Faculty Bulletin

Our three Award juries have just decided the latest winners of the AUC Faculty Merit Awards for Excellence in Academic Service, Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors, and Excellence in Teaching. Now as ever, the jurors had difficult decisions to make.

Juries include a mix of recent past Award winners and representatives from each of the AUC Schools. Winners will be honored at the June 15, 2013 Commencement ceremonies.

For a full list of past Award winners, please see the following webpage (today’s winners will be added to the list within the next few days):

http://www.aucegypt.edu/fac/awards/Pages/default.aspx

 

Excellence in Academic Service

•Mahmoud Farag, Department of Mechanical Engineering

Mahmoud has been with AUC since 1971. In recent years he has been most visible through his work in the University Senate. From 2008-2010 he was the first Senate Chair at the New Cairo Campus; since that time, he has been the tireless Chair of the Senate Faculty Affairs Committee. Among his many achievements in the latter role was his success in building consensus for the replacement of the old PPP document by the new Faculty Handbook (the Handbook resolution passed, astonishingly enough, by unanimous vote). From 1992-2005, he served as Vice Provost of the University, transforming AUC’s Faculty Support Grants Program into what it is today. Also while Vice Provost, he founded such familiar AUC entities as the Research Advisory Council, the Graduate Admissions Office, and the Annual AUC Research Conference (which he directed for its first thirteen years of existence). He is also the Director of Engineering and Science Services, which serves more than 600 major public and private sector companies, banks, and governmental agencies, enrolls more than 3,500 trainees, and offers 6 professional certificates and more than 90 intensive courses. These are simply a few of the highlights of Mahmoud’s vast service record, which fully qualifies him for this well-deserved award.

 

Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors

•Maki Habib, Department of Mechanical Engineering

Maki joined AUC in 2007, having spent much of his previous career in Japan. He is Professor of Robotics and Mechatronics, and his research topics strike a futuristic as well as a humanitarian note. Among the most prominent articles for which he was the lead author are “Efficient Method to Generate Collision-Free Paths for an Autonomous Mobile Robot Based on a New Free-Space Structuring Approach” and “Simulation Environment for an Autonomous and Decentralized Multi-Agent Robotic System.” His work in the area of removing dangerous landmines can be found in such obviously useful works as “Humanitarian Demining: Reality and the Challenge of Technology– The State of the Art,” “Mechanical Mine Clearance Technologies and Humanitarian Demining: Applicability and Effectiveness,” and “Controlled Biological and Biomimetic Systems for Landmine Detection.” Maki is the author of more than 200 refereed journal articles and conference proceedings publications, has written more than a dozen book chapters, and authored or edited six books. Described by one of his colleagues as “the pillar of the Mechatronics concentration in the Department of Mechanical Engineering,” he is known to his students as a tough but likable mentor. Maki is the fourth winner of the Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors Award from the Department of Mechanical Engineering, an AUC record.

 

Excellence in Teaching (2 winners)

•Rania Jabr, English Language Institute

Rania is a Senior Instructor who joined AUC in 1990. She is praised by students not only for her abilities as an instructor of English, but for her skills in teaching writing as well. Despite evidence that she can be a rather demanding instructor (“strict” is a word frequently encountered in the course evaluations), the popularity of her classes is considerable. Highly organized, and not inclined to waste even a minute of valuable class time, Rania is praised for leading her classes “at a balanced tempo,” while “communicating with students in a gentle manner.” It is remarkable how often students seem to be almost stunned by their improved skills after spending a semester with her. Indeed, a fair number of students wish that they could take “every class at AUC” with her. “Friendly,” “helpful,” and “perfect” are other words frequently used to describe the classroom persona of Rania Jabr. Her record shows a consistent pattern of teaching excellence.

