APLU’s Board on Human Sciences Awards Announced

The Association of Public and Land-grant Universities’ (APLU) Board on Human Sciences (BoHS) recently honored three faculty members and a national public servant with its 2014 Board on Human Sciences Awards. The annual honors, which are presented to nationally-recognized leaders working to advance human sciences in higher education, took place earlier this month during the 127th APLU Annual Meeting in Orlando, Florida.

The awards are part of the broader BoHS mission of advancing intellectual integrity, stature and

centrality of the human sciences at APLU member institutions and beyond to include supporting the development and stewardship of academic excellence in human sciences; advocating for visibility and leveraging resources to support human sciences research/discovery, extension/outreach and teaching/learning programs; and educating leaders regarding the capacity of the human sciences to solve human problems.

2014 Ellen Swallow Richards Public Service Award

Barbara Thompson, Director, Office of Family Policy/Children & Youth/Special Needs, Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, U.S. Department of Defense
The BoHS Ellen Swallow Richards Public Service Award honors a nationally recognized leader who has a significant history of promoting and advancing the human sciences. For more than 35 years, Thompson has made a remarkable number of important contributions to the lives of children, youth and families. She has repeatedly demonstrated her belief in the power of collaboration between science and practice to address issues facing military families. Thompson has successfully made the case that supporting service members and their families is everyone’s responsibility.

2014 Lifetime Achievement Award

David Edgell, Professor, School of Hospitality Leadership, College of Human Ecology, East Carolina University
The BoHS Lifetime Achievement Award honors a nationally-recognized leader who has a significant history of promoting and advancing the human sciences in higher education. Edgell’s background and experience in promoting positive tourism policies and programs include an explicit concern for poverty reduction and for the sustaining of natural and built resources throughout the world. His interdisciplinary approach in teaching along with his research into the principles and practices of tourism through the medium of economics, sustainability, history, heritage, and culture has helped human science academicians and practitioners better understand the impact that the tourism industry has on global welfare, including the tourism-poverty nexus.

2014 Outstanding Engagement Award

David Riley, Professor, Human Development and Family Studies, UW-Extension, Cooperative Extension, University of Wisconsin-Madison
The BoHS Outstanding Engagement Award recognizes an individual who is “campus based” or a “state level faculty member” for exceptional creativity and scholarship in the development, application, and evaluation of outreach, extension, and public service programs. Riley has made exceptional contributions to the fields of early childhood and parenting, particularly by producing a measurable, positive impact on issues of concern to Wisconsin citizens. He works with people in their own communities to use the tools of research to address these issues, and for doing this with extraordinarily large numbers of citizens and communities across the nation and globally.

2014 Undergraduate Research Mentor Award

Matthew Rowling, Assistant Professor, Food Science and Human Nutrition, College of Human Sciences, Iowa State University
The Board on Human Sciences Undergraduate Research Mentor Award recognizes a faculty member in the human sciences for exceptional performance as a research mentor for undergraduate students. The undergraduates that conduct research under Rowling’s supervision address nutrition and its role in disease from the whole animal, to specific cell types, to understanding the mechanistic basis at the molecular level. It is Rowling’s mentoring skills and the environment he provides that develop the inexperienced undergraduate into an independent researcher. For a number of students, these experiences have had a major impact on their careers and goals. His research and professional practice activities allow him to bring that knowledge into the classroom and attract undergraduates who want to gain valuable research experience that can really be career changing.

BoHS is part of APLU’s Commission on Food, Environment, and Renewable Resources (CFERR), which focuses on cross-cutting issues related to agriculture, forestry, ocean and atmosphere and human sciences. Members are committed to a national agenda that unifies disciplines within and beyond the human sciences to enrich people’s lives.