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Thomas Huang, Center for Advanced Study professor of electrical and computer engineering and a professor in the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, has been awarded the Okawa Prize for 2005 by the Okawa Foundation of Japan. Huang’s wide-ranging work involving images focuses on areas such as human-computer interfaces, multimedia databases, and 3-D modeling, analysis, and animation of the human face, hands and body. Each year one foreign scientist is honored, along with one Japanese winner from business or academia, for their contributions in the information and telecommunications fields. The prize includes a certificate, gold medal and cash award of 10 million yen, or about $90,000. Huang will be honored at a ceremony in Tokyo on Nov. 25. The Okawa Foundation for Information and Telecommunications is a non-profit organization providing funding studies in those fields.
Gary Kesler, associate head and professor of landscape architecture, has been elected vice president of education for the American Society of Landscape Architects. The society represents more than 16,000 members and promotes the landscape architecture profession and advances the practice through advocacy, education, communication and fellowship. Kesler has been actively engaged in a variety of roles with the society, including chair of Illinois education committee, chapter secretary and president, and chair of the society’s council of education.
Ron Guenther, UI director of athletics, was honored Sept. 23 for his “vision, creativity and leadership in fundraising at Illinois.” The tribute from the board of directors of the UI Foundation came at a surprise presentation at a luncheon during the foundation’s 70th annual meeting. Making the presentation were Foundation President Sidney S. Micek and Chancellor Richard Herman. Guenther is a member of the steering committee of the $30 million University Library Campaign that kicked off two years ago. He created an innovative partnership between the University Library and the Division of Intercollegiate Athletics that marks the first campus fundraising effort to combine academics and athletics. The DIA’s own multi-year fundraising effort is directed specifically at benefiting the renovation and renewal of the Undergraduate Library, which is used by student-athletes as well as students in all disciplines across campus.
J. Steven Beckett was recently named as a Criminal Justice Act panel representative for the U.S. District Court. Beckett will assist lawyers who provide services to indigent clients in the Central District of Illinois, one of 94 judicial districts in the U.S. He will also represent the interest of all Criminal Justice Act panel lawyers in dealing with administrative matters and the Federal Judiciary and serve as a liaison with the Office of Defender Services in Washington, D.C.
Mara R. Wade received the Maria Goeppert-Mayer Prize for the spring semester 2006 for teaching and research at Hochschule fur Musik und Theater (HMT), Hanover, Germany. The program brings internationally recognized scholars and teachers to universities in Lower Saxony. HMT also has initiated a conference, focusing on early modern music and gender, around her guest professorship.
UI Continuing Education programs and research have been honored with Awards of Excellence by the University Continuing Education Association, Mid-America Region. Two professional development programs, “Monsanto Corn Agronomic Training” and “Municipal Clerks of Illinois Institute and Academy,” received association awards for Creative Program-Noncredit. In the category of Research and Publication, the association cited staff members in the department of educational psychology for their work, “Impact of Online Professional Development in the Work Environment,” submitted for review for the conference. Those honored: Thomas H. Anderson, professor of educational psychology, Norma Scagnoli, visiting project coordinator, and Melissa Stephens, graduate research assistant. In addition, Najmuddin Shaik, of the Office of Continuing Education, was acknowledged for his efforts as research chair in conjunction with the Research and Publication award. Recipients were honored at the association’s annual regional conference last month.