 

•Hani Sayed, Department of Law

Hani joined AUC in 2005. Although he was so surprised to be nominated that he did not even submit materials to our office the first time it happened, the testimony of students and colleagues shows an outstanding track record in the classroom. One department colleague writes that Hani’s main strengths as a teacher are “his impressive intellect, a natural teaching ability and commitment to and respect for his students.” He is described as “an intellectual master at the top of his craft,” one who “challenges, cajoles, prods, and provokes” the students to reach new levels of academic performance. Hani addresses not only the top students in the class, but (his colleagues report) has given special attention to students with learning disabilities. One well-travelled former student, who describes herself as “thrilled” to write an unsolicited letter of nomination, found Hani to be an even more skilled teacher than the best professors she had at SOAS in London and at Harvard. Other students frequently describe him as “the best professor I’ve ever had,” and often give even more precise compliments. For example: “[Dr. Sayed’s class is a] class of thoughts; it gives the seeds to grow new scholars.” He is praised for always coming to class prepared, always covering enough material for the full three hours to be fruitful, and always being excited about the class and the material. It would be no exaggeration to say that Hani has changed the lives of many AUC students.

Please congratulate our newest winners the next time you see them. The next set of Awards will be announced in December 2013, for presentation at the February 2014 Commencement ceremonies. For any questions about the nomination or selection process, please contact me at gharman@aucegypt.edu.

Our three Award juries have just decided the latest winners of the AUC Faculty Merit Awards for Excellence in Academic Service, Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors, and Excellence in Teaching. This semester in particular, the jurors had difficult decisions to make.

Juries include a mix of recent past Award winners and representatives from each of the AUC Schools. Winners will be honored at the February 16, 2013 Commencement ceremonies.

For a full list of past Award winners, please see the following webpage (today’s winners will be added to the list within the next few days):

http://www.aucegypt.edu/fac/awards/Pages/default.aspx

 

Excellence in Academic Service

•Jennifer Bremer, Department of Public Policy and Administration

Jennifer joined AUC in 2007. She is an almost ubiquitous figure on campus, so it was not surprising to hear jury members tell stories of her service well beyond department and school duties. Perhaps her best-known service work was in rebuilding the depleted Public Policy and Administration unit into a full-fledged department in the School of GAPP. The department has now expanded to 12 faculty and 150 students and offers three graduate degrees. Jennifer is also actively involved in building links between AUC and the surrounding community, whether through community-based learning classes, collaboration with local groups and government organizations, or the promotion of corporate responsibility. Her service activities extend beyond the walls of AUC as well. She serves as executive director of the US-Egypt Friendship Society (a non-profit organization dedicated to building stronger ties between the U.S. and Egypt), and was appointed to the US-Egypt Business Council in December 2005 by U.S. Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez. Her extensive international experience includes long-term assignments in Egypt and Mexico and more than eighty short-term assignments in the United States and thirty other countries, emphasizing policy reform, trade and investment, corporate responsibility, infrastructure development and private enterprise promotion.

 

Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors

•Mohab Anis, Department of Electronics Engineering

Mohab joined AUC in 2008 from the University of Waterloo in Canada. Despite his relative youth, his work has already been cited more than 1,000 times by other researchers. His research interests are integrated circuit design and design automation for VLSI systems in the deep submicrometer regime, and the management of technological innovation. He is the author of two books and more than eighty articles, of which the most frequently cited are “Dynamic and leakage power reduction in MTCMOS circuits using an automated efficient gate clustering technique,” “Design and optimization of multithreshold CMOS (MTCMOS) circuits,” and “Multi-threshold CMOS digital circuits: Managing leakage power.” Mohab is no stranger to awards, having already won the 2009 Early Research Award from the Ministry of Research and Innovation, Canada, the 2004 Douglas R. Colton Medal for Research Excellence (in recognition of excellence in research leading to new understanding and novel developments in microsystems in Canada), and the 2002 International Low-Power Design Prize. Along with his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, Mohab holds an M.B.A. with concentration in Entrepreneurship and Innovation and a Masters of Sciences with concentration in Management of Technology.

