Lehigh University honored the recipients of the 2006 Faculty Awards at the annual faculty dinner on May 1.

Those honored include:

MJ Bishop, assistant professor of educational technology, recipient of the Lehigh Junior Award for Distinguished Teaching, which is presented to a junior member or members of the teaching staff for distinguished teaching performed during the academic year.

Lynne Cassimeris, professor of biological sciences, recipient of the Eleanor and Joseph F. Libsch Research Award, which is named in honor of Lehigh’s first Vice President for Research and his wife and rewards those conducting distinguished research.

Mary Beth Deily, associate professor of economics, and Michael Santoro, associate professor of management, who both received the Carl R. and Ingeborg Beidleman Research Award, which highlights quality applied research and refereed scholarship in business and applied economics.

John DuPont, associate professor of materials science and engineering, and Jeffrey Linderoth, assistant professor of industrial and systems engineering, who received the Eleanor and Joseph F. Libsch Early Career Research Award, which honors faculty members who are early in their research career and who have demonstrated the potential for high-quality research and scholarship.

Elizabeth Fifer, professor of English, recipient of the Hillman Award for Excellence in Graduate Advising, which recognizes excellence in the advising of graduate students.

Sharon Friedman, professor of journalism and communication and Director of the Science and Environmental Writing Program, and Thomas Hyclak, professor of economics and Interim Dean of the College of Business and Economics, recipients of the Hillman Faculty Award, which recognizes excellence in teaching or research work, or for advancing the interests of the University.

Shalinee Kishore, P.C. Rossin assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, who received the Alfred Noble Robinson Award, which is presented to a member of the teaching, administration, or research staff who provides outstanding performance in service to the University and exhibits unusual promise of professional achievement.

Abigail Pattishall, biological sciences; David van der Goes, economics; and Christian Capotosto, engineering, recipients of the Lehigh University Teaching Assistant Award, which honors excellence demonstrated by graduate student teaching assistants.

Colin Saldanha, assistant professor of biological sciences, who received the Donald B. and Dorothy L. Stabler Award for Excellence in Teaching, which is presented to a member of the faculty who has demonstrated not only mastery of his or her field and superior ability in communicating it to others, but also an exceptional talent for encouraging students.

Kenneth Sinclair, professor and chair of accounting, who received the Robert & Christine Staub Faculty Excellence Award, which honors a faculty member in the College of Business and Economics who is perceived to have made a positive difference in the lives of students, the college community, or with fellow faculty members.

Geraldo Vasconcellos, professor of finance and economics, who received the Deming Lewis Award, which honors a faculty member selected by the 10-year class as having most significantly influenced its members’ educational experience.

Richard Weisman, professor of civil and environmental engineering, who received the Hillman Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Advising, which recognizes excellence in the advising of undergraduate students.

Below are brief bios on each of the 2006 winners:

Mary Jean “MJ” Bishop, assistant professor of educational technology, received her B.A. from Lebanon Valley College, her M.A. from Millersville University, and her Ed.D. from Lehigh University. She teaches courses in instructional design, interface design, and Website and resource development. She has worked with colleagues on the development and delivery of three new online courses using a variety of asynchronous and synchronous technologies. She collaborates regularly with other college faculty as they have begun seeking ways to put their own courses online. In 2004, Bishop was named to a Frank Hook Assistant Professorship for two years (2004-2005 and 2005-2006) for exemplifying the scholar-teacher model and contributing significantly to the mentoring of students. In addition to her teaching, Bishop is project director and a Co-PI of the Clipper Project, a research project aimed at evaluating the short- and long-term costs and benefits associated with offering Web-based courses to high school seniors who have been “pre-admitted” to the university. Bishop’s research interests include understanding the fundamental components and the psychology behind instructional media and delivery systems in order to discover their pedagogical capabilities and limitations and to devise more effective ways to design instructional technologies to enhance learning. In 2001, she received the Educational Technology Research and Development (ETR&D) Young Scholar Award from the ECT Foundation of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) for theoretical foundations for sound’s use in multimedia instruction to enhance learning (published in ETR&D that year). Bishop has been a member of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) since 1996 and is currently serving as president of its Design and Development Division. Since 2003, she has been a consulting editor for ETR&D, from which she received the “Outstanding Reviewer Award” in 2004.

