Robert B. Leiter, director of the Georgia Center for Continuing Education, received the 2005 Meritorious Service Award from the Association for Continuing Higher Education.

The ACHE award recognizes individuals for their outstanding leadership and service to continuing higher education at their own institutions and to ACHE over a period of years.

Susanne Ullrich, assistant professor of physics and astronomy, is one of 26 recipients of Oak Ridge Associated Universities’ Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Awards for the 2005-2006 academic year.

The grants of $5,000 each provide “seed money” that will allow these faculty members, all of whom are in the first two years of a tenure track, to enhance their research during the early stages of their careers. Each recipient’s institution matches the ORAU award with an additional $5,000, making the total prize worth $10,000 for each winner.

Ullrich won the grant in the category of physical sciences for a research project titled “Time-resolved Photoelectron Spectroscopy of Biomolecular Building Blocks.”

ORAU is a university consortium leveraging the scientific strength of 91 major research institutions to advance science and education by partnering with national laboratories, government agencies and private industry.

Barbara White

Barbara White, chief information officer and associate provost, was a keynote presenter at the Syllabus 2005 conference in Los Angeles. She spoke on the topic “Orchestrating the IT Enterprise: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”

The 12th annual Syllabus Education Technology Conference was a five-day event spotlighting innovation, integration and collaboration in the higher education information technology environment. White joined three other speakers chosen for their “provocative and challenging insights on their work with academic, administration, networking and communication technologies on campus.”

William Yen

William Yen, Graham Perdue Professor of Physics, has been named winner of the ICL Prize for Luminescence Research. The honor from the International Conference on Luminescence was given for Yen’s “pioneering discoveries in the dynamics of solid state optical processes and for exceptional leadership in the field of luminescence.”

The ICL Prize was established in 1984 and is awarded in conjunction with the triennial International Conference on Luminescence. The prize was endowed by a consortium of concerns interested in the promotion of luminescence research and is currently funded by Elsevier Science Publishers of Amsterdam. Yen received a plaque and a check for $2,500.