Excellence in Teaching (2 winners)

•George Marquis, Department of Rhetoric and Composition

George returned to AUC in 2006, and is now Acting Chair of the Department of Rhetoric and Composition. His demanding classroom workload and meticulous attention to detail are greatly appreciated by students. Numerous AUC alumni have found George’s classes to be of direct professional benefit in their post-AUC careers, whether in sales, marketing, or politics. By constantly shifting the pace of course activities, he keeps his students alert and attentive. Students in his classes say that they “learn something new in this class every day,” that “this is the most amazing class I’ve ever taken,” and that George is a “sincere, compassionate, understanding person” and is “very devoted.” He is also known for providing assistance beyond the call of duty to other AUC departments and schools. A colleague offers further praise: “George’s application and pedagogical use of instructional technology is often leading edge and is often copied by the other instructors… Due to his student-centered and interactive teaching style, he is also very much in demand as a teacher trainer and has done a great deal of outreach work for ministries in Egypt, Abu Dhabi, and USAID, as well as corporate training programs.”

 

•Jehane Ragai, Department of Chemistry

Jehane joined AUC in 1970, and has served the university with distinction on both campuses. Positive student comments are numerous. A study abroad student remarks: “it is very rare that I come across a professor that I find both to be brilliant within her profession as well as a fantastic professor on the material that she has mastered throughout her life.” Another student says that Jehane “can make anyone improve no matter how weak they are at the subject.” Still another compliments her sense of humor, as well as her versatility in teaching students how to make blog posts and sharing her love of archaeology– a well-rounded approach that greatly impressed jury members. In addition to her normal teaching load, Jehane has participated extensively in the Scientific Thinking program, where her lecture on the detection of art forgery using chemical techniques was a great favorite. A colleague perhaps sums it up best: “Dr. Ragai raises the interest of students, succeeds in drawing them into the subject matter at hand, and manages to actively engage them in their learning process, while maintaining the highest levels of scholarship. This has led her to be not only a popular teacher among the student body at AUC, but also a highly appreciated one.”

Please congratulate our newest winners the next time you see them. The next set of Awards will be announced in May 2013, for presentation at the June 2013 Commencement ceremonies. For any questions about the nomination or selection process, please contact me at gharman@aucegypt.edu.

Our three Award juries have just decided the latest winners of the AUC Faculty Merit Awards for Excellence in Academic Service, Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors, and Excellence in Teaching. I would like to thank the jurors for their tireless work in evaluating the many high-quality applications received this semester.

Juries include a mix of recent past Award winners and representatives from each of the Schools. Winners will be honored at the June Commencement ceremonies.

For a full list of past Award winners, please see the following webpage (today’s winners will be added to the list within the next few days):

http://www.aucegypt.edu/fac/awards/Pages/default.aspx

Each Award will be presented at one of the two Commencement Ceremonies to be held on Friday, June 15. For Research and Creative Endeavors it will be Graduate Commencement; for Academic Service and Teaching it will be Undergraduate Commencement. Winners are expected to attend so that we may honor them in public.

Excellence in Academic Service

•Ibrahim Hegazy, Department of Management

Ibrahim joined AUC in 1992. This semester’s jury was impressed by the long duration and consistency of his service to the School of Business. In 2001 he won the Harold Harrison Faculty Award from the International Advertising Association, which pointed to the same types of achievements noted today by the AUC Excellence in Service Award jury. Colleagues express their gratitude that during his time as Chair of the Department of Management he was instrumental in receiving AACSB accreditation. Another writes that “he is always committed to offering the best for achieving academic excellence. Dr. Hegazy is always available and makes himself available for students and members of the AUC community.” Numerous jury members expressed that they have enjoyed serving with him on numerous committees at various levels of the University, both inside and outside the Senate. He is also the Executive Director of the Institute of Management Development at AUC, which has been described as one of Egypt’s leading training centers. With the firm support of the jury, he is this semester’s winner of the AUC Excellence in Academic Service Award.

