied Resources, received the American Chemical Society’s Helen M. Free Award for Public Outreach. Moy was recognized for a lifetime achievement in outreach to students and teachers.

Ioannis Pavlidis, associate professor of computer science, was awarded a $640,169 grant from the National Science Foundation for his research on monitoring a person’s health during computer use.

Nancy B. Rapoport, UH Law Center dean, will be inducted as an American College of Bankruptcy fellow. Rapoport also has been selected to serve on the Library of Congress’ Advisory Committee for its project, “The Birth of the Dot–Com Era” and on the city of Houston’s Pension Governance Advisory Committee.

Landon Storrs, associate professor of history, won the Society for History in the Federal Government’s 2004 James Madison Prize for her article, “Red Scare Politics and the Suppression of Popular Front Feminism,” which appeared in the Journal of American History 90, No. 2.

Karl Sparks, executive director of human resources, was elected to the Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association–College Retirement Equities Fund’s (TIAA–CREF) Customer Advisory Board. TIAA–CREF provides financial and retirement services to companies and institutions in the academic, research, medical and cultural fields.

David Tsai, lecturer in the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture, was named a finalist in “Modern + Design + Function: Chicago Furniture Now,” a prestigious Chicago furniture design contest sponsored by TENbyTEN magazine. His original steel side table was one of 25 pieces selected from a pool of 160.

Allen Warner, professor of curriculum and instruction, was sworn in as Faculty Senate president.

Arthur C. Vailas, vice chancellor of research and intellectual property management and vice president for research, spoke at the “Environmental Risk Management Under Modern Technological Aspects” conference at the Modern Academy at Egypt’s Cairo University.

Students

Mansour AbdulBaki and Adrian Morales, senior chemical engineering students, placed 13th among 40 teams for their entry of a fuel-cell-driven car in the national American Institute of Chemical Engineers’ “Chem-E-Car” competition. The team placed second at the association’s regional competition.

Presidential Classroom, a national civic organization, recognized
Shar-day Campbell, freshman, as the 2004 Honors Graduate of the Year.

The Scholars Academy was among the four programs in the state selected by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board for a Star Award for fostering academic success within an urban university environment.

The Greater Houston Preservation Alliance recognized the Willow Street Pump Station with a Good Brick Award as an outstanding project that preserves and documents Houston’s architectural and cultural history.

The August/December ’04 graduating class was the largest in UHD’s history—1,044 students.

Richard Aló, executive director of the Center for Computational Science, chaired InTech ’04, an international conference held at UHD in partnership with Thailand’s Assumption University. It was the first time the conference, which focused on intelligent and fuzzy technologies, was held in the United States.

Alumni

Kelly Wroblewski (’02), Cyril Harris (’04) and Odabiah Kegege (’02) received the National Science Foundation’s Bridging to the Doctorate fellowships through the University of Texas–Pan American.

Faculty/Staff

Carolyn Ashe, associate professor and assistant chair of the Department of Management, Marketing and Business Administration, was quoted in an article on ethics for the National Business Education Association journal.

Aaron Krochmal, assistant professor of natural sciences, published a paper on pit vipers in the Journal of Experimental Biology that was featured on the home page of the Science Now Web site, an American Association for the Advancement of Science online publication.

Students

Scholars Academy students Gina Miles, Leslie Cook, and Colin Carandan won first-, second- and third-place awards, respectively, in the student poster presentation session at the Sigma Xi: The Scientific Research Society student research conference.

Wendy Callejas won a third-place award at the American Society for Gravitational and Space Biology annual conference for work done with researchers at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

The School of Science and Computer Engineering announced the addition of an engineering division to its natural sciences and computing and mathematics divisions.

President William A. Staples received the Texas Art Education Association’s Governmental Award for Meritorious Service in the Arts. The association honored Staples for his commitment to art education and the advancement of teaching practices in art in the state and at UHCL.

Everette Penn, assistant professor of criminology, was awarded a Fulbright scholarship. Penn will spend the spring semester in Egypt, where he will lecture on criminology and the criminal justice system at Cairo University’s College of Law. Penn received a doctorate in criminology from Indiana University in 2000. He taught for five years at Prairie View A&M University, where he was a founding faculty member of the doctoral program in juvenile justice. In 1999, Penn was chosen as a fellow for the Corporation for National Service, where he did research on reducing delinquency through public service. He also is the author of “Race and Juvenile Justice.”

Alumni

Kimberly Barfield (’01) is a coordinator for special programs at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. She also chairs the UHCL Alumni Association Executive Council.

Janet Bashen (’84) received the National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women’s Clubs Inc.’s Crystal Award, which recognizes outstanding businesswomen. She is the president and chief executive officer of Bashen Consulting.

Theodore Gould (’99) was named director of the University of Texas Health Center at Tyler’s Emergency Care Center.

Eileen Montgomery (’97) was recognized as the 2005 Coca-Cola Distinguished Teacher in the Arts. She co-chairs the visual arts department at the Houston Independent School District’s High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.

Candy M. Torres (’88,’94) placed seventh in the Veteran Women’s Foil at the 2004 U.S. Fencing Association’s Summer National Championships. She is the first person in her fencing club to be selected for the U.S. team for international competition and the only Houstonian on the team last year.

