AUSTIN, Texas—Recipients of some of the most prestigious awards given by The University of Texas at Austin to faculty and supporters of higher education will be honored Jan. 22 at an awards dinner at the Blanton Museum of Art hosted by William Powers Jr., president of The University of Texas at Austin.
Award presentations will include the Presidential Citation, the Civitatis Award, the Chancellor’s Council Outstanding Teaching Award and the President’s Associates Teaching Excellence Awards.
The Presidential Citation was created in 1979 to recognize the extraordinary contributions of individuals who personify the university’s commitment to the task of transforming lives. The university does not award honorary degrees, and these citations are designed to salute those whose service exemplifies the values shared by The University of Texas at Austin community. In honor of each recipient, a Presidential Citation Endowed Scholarship will be awarded to three students.
Recipients of the 2005-06 Presidential Citation award are James B. Ayres, the Shakespeare at Winedale Regents Professor Emeritus and Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus, Department of English; Admiral B.R. Inman, USN (Ret.), the Lyndon B. Johnson Centennial Chair at The University of Texas at Austin’s LBJ School of Public Affairs; and George Sudarshan, an internationally acclaimed physicist who has made seminal contributions in areas related to quantum mechanics and particle theory.
Ayres founded the Shakespeare at Winedale program in 1970 in rural Round Top, Texas, and presented the plays of William Shakespeare there and in Great Britain. In recognition of his work at Winedale, Ayres was given the highest honor of the College of Liberal Arts, the Pro Bene Meritis Award.
Inman was graduated from The University of Texas at Austin in 1950 and began a distinguished career in the U.S. Navy. He was director of the National Security Agency and deputy director of Central Intelligence. He was named an adjunct professor at The University of Texas at Austin in 1987 and was appointed to the Lyndon B. Johnson Centennial Chair in National Policy in 2001. In 2005, he was interim dean of the LBJ School.
Sudarshan has been a faculty member at The University of Texas at Austin since 1969 and established and directed the Center for Particle Theory, which has helped to build the university’s international reputation in physics. Notable among his contributions are the V-A theory of weak interactions and the quantum theory of optical coherence, which laid the basic foundations for these topics and also predicted the existence of Tachyons, particles traveling faster than light, contrary to established wisdom.
The Civitatis Award is presented to faculty members who have shown exemplary campus citizenship throughout a career of service at the university. The 2005-06 recipients are Judith Langlois, interim dean of the College of Liberal Arts, and Paul Woodruff, dean of undergraduate studies.
The award’s name derives from the Latin motto that appears on the university’s seal—Disciplina Praesidium Civitatis—taken from the words of Mirabeau B. Lamar, former president of the Republic of Texas, “Cultivated mind is the guardian genius of democracy.”
Langlois is the Charles and Sarah Seay Regents’ Professor of Developmental Psychology and director of the Langlois Lab in Psychology at The University of Texas at Austin. She also is a member of the Children’s Research Laboratory. Langlois is a leading researcher in children’s social development, with a focus on the origins of social stereotypes.
Woodruff has taught at The University of Texas at Austin since 1973, with an academic specialty in ancient Greek philosophy. He became director of the Plan II honors program in 1991 after three years chairing the Department of Philosophy. He is the Darrell K. Royal Professor in Ethics and American Society and holds the Hayden Head Regents Chair as director of Plan II. He has won the Harry Ransom Teaching Award and is a member of the Academy of Distinguished Teachers.
The Chancellor’s Council Outstanding Teaching Award recognizes excellence in undergraduate teaching at The University of Texas at Austin. A cross-college committee of five faculty members and two students reviewed materials submitted by the deans of each school and college to determine who would be selected for the award. The 2005-06 recipient is Don B. Graham, the J. Frank Dobie Regents Professor of American and English Literature. The award provides for a $5,000 honorarium from the Chancellor’s Council and a $2,500 honorarium. Graham joined the Department of English as an assistant professor in 1976.
The President’s Associates Teaching Excellence Award recognizes excellence in undergraduate teaching. The award, made possible by “Friends of the University,” was established in 1980 to recognize excellence in undergraduate teaching at The University of Texas at Austin. Awards are based upon nominations received from deans and department chairs in the colleges of Liberal Arts and Natural Sciences. The 2005-06 award recipients approved by the executive vice president and provost include Associate Professor Edward R. Anderson of the Department of Human Ecology, College of Natural Sciences; and recipients from the College of Liberal Arts, including Professor David F. Crew, Department of History; Professor Laura J. Furman, Department of English; Associate Professor James N. Loehlin, Department of English; Assistant Professor Sean M. Theriault, Department of Government; and Assistant Professor Michael P. Young, Department of Sociology.
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