 

Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors

•Hamza El Dorry, Department of Biology

Hamza joined AUC in 2006. Though a native Egyptian, he spent many years in Brazil at the University of São Paulo before returning to the banks of the Nile. Hamza is so modest about his research achievements that only with difficulty did we persuade him to submit materials after he was nominated for the Award by a colleague. According to his AUC webpage, Hamza’s research interests are principally in the area of enzymology and the regulation of metabolic pathways, regulation of gene expression, and structural and functional genomics. His 2007 article in Science, “Genome Sequence of Aedes aegypti, a major arbovirus vector,” has been cited nearly 400 times in the literature, and he has also published in the prestigious Nature. Other heavily cited articles from Hamza’s research dossier include “The Contribution of 700,000 ORF sequence tags to the definition of the human transcriptome” and “Antisense intronic non-coding RNA levels correlate to the degree of tumor differentiation in prostate cancer.” He is also praised by colleagues for having greatly enhanced the research projects of other AUC faculty and students, and for having contributed to the establishment of the AUC genomics facility, the first high throughput genomics facility in Egypt and one of very few in the region. AUC is fortunate to have lured Hamza back to Egypt from the nation of Brazil, which he loves so well.

Excellence in Teaching (2 winners)

•Melanie Carter, Department of Rhetoric and Composition

Melanie joined AUC in 2004. In the words of a colleague, her teaching “is characterized by her quiet, unobtrusive competence and excellence. She sees what needs to be done and she goes about doing it.” Her teaching is also praised for its student-centered approach, which allows students the space to find their own voices as writers. (As many know, Melanie is an accomplished writer herself). She is also cited for her unusual intuitive sense of the varying sensibilities of different students. Described as “one of the kindest and friendliest professors, who provides a safe and welcoming atmosphere for students,” she produced what one observer called a “literary miracle” in leading a classroom of novice students to produce a volume of beautiful poetry after just one semester of her poetry writing class. Though course syllabi are often dreadfully boring documents meant only to fulfill bureaucratic requirements, Melanie’s syllabi are a pleasure to read, and clearly convey the welcoming and inspiring classroom style to which so many of her students refer. More generally, as one student put it: “Dr. Melanie is the most marvelous professor I have ever met. She is really a role model for how the professor should be.”

 

•Hanan Kholoussy, Department of History

Hanan joined AUC in 2008 and made an immediate impression on students. Her student evaluations are a feast of diverse positive comments, but she is praised with especial regularity for a passion for the subject of history and her objectivity in presenting all sides of every question fairly. Some students have even urged that all other AUC students be forcibly enrolled in her HIST 247 class, “The Making of the Modern Arab World,” which is praised for shedding new light on the current situation in the region. Hanan earns widespread praise for providing helpful feedback on papers. As one student writes, “she is so professional and punctual and is very thorough with her students. She gives them limitless office hours and is always available for feedback. I can’t stop talking about this professor because she is amazing.” Her faculty colleagues are equally impressed. One calls her “a natural” in the classroom, but also describes her as “being deeply committed to honing her craft and to making every class and every course better than the one before.” Another says that Hanan “has earned a reputation as a courageous, committed, and creative teacher.”

Please congratulate our newest winners the next time you see them. The next set of Awards will be announced in December 2012, for presentation at the February 2013 Commencement ceremonies. For any questions about the nomination or selection process, please contact me at gharman@aucegypt.edu.

 

Our three hardworking juries have just decided the latest winners of the AUC Faculty Merit Awards for Excellence in Academic Service, Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors, and Excellence in Teaching. It seems like the decisions become more and more difficult each semester, and jury members found it harder than ever to make their final choices today.

Under the new voting procedures instituted this semester in consultation with Provost Haroun, juries include a mix of recent past Award winners and representatives from each of the Schools. Winners will be honored at the February Commencement ceremonies.

For a full list of past Award winners, please see the following webpage (today's winners will be added to the list within the next few days):    

http://www.aucegypt.edu/fac/awards/Pages/default.aspx

Each Award will be presented at one of the two Commencement Ceremonies to be held on February 18. For Research and Creative Endeavors it will be Graduate Commencement; for Academic Service and Teaching it will be Undergraduate Commencement. Winners are expected to attend so that we may honor them in public.

