Spring 2001 -- Vol. 18, No. 1

Alumni & Philanthropy News

Alumni and Friends,

We understand that for some of you it’s not always easy to get back to Penn State due to hectic schedules, family responsibilities, and potential travel challenges. And with just over 36,000 science alumni located throughout the world, it’s not easy for us to “bring” Penn State to all of you in our travels. Therefore, we’re always looking for convenient opportunities for you to keep your Penn State connection “open.”

Obviously, the World Wide Web and e-mail have greatly enhanced our ability to communicate with the growing number of college alumni and friends becoming networked each day. Our college Web site, which is updated often with current information and news about the college, can be accessed any time, day or night, from any networked computer in the world (www.science.psu.edu). There’s even a special science alumni and development subsection of the overall college site that provides specific information of interest to our alumni and donors. In the near future we’ll be restructuring and fine tuning that subsection to serve your needs better, so visit the site and let us hear from you with your suggestions for improvement.

For those of you still shopping for the best buy in a computer or an on-line provider or just not ready yet to enter the technological age, we have added a toll-free number for our office so that you can contact us by phone at no expense to you. That number is (800) 297-1249; we encourage you to use it.

And finally, we’ve expanded our written communications to provide for more frequent news from the college via mail. Science Journal, which goes to all alumni of the college, will now be published and mailed twice a year. To supplement the Science Journal magazine, an alumni newsletter has been developed for twice-a-year mailing to college alumni who are members of the Penn State Alumni Association.

The timing of these two publications will be staggered so that you—if you are an Alumni Association member—will receive one or the other quarterly. If you are not currently an association member, perhaps you will consider becoming a member in order to check out the new college newsletter that is now part of the membership benefits package.

Although it is often said that long-distance relationships don’t work well, our job is to make your relationship with the Eberly College of Science work well—despite the distance.

Help us by letting us know how the relationship is working for you. Your input is always welcome and greatly appreciated.

For the glory,

Joanne T. Cahill
Director of Development and Alumni Relations
jtc7@psu.edu

Suzanne Sinclair Grieb
Assistant Director of Alumni Relations
sds6@psu.edu

Private gifts to the college play an important role in
its efforts to excel as a top-notch institution of science teaching, research, and service. State-of the-art facilities and equipment are crucial in attracting the most outstanding faculty and students—as well as enabling them to perform at a level commensurate
with their individual talents.

The college has to get them here first though, so financial incentives in the form of student-aid packages and faculty start-up funds are essential in
the competitive higher education recruiting environment. Once on board, these dynamic
scientists and future scientists with all their energy
and talent provide the research and new ideas so
vital to the scientific endeavor. The results are pace-setting advancements in science and technology.

At the onset of the new millennium, Discover and Time magazines published a review of the revolutionary advancements in science in the past millennium—citing some that originated at Penn State.

Did you know that it was a Penn State organic chemistry professor who discovered the first
practical synthesis of the hormone progesterone, making possible the birth control pill and a variety
of hormone treatments?

Some other contributions to science and technology attributable to Eberly College of Science scientists
include the nitroglycerine patch and discovery of the first planet outside of our solar system.

To celebrate the beginning of another millennium which promises even more revolutionary contributions by the college to society, to acknowledge the role that private support plays in advancing science and technology, and to recognize those who donate their financial resources, the Eberly College of Science is pleased to announce the formation of a new donor recognition society called the Millennium Society.

Beginning this fiscal year (2000-2001), annual
donors of $1,000 or more to the college will qualify
for membership in this new society.

If you donate at least $1,000 total to the college between July 1, 2000 and June 30, 2001 (or if your own personal gifts in combination with matching gifts from your employer or gifts by a donor-advised fund at your suggestion add up to at least $1,000), you’ll automatically be a charter member of the Millennium Society. And each fiscal year thereafter, your membership will continue as long as your contributions to the college total at least $1,000.

Millennium Society members will receive a small gift each year to represent the college’s appreciation and recognize the role that they have played in its efforts.

Other benefits of membership will include invitation each year to the annual Millennium Society reception—where members can gather, interact, and network with others who share their philanthropic vision for the college and also with college faculty, students and staff who benefit from private support. Finally, members will receive special mailings from the college and invitations to special college events and activities on campus.

Thanks to generous alumni and friends, the Eberly College of Science has made its historical mark in the field of science and is getting ready for another exciting millennium of revolutionary scientific research and discovery.

Information about how you can be a part of it through membership in the Millennium Society is available by contacting the college’s Office of Alumni Relations and Development at (800) 297-1429.