Faculty/Staff

Anna M. Agathangelou, lecturer in behavioral sciences, published “The Global Political Economy of Sex, Desire, Violence, and Insecurity in Mediterranean Nation States.”

Angela Howard, professor of history, was selected by faculty, staff and students as a 2005 Piper Award nominee.

David Malin, professor of psychology and neuroscience, received a $63,544 award from GlaxoSmithKline Inc. to continue his research to develop a nicotine vaccine.

Ramiro Sanchez, professor of organic chemistry, received a $135,000 grant from the Robert A. Welch Foundation to fund such items as student stipends in the chemistry department.

Brenda Weiser, director of environmental education for the Environmental Institute of Houston (EIH), received a $15,000 grant from the National Biological Information Infrastructure’s Central Southwest Gulf Coast Information Node, through the Houston Advanced Research Center. The grant will allow EIH to recommend enhancements of the Central Southwest Gulf Coast Information Node’s Web site for teachers.

The University of Houston-Victoria joined The Hispanic Caucus of the American Association for Higher Education.

The MBA program received a “Best Buy MBA” designation by GetEducated.com’s Best Distance Learning and Graduate Schools, Business and Management 2004. The program ranked fourth among the top 25 designated programs.

The Small Business Development Center and the Victoria Chamber of Commerce hosted Microsoft Corporation’s traveling technology tour in November.

President Tim Hudson was appointed to the American Association of State Colleges and Universities Committee on International Education at its annual meeting in Charleston, S.C. Hudson met with other university presidents and administrators from across the nation to discuss international initiatives for their respective institutions.

Alumni

The Texas Speech Communication Association has selected Linda Alderson (’77) as the Secondary Educator of the Year. She is a Boling High School speech and English teacher and an adjunct instructor at UHV and Wharton County Junior College.

Kelly Arnecke (’96) was promoted to facility administrator at the Victoria Regional Juvenile Justice Center.

Lisa Arnold (’98) graduated from UH-Clear Lake with a Master of Science in Instructional Technology. She is a training specialist at Marathon Ashland Petroleum in Texas City.

Elizabeth Church (’03) was nominated as a 2004–2005 Northside Independent School District (NISD) First Year Educator of the Year Award. She is an elementary teacher for San Antonio’s NISD.

Rhiannon Davila (’02) was hired as a degree plan counselor at UHV’s School of Business Administration.

Tina Herrington (’90,’93) was hired as Sealy Independent School District’s assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction.

Sandra Hyak (’03) was hired as principal of Austin’s Windham School District’s Travis State Jail.

Richard Jones (’85) was promoted to the city of Victoria’s chief of police. He was interim police chief and had been deputy chief. Andy Peters (’96) was hired as Louise Independent School District’s superintendent.

Kerry Pozzi (’97) was appointed Victoria County Juvenile Services’ contract parole officer.

Beverly Tomek (’97) is completing a dissertation at UH on antislavery and colonization. She contributed a series of six articles to “The Encyclopedia of American Social Movements.”

Faculty/Staff

Jeffrey R. Di Leo, assistant professor of humanities/English and philosophy, will have two books —“If Classrooms Matter: Progressive Visions of Educational Environments” and “On Anthologies: Politics and Pedagogy” — published this winter.

Judith Johnson, assistant professor of psychology, co-authored an article titled, “Feminism’s Final Frontier: Cyberspace,” for the Academic Exchange Quarterly winter issue. Johnson also presented “Research-based math interventions using the Cognitive Assessment System” at the 2004 Conference of the National Academy of Neuropsychology. She also co-presented a poster, “Analysis of spelling errors in youth with and without writing disabilities,” with graduate student Nadia Cano.

Students

The outstanding students for the fall 2004 semester are: Shari Symonds, outstanding undergraduate student, and Evelyn Arkebauer, outstanding graduate student in the School of Arts and Sciences; Renae Anne Ketterer, outstanding undergraduate student, and Lisa Ann Guidry, outstanding graduate student in the School of Business Administration; Rosanna Raab, outstanding undergraduate student, and Rebecca Frels, outstanding graduate student in the School of Education and Human Development.

Linda Richards, undergraduate business student, has co-authored a paper with Cam Caldwell, assistant professor of business management, and David Satava, associate professor of business administration and accounting, titled “Ethics and the Auditing Culture: Rethinking the Foundation of Accounting and Auditing.” Caldwell presented the paper at the International Conference on Ethics in Business.

Pam Vollmar, undergraduate business student, co-authored a paper titled “Principal Theory and Principle Theory–Ethical Governance from the Follower’s Perspective” with Cam Caldwell, and Ranjan Karri, assistant professor of business at Bryant University. Caldwell presented the paper at the International Conference on Ethics in Business.

Winning teams of the School of Business Administration’s Fall 2004 MBA Case Competition are Shane Degeyter, Lisa Guidry, Mario Heredia and Jie Huang (first place); Lisa Kinsey, Glen Ruppert, Scott Shobe and Tracy Whitt (second place); and Pamela Gubbels, Frances Koch and Yara Quinero (third place).