  

Excellence in Academic Service

•Hoda Grant, Associate Director of the Core Curriculum

In her role as Associate Director of the Core Curriculum and founder of the highly successful Freshman Year Experience (FYE), Hoda is simply beloved by AUC students. One graduating senior writes that Hoda “is always dedicated to helping, advising, and educating the students of AUC [through] her ongoing help and support for students with their academic and social lives and her helping them throughout the year especially during registration/drop and add periods.” This statement was signed by no fewer than 75 students, and this seems to be just the tip of the iceberg in assessing Hoda’s impact on the life of AUC. “Hoda is a builder,” said one jury member today. “She creates things that endure.” A veteran of the AUC faculty writes: “For most students and for many faculty Dr. Grant represents everything that is best about the University’s Core Curriculum… I believe that Dr. Grant is one of the four or five people at this university who are most fully committed to ensuring that our undergraduate students receive the education that we say we want them to receive… I regard Dr. Grant as one of AUC’s foremost assets.” Another prominent member of the AUC community echoes those remarks: “Hoda is one of the most dedicated colleagues I have worked with over the past ten years; she is one of the most valuable human assets at AUC.” For all those who benefit from her hard work, kindness, and commitment, it is nearly impossible to imagine AUC without Hoda Grant.

  

Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors

•Amr Shaarawi, Dean of Graduate Studies 

In recent years Amr has been most visible on campus in various administrative and service capacities: as Director of the Scientific Thinking Program, then as Associate Dean of the School of Sciences and Engineering, and since 2010 as AUC’s first-ever Dean of Graduate Studies. But alongside these valuable activities, Amr is also an expert in the physics of waves, and in this field he has a much greater impact than most people on campus realize. For example, he has an outstanding h-index of 16, meaning that 16 of his articles have been cited at least 16 times apiece (and at least 5 of the articles have been cited more than 100 times apiece, a difficult achievement). Among Amr’s most influential articles is “A novel approach to the synthesis of nondispersive wave packet solutions to the Klein-Gordon and Dirac equations.” If that one sounds too intimidating, you might try the simpler “A note on an accelerating finite energy Airy beam.” You might wish to sample the even more influential articles “Aperture realizations of exact solutions to homogeneous-wave equations” and “A bidirectional traveling plane wave representation of exact solutions of the scalar wave equation.” All of this work presumably emanates from his very simply titled 1989 doctoral thesis at Virginia Tech, “Nondispersive Wavepackets.” Amr is able to explain difficult concepts clearly, and perhaps we will have the opportunity to hear him explain his research on campus in the near future.

 

Excellence in Teaching. (2 winners.)

•Khaled Samaha, Department of Accounting 

Khaled joined AUC in 2008 with the opening of the New Cairo Campus, and quickly became a student favorite. Jury members were especially struck by the level of innovation he brings to the teaching of accounting, which sometimes includes role-playing and other methods that one might expect in the performing arts rather than accounting. AUC students are already hooked on his classroom style, which student comments indicate is unusually lucid and democratic: “He makes sure no one leaves the classroom if they don’t understand. Amazing doctor.”; “I super understand in his class”; “he explains very well and [repeats] the idea from scratch to refresh your memory”; “doesn’t get annoyed by having to repeat things hundreds of times.” Students wanting to enroll in even more of Khaled’s classes have even complained that “his name should be written under the course he’s teaching, not ‘staff’.” His work ethic also earns frequent praise: “Dr. Samaha is always punctual to class, he never cancels classes, he is always available for students for consultation and advising.” And finally: “No recommendations. He is perfect.” Students also greatly appreciate Khaled's method of bring real-life cases to the classroom.

 

•Marian Sarofim, English Language Institute  

Marian is a Senior Instructor in the English Language Institute (ELI), and has taught at AUC since 1975. She is widely viewed by her colleagues as one of the pillars of the ELI, and is described by students with superlatives such as “perfect” and “the best.” One former colleague writes as follows: “she brings enthusiasm and a willingness to work hard to any task she takes on. She is truly a dynamo, most enthusiastic about anything she does.” Another says that “Marian’s reputation, even among incoming students, was so great that they often asked to be placed in her class,” and still another calls her “a role model of professionalism.” Her student evaluations are a veritable feast of positive comments, despite the fact that she is also known for being very tough on lazy students. Beyond this generally positive impression of Marian among the students, it is perhaps in individual cases that her record shines most brightly. Marian has had a tremendous impact on the life history of many students who testify to her importance in their lives, including quite a number who were on the verge of dropping out of AUC until she convinced them otherwise. To conclude with a poetic tribute from a student named Hussein: “Mrs. Marian… is one of the few teachers who nurtured passion in her students like Aristotle to Alexander. She treated every student like an Alexander, restoring my lost faith in the existence of a perfectly objective and loving human being. Never have I seen a teacher so giving, caring and cultivating… She gave me a better life and I shall remain in debt to her for more than just my lifetime.”

