This column offers a sampling of honors recently awarded to UC Davis' faculty, staff and units:

UC Davis historian Louis Warren has won the 2006 Caughey Prize from the Western History Association for his 2005 book, Buffalo Bill's America: William Cody and the Wild West Show. The Caughey book prize is given annually for the most distinguished book on the history of the American West. The award includes a $2,500 prize.

Gary Stewart, head men's basketball coach, has been elected to the board of directors of the National Association of Basketball Coaches. Stewart fills a position on the board vacated when Barry Collier resigned as basketball coach at the University of Nebraska to become the director of athletics at Butler University. Beginning his fourth season as head coach at UC Davis, Stewart has been an active member of the NABC, serving on the board of directors for the Assistant Coaches Committee and as a coordinator and assistant coach for the annual NABC All-Star game for the past four seasons. Stewart also serves as a member of the NABC Ethics Committee.

A national study identified two

UC Davis general physics courses and their instructors, Wendell Potter and David Webb, for "exemplary" practices. The Center for Educational Policy Research reviewed 139 courses for the study. "The study sought to identify best practices college courses that could inform the redesign" of Advanced Placement courses, according to David Conley, a University of Oregon professor who serves as director of the Center for Educational Policy Research. He said a panel of national experts in physics bestowed the "exemplary" label on the Potter and Webb courses. "This is the highest distinction awarded," Conley said, "and only a very few courses in our study met this standard of distinction and excellence."

Dateline previously noted a similar best practices honor for Catherine Kudlick's course titled Introduction to European History, 1789-Present. For that study, the Center for Educational Policy Research reviewed 73 European history courses around the nation, with an eye toward redesigning AP courses. The experts conducting this study gave an "exemplary" designation to Kudlick's practices. The Center for Educational Policy Research carried out the studies on behalf of the College Board, a not-for-profit association of more than 5,000 schools, colleges, universities and other educational organizations. The College Board's best known programs include Advanced Placement, a set of 38 college-level courses taught in high school, and the SAT exam that many colleges and universities use for admission purposes.

The Association for Academic Psychiatry announced that its educator of the year award for 2006 will be presented to Robert Hales, professor and chair of the UC Davis Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. The award is to be presented in San Francisco during the association's annual meeting in September. The Association for Academic Psychiatry comprises psychiatry representatives from medical schools and residency training programs around the United States. The association's awards program recognizes innovative approaches that enhance training at all levels of medical education, as well as increase the public's general awareness about psychiatric issues. Hales, an adult psychiatrist, specializes in neuropsychiatry, clinical psychopharmacology and mental health services research. He joined the UC Davis faculty in 1995 and was named department chair five years later.

Harry Cheng, a professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering, has been elected a Fellow of American Society of Mechanical Engineers. The fellow grade of the membership recogonizes exceptional engineering achievements and contributions to the engineering profession.

Steve Blank, a Cooperative Extension specialist in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, received the Outstanding Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics Article Award from the Western Agricultural Economics Association. Blank's paper, Profit Patterns Across American Agriculture, was published in the Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics.

Christine Bruhn, Cooperative Extension specialist in the Department of Food Science and Technology, has been selected to receive the Julius Bauermann Lectureship Award from the Institute of Food Technologists. The award is presented each year to a scientist who has made significant advancements in food science and technology. The awardee is chosen by a jury of section members selected to represent different areas of specialization and of the industry — government, academic, and industry representatives are included.

Gail Feenstra, food systems analyst, and Jeri Ohmart, program assistant, at the statewide UC Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program, and Sheri Zidenberg-Cherr, a Cooperative Extension nutrition specialist at UC Davis, are cited in a recently released report that examines the progress made by obesity prevention initiatives in the United States. The report is from the Institute of Medicine, a branch of the private, nonprofit National Academy of Sciences. Cited in the report are Feenstra and Ohmart's five-year assessment of farm-to-school programs, and Zidenberg-Cherr's study of innovative approaches to increase fruit and vegetable availability through farm-to-school programs. The report is available online, www.iom.edu/obesity.

UC Davis entomologist William Reisen, a mosquito specialist at the Center for Vectorborne Diseases, is this year's recipient of the John N. Belkin Award, international recognition for contributions to mosquito biology. The Belkin Award, given by the American Mosquito Control Association, is for meritorious contributions to mosquito systematics — the processes involved in describing a species — and-or biology. The association established the award in 1981, the year after Belkin's death. He was a UCLA professor and renowned mosquito taxonomist. "John Belkin was a world-class mosquito taxonomist who 'set the bar' for standards for mosquito descriptions," Reisen said. Reisen, who received the honor at the association's recent conference in Detroit, became the second UC Davis-affiliated entomologist to receive the award. Reisen works in the Arbovirus Research Program, and serves as an adjunct professor with the Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine. His focus now is the Culex mosquito and its ability to transmit arboviruses, including West Nile.