Lynne Cassimeris, professor in the department of biological sciences, completed her Ph.D. at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, for work in cell biology and was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania before accepting a faculty position at Lehigh University. Cassimeris is recognized internationally for her studies of cell division—errors in division resulting in birth defects or cancer. In recognition of her research accomplishments, Cassimeris was named a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. In December 2004, Cassimeris was named a Keith R. Porter Fellow, an award that recognizes individuals who show “unusual potential for an outstanding career in cell biology.” She has served on scientific review panels for the American Cancer Society, National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, and the Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research Program. Cassimeris’ laboratory has been supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and NATO. At Lehigh, Cassimeris was named a Distinguished Associate Professor (1999-2001), endowed by the Class of 1961 and was a Dana Foundation Faculty Fellow as an Assistant Professor (1992-1996). She is the Director of the Confocal Light Microscopy Facility and previously served as chair of the department’s undergraduate research committee (1997-2001).

Mary Beth Deily, associate professor of economics, received her Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University. Deily does most of her work in the area of industrial organization, specializing in studying industries undergoing shakeout or decline. She has written papers on the integrated steel industry, including studies of steel firms’ disinvestment and plant-closing decisions, their compliance with pollution regulation, and their wage decisions. Most recently, she has been studying the hospital industry, estimating and examining how hospital efficiency is related to hospital closures and to hospital mortality performance. Deily teaches applied microeconomic analysis, competitor and market analysis, regulation of industry, and mathematics for graduate students in economics. She has taught at Texas A&M University, was a Visiting Scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, and served at the National Science Foundation as a Director of the Economics Program.

John N. DuPont, associate professor of materials science and engineering, received his B.S. degree in metallurgical engineering from Ohio State University and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in materials science and engineering from Lehigh University. He was a research scientist and Associate Director of the Energy Liaison Program until 1999 when he joined the materials science and engineering department as an assistant professor. His research interests cover processing-microstructure-property relations in solidification and joining of materials, Laser Engineered Net Shaping, and alloy development. DuPont was an ASM scholar in 1990 and received an AWS National Fellowship Award in 1995. He was twice the recipient of the AWS Harold H. Jennings Award in 1996 and 2000 and the AWS William Sparegan Award in 1999 and 2000. He received the A.F. Davis Silver Medal Award from AWS in 2001, 2002, and 2004 and the Warren F. Savage Award in 2004. In 1999, he was awarded the AWS Prof. Koichi Masubuchi Award. In 2000, he received a Young Investigator Award from the Office of Naval Research for work on laser welding and surface treatment of super austenitic stainless steels in advanced double hull combatant ships, and a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation for research on Laser Engineered Net Shaping. In October of 2000, he received the National Science Foundation Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). In 2002, he received the AWS Adams Memorial Award for outstanding teaching activities at the undergraduate and post-graduate level and in 2003 received the Lehigh University College of Engineering Teaching Excellence Award. DuPont is currently a Principal Reviewer for the Welding Journaland a reviewer for the Journal of Materials Engineering and Performance.

Elizabeth Fifer, professor of English, has taught Contemporary World and American Multicultural Literature in the English department since 1973. She has written on Gertrude Stein and is currently at work on a book about Horton Foote’s Orphans’ Home Cycle, nine plays set in Texas from 1902 to 1928. Fifer's book explores the reaction of families in the town to the many economic and social changes that transformed it from a farming community to its present condition as a strip mall. Her interests include revolution and rebellion, social justice, and the interaction of literature and history. In 1999, she was the recipient of the Stabler Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Sharon M. Friedman, professor and Director of the Science and Environmental Writing Program as well as Curriculum Director of the Environmental Studies Program, served as chairperson of Lehigh’s department of journalism and communication from 1986 to 1995 and as an endowed Iacocca Professor from 1992 to 2000. Her research focuses on how scientific, environmental and risk issues are communicated to the public, particularly by the mass media. Currently, she is studying media coverage of potential health and environmental risks of nanotechnology. She served as a consultant to the President's Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island, and to the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, co authoring the volume, Reporting on the Environment: A Handbook for Journalists, which has been translated into 12 languages. Friedman has conducted training workshops in many Asian countries for science and environmental journalists. She is the co editor of two books, Communicating Uncertainty: Media Coverage of New and Controversial Science, and Scientists and Journalists: Reporting Science as News. She also has authored numerous book chapters and journal articles on risk communication and mass media topics. Friedman is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), selected for her contri¬butions toward furthering the public understanding of science and technology. A member of three National Academy of Sciences’ committees dealing with radiation risks and health effects in recent years, she also was elected to two terms on the Council of the AAAS. She is a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the journal, Science Communication, and of the Society of Environmental Journalists, the National Association of Science Writers, the Society of Risk Analysis, and the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication.