Please congratulate our newest winners the next time you see them. The next set of Awards will be announced in May 2012, for presentation at the June 2012 Commencement ceremonies. For any questions about the nomination or selection process, please contact me at gharman@aucegypt.edu.

The relevant juries have just decided the latest winners of the AUC Merit Awards for Excellence in Academic Service, Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors, and Excellence in Teaching. Once again, there were strong pools in all three categories, and we saw some of the most difficult decisions in the history of the Awards.

Under current procedures, Award winners are chosen by juries made up of past winners. In consultation with Provost Haroun, this system will be modified somewhat next year in order to balance Award juries between recent winners and representatives of all Schools.

For a full list of past Award winners, see the following webpage (the latest winners will be added within the next few days):

        

http://www.aucegypt.edu/fac/awards/Pages/default.aspx

Each Award will be presented at one of the two Commencement Ceremonies to be held on June 16. For Research it will be Graduate Commencement; for Service and Teaching it will be Undergraduate Commencement. Winners are expected to attend so that we may honor them.

 

Excellence in Academic Service

•Aziza Ellozy, Center for Learning and Teaching

No one at AUC will be surprised to see Aziza honored for excellence in service. Jurors were especially impressed by the sheer breadth and diversity of her contributions to AUC. While she is perhaps most associated with her tireless leadership of the Center for Learning and Teaching (CLT), Aziza also manages to be both forceful and collegial as a committee member. In recent years she has made important contributions to the Senate Faculty Affairs Committee. In the areas of accreditation and academic integrity, she has long been one of the pillars of our community. Many important search committees have welcomed Aziza as a willing and energetic member. Her contributions to freshman courses have been considerable, particularly with the required Scientific Thinking course. Colleagues also salute her remarkable punctuality and reliability. Indeed, things generally just seem to go better whenever Aziza is involved. In the words of someone who has worked with her often: “I have not asked Aziza, not even once, for a contribution or assistance without receiving her approval even when I knew she was extremely busy… Has anyone ever seen Aziza lose her smile or cheerful behavior and kindness even in the midst of stressed working conditions?” The question answers itself.

 

Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors. (2 winners.) 

•Rasha Abdulla, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication

This Award is especially well-timed. Rasha has been described by some observers as the world’s leading expert on social media in the Arab world. When she predicted that there would be a revolution in Egypt in 2011, and that Facebook would play a key role, few were willing to believe it. Yet in the wake of January 25, Rasha now finds herself in great demand as a speaker around the globe. She is the author of The Internet in the Arab World: Egypt and Beyond and Policing the Internet in the Arab World. Even before the January 25 Revolution, Rasha had turned the emerging social media into a fascinating academic topic, as you will quickly discover if you are fortunate enough to hear her lecture on the topic. Rasha is a graduate of the American University in Cairo, and is also the first Merit Award winner from the new School of Global Affairs and Public Policy (GAPP).

 

•Ezzeldin Soliman, Department of Physics

Ezzeldin is a remarkably fruitful researcher in two areas in particular: the design of integrated antenna systems, and computational electromagnetics, with more recent interests in the field of plasmonics. He has earned a worldwide reputation for his invention of several new miniaturized antenna devices. Along with such inventions (for which he has already earned three patents), Ezzeldin has also published more than 70 technical papers. Among the most cited articles for which he served as lead author are “Bow-tie slot antenna fed by CPW,” “Propagation of electromagnetic waves in planar bounded plasma region,” and “Dual-polarized omnidirectional planar slot antenna for WLAN applications.” The jury was impressed by Ezzeldin’s ability to turn first-rate academic work in the sciences into practical impact on everyday life.

