Mont Hubbard, professor of mechanical engineering at UC Davis, has been named as the first recipient of the American Society of Biomechanics Jim Hay Memorial Award for research in sports and exercise. Named for sports biomechanics pioneer Jim Hay, this award recognizes outstanding career accomplishment and is awarded annually to an investigator who has conducted exemplary research in the area of sports and exercise science biomechanics. Selection is based on originality, quality and depth of the research and its relevance to the field of sports biomechanics.

In other recent awards, UC Davis psychology professor Dean Simonton is the winner of the 2006 Robert S. Daniel (Four-Year College Category) Teaching Excellence Award of the Society for the Teaching of Psychology, a section of the American Psychological Association. A longtime faculty member who studies genius, greatness and creativity, Simonton was a former winner of UC Davis Prize for Teaching and Scholarly Achievement.

The Society of Architectural Historians has awarded the 2006 Spiro Kostof Book Award to UC Davis art historian Heghnar Zeitlian Watenpaugh, for her book "The Image of an Ottoman City: Imperial Architecture and Urban Practice in Aleppo in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries." Watenpaugh joined the UC Davis faculty this year. Her award is given each year for the greatest contribution to understanding urbanism and its relationship with architecture.

Two faculty members in the UC Davis Department of History recently received kudos for their superior teaching. Professor Catherine Kudlick's course, "Introduction to European History, 1789-Present," was judged one of the top 20 examples of best practices from among all submitted courses in European history in a recent competition for best practices by the College Board Advanced Placement. Components from these best practices will be used to develop new Advanced Placement course descriptions, AP exam specifications and professional development guidelines for AP teachers. Professor Don Price is the recipient of a 2006 Phi Beta Kappa Northern California Association award for Teaching Excellence.

Professor Malaquias Montoya is the recipient of the Beatrice and Sidney Laufman Award for a work on exhibition at the 181st annual Invitational Exhibition of Contemporary American Art at the National Academy Museum in New York. The exhibition runs May 11-June 18. Besides his solo exhibitions at the UC Davis Nelson Gallery and, recently, at the Delhi Center, a nonprofit organization serving the Orange County Latino community, Montoya is also participating in group exhibitions at the Taller Boricua, Julia de Burgos Cultural Center in New York, and the Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum, Chicago. Montoya is a professor of Chicana/o studies, and art and art history at UC Davis.

Thanks to a National Endowment for the Humanities $350,000 grant, UC Davis English professor Scott Simmon will curate "Treasures 3," a DVD anthology, with printed program notes, exploring "social-issue films" of the silent era. Simmon also curated the first two anthologies. The project is coordinated by the National Film Preservation Foundation, a nonprofit organization created by the U.S. Congress to help save America's film heritage. The NEH has designated "Treasures 3" a "We the People Project," a special designation given to model projects that promise to enhance the teaching and understanding of American history.

UC Davis Spanish lecturer Francisco Alarcón will be featured in Latino Writers & Journalists, published by Facts on File. Winner of numerous national awards for his seasonal poems, Alarcón writes bilingual poems about the Hispanic American experience for children. His children's books include "Jitomatoes Risueñas" ("Laughing Tomatoes") and "From the Bellybutton of the Moon." A teacher of college Spanish composition, Alarcón also wrote a best-selling high-school textbook on Spanish for Spanish speakers.

The Center for Great Plains Studies has chosen "Buffalo Bill's America" by UC Davis historian Louis S. Warren as the winner of the 2005 Great Plains Distinguished Book Prize. Warren, the W. Turrentine Jackson Professor of Western U.S. History, will receive a cash prize of $1,000 and be invited to travel to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln this fall to present a lecture on his book. The Great Plains Distinguished Book Prize was created to emphasize the interdisciplinary importance of the Great Plains in today's publishing and educational market.

Pamela Houston, an English professor and director of the Creative Writing Program at UC Davis, has been honored as this year's Evil Companions Literary Award honoree. The award, presented by the Colorado Review in collaboration with the Oxford Hotel and the Tattered Cover Book Store, pays homage to a group of Denver writers who met in the 1950s and 1960s to drink and discuss writing, and dubbed themselves the Evil Companions.

Caroline Kieu Linh Valverde, assistant professor of Asian-American Studies at UC Davis, is the co-curator of a new exhibition on the Vietnamese garment called the ao dai, at the San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles. Ao Dai: A Modern Design Coming of Age is believed to be the first exhibition of its kind in North America. The garment is the cultural symbol of Vietnam, worn by women and men as a fitted tunic-style gown over long, loose-fitting pants. Valverde and UC Davis textiles and clothing professor Susan Kaiser are also delivering workshops at the San Jose museum related to the exhibition.

Kevin Johnson, associate dean for academic affairs at the UC Davis School of Law and professor of law and Chicana/o studies, was recently elected to the board of directors of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund. The organization works to protect the civil rights of Latinos and empower their participation in society through litigation, advocacy and educational outreach.

Terri Malmgren, head of the UC Davis Medical Center Library, is the 2006 recipient of the Northern California and Nevada Medical Library Group Award for Professional Excellence.

The Division of Lipid Oxidation and Quality of the American Oil Chemists Society has initiated an award to recognize the research achievements of Edwin Frankel, an adjunct professor in the UC Davis Department of Food Science and Technology. The Frankel Award will be presented annually for the best research paper concerning lipid oxidation published in one of the society's journals.