Thomas Hyclak, professor of economics, is currently serving as Interim Dean of the College of Business and Economics at Lehigh University. He earned B.A. and M.A. degrees from Cleveland State University and holds a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Notre Dame. He came to Lehigh in 1979 after serving on the faculty of Ball State University for three years. His fields of study are labor economics and urban-regional economics and he has published numerous academic papers on regional unemployment, wage and income inequality, gender and racial wage differentials, and human resource management practices. His recent books are Rising Wage Inequality: The 1980s Experience in Urban Labor Markets (WE Upjohn Institute, 2000) and Fundamentals of Labor Economics, co-authored with Geraint Johnes and Robert Thornton, (Houghton-Mifflin, 2005). At Lehigh, Hyclak has taught principles of economics, intermediate micro and macroeconomics, and undergraduate and graduate courses in labor relations and urban economics. Along with Vince Munley and Todd Watkins, he developed the LUCORPS Projects course that engages teams of undergraduate students in consulting-type research projects identified by community organizations. He is also serving as President of the Board of Directors of the Community Action Development Corporation of Bethlehem, which fosters entrepreneurship and business development in South Bethlehem. Hyclak lives in Bethlehem with his wife, Jean; daughter, Anna; son, Ben; and retired racing greyhound, Glory.

Shalinee Kishore, assistant professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering, joined the faculty at Lehigh in January 2003. She obtained Ph.D. and M.A. degrees in electrical engineering from Princeton University in 2003 and 2001, respectively, and M.S. and B.S. degrees in electrical engineering from Rutgers University in 1999 and 1996, respectively. Kishore's research interests are in communications theory, networks, and signal processing, with an emphasis on wireless systems. From 1994 to 2002, she held numerous internships and consulting positions at AT&T, Bell Labs, and AT&T Labs-Research. Kishore is the recipient of a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, the P.C. Rossin Assistant Professorship, and the AT&T Labs Fellowship Award. She holds two patents in the area of wireless communications, is the author of numerous technical papers, and is a member of various honors societies, including Eta Kappa Nu, Tau Beta Pi, and Sigma Xi.

Jeffrey T. Linderoth, assistant professor of industrial and systems engineering, joined Lehigh in 2002. He received a B.S. in general engineering from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the department of industrial and systems engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. He has research interests in the computational and theoretical aspects of large-scale mathematical optimization. From 1998-2000, Linderoth was employed with the Mathematics and Computer Science Division at Argonne National Laboratory. Prior to joining Lehigh, he was a Senior Consultant with the optimization-based financial products firm of Axioma Inc. In 1999, Linderoth was named the Enrico Fermi Scholar at Argonne National Lab; in 2002, he was awarded the SIAM/Activity Group on Optimization Prize; and in 2005, he was the recipient of an Early Career award from the U.S. Department of Energy.

Colin J. Saldanha, assistant professor of biology, holds a Ph.D. in biopsychology from Columbia University and trained at the Brain Research Institute, UCLA School of Medicine prior to joining the department of biological sciences at Lehigh in 2001. He teaches courses in integrative and comparative biology, comparative physiology, developmental neurobiology, and specialty courses such as Hormonal Correlates of Neuroplasticity, Adult Neurogenesis: Structure and Function, and Casual Sex: Sexual Determinism and Differentiation. Saldanha also trains undergraduates, graduate students, and postdoctoral trainees in the scientific method through supervised individual projects in the laboratory. Saldanha and members of his laboratory are curious as to how hormones, particularly steroids like estrogen, participate in brain repair. Using species of songbirds that dramatically alter the architecture of their brains throughout life, he studies how estrogens are provided to specific targets, interact with their receptors, and thereby mold the structure and function of the brain. His scholarship is supported by the Alzheimer’s Association, the Pennsylvania Department of Health, and the National Institutes of Health. At Lehigh, Saldanha has been the recipient of several awards including the Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation Junior Faculty Award (2002), Eleanor and Joseph F. Libsch Early Career Research Award (2005), and, most recently, the Donald B. and Dorothy L. Stabler Award for Excellence in Teaching (2006).