 

Excellence in Teaching. (2 winners.)

•Mohab Anis, Department of Electronics Engineering

Mohab was first nominated by a grateful student who noted how difficult it is to analyze electronic devices and circuits, and was amazed by how well Mohab was able to clarify such analysis. Students were especially impressed by his exams, which are described as not just evaluations, but as invitations to original thinking. Among other compliments received from students, “he never tried to jam the course content with material just for the sake of saying he covered it.” Instead, he always gave “ample time for explanation and practice.” Another strong point of Mohab’s courses cited by students was his focus on practical problems rather than allowing students to get lost in vague theoretical aspects of the subject. As one student put it: “I am grateful that Dr. Anis decided to come to AUC. I am finally understanding electronics!” 

 

•Valerie Carpenter, English Language Institute 

Valerie is noted for being a very popular instructor despite her willingness to accept unpopular teaching assignments. With very high numerical evaluations and nearly uniform positive comments from students, she has established herself as a campus favorite among students who marvel at her accessibility both in person and via email at times that might seem inconvenient. In her course evaluations, we read that “she is perfect in all subjects, even in grammar.” Another student chose to address her directly as follows: “Ms. Valerie you are the best teacher I’ve ever met, and I can’t deny that you helped me so much in learning English in general.” Yet another describes her as “VERY VERY clever, a brilliant… teacher [who] knows how to make her students work hard… She never feels too lazy to do her work even if she is totally exhausted.” She is also cited for her numerous contributions to curriculum development. Given this level of energy and commitment, so appreciated by her AUC students and colleagues, we are pleased to see Valerie as a winner of the Excellence in Teaching Award. 

Please congratulate our newest winners the next time you see them.

The next set of Awards will be announced in December, well in advance of the February 2012 Commencement ceremonies. For any questions about the nomination or selection process, please contact me at gharman@aucegypt.edu.

With this post we are pleased to announce the latest winners of the AUC Merit Awards for Excellence in Academic Service, Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors, and Excellence in Teaching. As usual, the juries had very difficult choices to make this semester, given the overall quality of the nominee pools. All nominations remain active for two years, and are renewable

Award winners are chosen by juries made up of past winners. For a full list of past winners, see the following webpage:

 

http://www.aucegypt.edu/fac/awards/Pages/default.aspx

 

Each Award will be presented at the appropriate February Commencement Ceremony. For Research it will be Graduate Commencement on Wednesday, February 9, 2011. For Service and Teaching it will be Undergraduate Commencement on Friday, February 11, 2011. Winners are expected to attend so that we may honor them.

 

Excellence in Academic Service

•Adham Ramadan, Department of Chemistry

Adham is an AUC alumnus, and joined our faculty in 2003. He currently serves as Chair of the Department of Chemistry. His helpfulness and good attitude are legendary on campus; no one remembers any case of Adham refusing a request or complaining about anything in even the most stressful of situations. But perhaps the most striking aspect of his service record is its remarkable breadth. Indeed, it is difficult to keep track of the many aspects of campus life in which Adham is involved. As a member of the Institutional Review Board his analysis of cases is thorough and almost instant. Within the Department of Chemistry and the School of Sciences and Engineering, he is widely praised for his meticulous work in assessing and improving university equipment and facilities. In the AUC Senate, he brings energy and enthusiasm to every policy discussion he joins. In the Registrar’s Office he is valued for his tireless committee work in considering special student cases. His warmly welcoming spirit is also evident in his participation in both New Faculty Orientation and the Freshman Year Experience, in both of which his performance has reportedly been outstanding. But all of this is merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Adham’s service record, which is impossible to summarize in a paragraph.

 

 

Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors. (2 winners.)

 

•Ashraf Abdelbar, Department of Computer Science and Engineering

Ashraf is an AUC alumnus, and joined our faculty in 1996. He has more than 50 refereed publications in international journals and conference proceedings. On a remarkably consistent basis, Ashraf publishes articles with discernible impact on other researchers in his field, as witnessed by his lead authorship role in such journal articles as “Approximating MAPs for belief networks is NP-hard and other theorems” and “Approximating cost-based abduction is NP-hard,” both in Artificial Intelligence, and “Abductive reasoning with recurrent neural networks” in Neural Networks. Studies of swarm intelligence are also part of his recent research agenda. While the titles of Ashraf’s articles may sound forbiddingly specialized to an outsider, they and his other publications have been greatly esteemed by readers in fields other than computer science. We salute his consistent track record of research productivity.

 

 

•Hanadi Salem, Department of Mechanical Engineering

Hanadi is an AUC alumna, and joined our faculty in 1999. Her field of specialty is nanotechnology: the manipulation of physical matter at the tiny scale of molecules and even atoms, in which AUC has recently become an emerging power. Hanadi has over 50 international publications in journals and conference proceedings, and has received numerous grants in the field of nanomaterials synthesis and processing for high performance applications, all while supervising more than 40 Master’s and Ph.D. students. Since 2003 her research interests have focused on the synthesis and fabrication of nanomaterials starting from micronpowders refined into nanosized powder particles with nanosize internal structure. Hanadi was the lead author of several widely cited recent articles, including “Microstructure and retention of superplasticity of friction stir welded superplastic 2095 sheet” and “Friction stir weld evolution of dynamically recrystallized AA 2095 weldments,” which both appeared in Scripta Materiala, and “Friction stir welding parameters: a tool for controlling abnormal grain growth during subsequent heat treatment” in Materials Science and Engineering A. Before returning to Egypt she worked as a research associate in the United States at both Georgia Tech and the University of South Carolina.

 

 

Excellence in Teaching. (2 winners.)

 

•Mona Amer, Psychology Unit (Department of SAPE)

Mona is an AUC alumna, and joined our faculty in 2007. Her dedication to teaching has long been obvious from the quantity and quality of student research that emerges from her classes, much of it displaying intellectual courage. Her student following is already large, with many saying they chose Psychology as a major or minor after being inspired by one of her courses. Mona devotes large blocks of personal time to course preparation and grading in a manner that goes well beyond the call of duty. The following student speaks for many others whose comments we received: “I never studied under a professor who cared to give such detailed and thorough feedback on papers and reports.” Another called Mona “the most fair, hardworking professor I have ever met, who offers support in all areas of life and is always ready to lend a helping hand… She answers our e-mails at night and is always the first person online in the morning. She’s always ready to give feedback and answer questions [instead of being] sick of us.” In her brief AUC career so far, despite her demanding workloads in the classroom, Mona has clearly inspired the enthusiasm of the student population.

 

•Iman Soliman, Arabic Language Institute

Iman is the Executive Director of CASA (Center for Arabic Study Abroad), one of AUC’s most internationally renowned programs. She joined the AUC faculty in 2006. Student reports from her classes indicate that she inspires loyalty and sometimes even amazement. One special talent cited by students is her ability to explain the intricacies of Arabic grammar simply and clearly. “She speaks immaculate fus’ha,” writes one student. Also noteworthy, say many who know her, is Iman’s natural ability to discipline even the most chaotic group of students in gentle fashion. One international student, who begins by admitting that he needed some discipline himself, continues as follows: “Hands down, she is the best teacher I have ever had; I have never had a teacher who made class so productive and captivating as she did. She even went so far as to go to a movie with us and take us to her home and cook amazing food.” Beyond the positive responses of students, she is cited by colleagues as an important force in curriculum development, not only within CASA but also in work for the Supreme Council of Education. To close this summary with a final student comment: “Iman Soliman displays infinite patience with the class when we don’t understand and is willing to repeat things for as often as it takes. She keeps us on track with a constant workload and does not get lazy when we get lazy towards the end of the school year.”

 

Please congratulate our newest winners the next time you see them.

As some of you may have noticed, 4 of our 5 Award winners were AUC students themselves. This is something of which we can all be proud.

The next set of Awards will be announced in April or May, well in advance of the Summer Commencement ceremonies. For any questions about the nomination process, please contact me at gharman@aucegypt.edu.