Michael Santoro, Class of 1961 Professor and associate professor of management, earned his Ph.D. in organization management from Rutgers University. Santoro’s expertise is in the area of strategic management. He currently teaches the introductory strategic management graduate course and the capstone integrative experience graduate course in Lehigh’s MBA program. Before joining Lehigh University, Santoro was a member of the Faculty of Management at Rutgers University. Recognized for his commitment to teaching excellence, Santoro has received “Teacher of the Year” awards at both Lehigh University (academic years 2004-2005 and 2005-2006) and at Rutgers University (academic year 1997-1998). Santoro's principal research interests are in the areas of strategic alliances and the external sourcing of knowledge and technological innovation. His research examines industry-university alliances and their role in advancing knowledge and new technologies and the governance and performance of biotechnology-pharmaceutical alliances. Santoro has over twenty publications in edited volumes and leading refereed journals including Strategic Management Journal, Research Policy, Journal of Engineering and Technology Management (JET-M), IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, Research-Technology Management, International Journal of Management Reviews, Journal of High Technology Management Research, Journal of Technology Transfer, International Journal of Technology Management, and International Journal of Learning and Intellectual Capital. Santoro has also served as guest editor for a special issue of the International Journal of Technology Management titled “Organizational Learning from External Sources: New Issues and Performance Implications.” He is active in three divisions of the Academy of Management—Business Policy and Strategy, Entrepreneurship, and Technology and Innovation Management and has presented papers annually at the Annual Meeting of the Academy of Management for the past decade.

Kenneth P. Sinclair, professor of accounting, joined Lehigh in 1972. He has served as department chair since 1988. Sinclair has held leadership positions with professional accounting organizations and served on numerous academic and advisory committees. Prior to being honored with Lehigh’s Robert and Christine Staub Faculty Award, he received several other awards for teaching and service, including the first Pennsylvania Institute of Certified Public Accountants’ Outstanding Accounting Educator Award, the Lehigh University Alumni Deming Lewis Faculty Award, Lehigh’s Donald B. and Dorothy L. Stabler Award, and Lehigh’s Lindback Teaching Award. Sinclair has researched and written on a myriad of subjects related to accounting. Sinclair earned a bachelor of business administration degree in accounting, a master’s of science degree in accounting, and a doctorate degree in business administration from the University of Massachusetts.

Geraldo Vasconcellos, the Allen DuBois Distinguished Professor of Finance and Economics, joined Lehigh's faculty in 1988 and has a joint appointment in the departments of finance and economics. Vasconcellos specializes in international finance and his research has focused on portfolio approaches to export diversification strategies, cross-border mergers and acquisitions, and privatizations. He is currently studying the interplay between financial structure and economic growth and development. Vasconcellos’ studies have been cited in publications of the U.N. Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), and academic journals. At Lehigh, he was awarded in previous years the Kane Faculty Fellowship, the Sue and Eugene Mercy, Jr. Professorship in Business and Economics, and the Arthur F. Searing Professorship in Finance and Economics. He is also a past winner of the Beta Gamma Sigma Faculty Award, the Carl and Ingeborg Beidleman Research Award, and the Christine and Robert Staub Faculty Excellence Award. He resides in Bethlehem with his wife, Margaret. His daughter, Tais, and son-in-law, Jared, live and work in New York City. His son, Tiago, also lives and works in the 'Big Apple.'

Richard Weisman, professor of civil and environmental engineering, received his doctorate in hydrology, his master’s degree in hydraulics, and his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Cornell University. His research interests include surface water hydrology, the stabilization of tidal inlets, and coastal processes. Weisman teaches a variety of courses on water resources engineering, hydraulics, and fluid mechanics. A member of the American Geophysical Union, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), and the American Water Resources Association (AWRA), Weisman has previously served as the chairman of the ASCE Tidal Hydraulics Committee and the president of AWRA’s Pennsylvania Section. He has worked as a consultant in the fields of physical hydraulic modeling, storm water modeling, and the development and testing of gates, valves, and flow devices. Weisman’s work on beach stabilization, coastal fluidation systems, and culvert inlets has appeared in such publications as the Journal of Transportation Engineering and the Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering.

Posted on Tuesday, May 23, 2006