Catherine Beath	Marcus Hansen
Woodrow Hoch	Morris Taradalsky

Outstanding Science Alumni Awards

Four Eberly College of Science alumni were named recipients of the 2000 Outstanding Science Alumni Award. The award, established in 1997 by the Board of Directors of the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society, recognizes outstanding science alumni for their leadership in science and for the impact they have had and will continue to have on society and on their professions.

The honorees were Catherine Beath, ’70 B.S. Micrb, vice president of quality systems for Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc.; Marcus Hansen, ’69 B.S. Math and Phys, president of Lockheed Martin Management and Data Systems; Woodrow Hoch, ’42 B.S. CChem, retired president of Viscosity Oil Company; and Morris Taradalsky, ’70 B.S. Math, executive vice president of engineering, Exodus Communications.

 

Douglas Arnold	John Lowe
Nicholas Pelick	Thomas Reissmann

Alumni Society Distinguished Service Awards

Douglas Arnold, John Lowe, Nicholas Pelick, and Thomas Reissmann were the recipients of the 2000 Penn State Eberly College of Science Alumni Society Distinguished Service Award, the society’s highest honor.

Established in 1979, the Distinguished Service Award is presented annually to individuals who have made exceptional leadership and service contributions to the college or its alumni society.

Douglas Arnold, distinguished professor of mathematics, received the award for his excellent record of scholarship and leadership in his research community and for his outstanding teaching and commitment to education at all levels.

John Lowe, professor emeritus of chemistry, was honored for his many years of service to Penn State and for his efforts to improve the quality of undergraduate teaching in the Department of Chemistry and across the University.

Nicholas Pelick, ’60 B.S., ’64 M.S. Bioch, and Thomas Reissmann, ’42 B.S., ’47 M.S., ’49 Ph.D. Chem, were both honored for their dedicated service and leadership to the Board of Directors of the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society. Pelick is the retired president and chief executive officer of Supelco, Inc. Reissmann is retired assistant to the corporate director for quality assurance at Ethicon, Inc.

Frymoyer and Plonka Named Alumni Fellows

Edward M. Frymoyer, ’59 B.S. ESc, ’67 Ph.D. Phys; and James H. Plonka, ’70 Ph.D. Chem; were named 2000 Alumni Fellows by the Penn State Alumni Association. This award is the most prestigious honor given by the association. The title “Alumni Fellow” is lifelong and permanent.

Edward Frymoyer is president of emf Associates, a company specializing in fibre channel consulting.

James Plonka is vice president, venture capital, at Dow Chemical Company.

Alumni Society Business Wrap-Up

The Board of Directors of the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society is the governing body of the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society. Its mission is to support the goals, objectives, and leadership of the college. The Fall 2000 meeting of the Board of Directors took place on the Penn State University Park Campus on October 7.

Six new alumni were welcomed to the Board membership on October 7. Elected to three-year terms which run from July 1, 2000, until June 30, 2003, were Kenneth S. Costa, ’75 B.S. Biol, a dentist in private practice in Whitehouse Station, New Jersey; Michael C. Goodman M.D., ’73 B.S. PM, a physician with Contemporary Ob/Gyn Associates in Rockville, Maryland; Thomas T. Griffith, ’87 B.S. Math, senior software engineer at Avtec Systems, Inc., in Fairfax, Virginia; Robert J. Houston, ’69 B.S. Zool, group manager of environment and planning at GAI Consultants, Inc., in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Maggie Ann Jeffries, ’99 B.S. Biol, a student at Hahnemann Medical School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and David A. Rugaber, ’78 B.S. Phys, chief operating officer of AGR International, Inc., in Prospect, Pennsylvania. Re-elected to serve another three-year term was incumbent James D. Nichols, ’71 Ph.D. Chem, lead scientist at Air Products and Chemicals, Inc., in Fogelsville, Pennsylvania.

Discussions continued at the meeting about the Penn State Premedical Shadow Program, a program designed to expose premedicine majors to clinical practice experience. Premedicine students who qualify for the program spend three days “shadowing” a physician in his or her practice and schedule their shadow experiences during summer and on semester breaks during the academic year. A core group of 40 physicians in Pennsylvania and the surrounding areas have agreed to serve as preceptors to the students. The physicians are primarily involved in the specialties of family practice, internal medicine, and pediatrics.

A progress report was given on the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society Board Enhancement Endowment, a fund created by the Board of Directors in 1995 to provide a source of funds to support alumni, faculty, or student activities and programs which promote the educational and research missions of the college. To date, approximately $85,000 has been committed by current and former members of the board. Income from the fund has been used to support the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society’s Careers in Science Conference and has also provided travel support grants for undergraduate and graduate students.

Additional items of business discussed at the meeting included an overview of the board’s task force membership and missions and preliminary planning for the next Careers in Science Conference, which will take place at University Park on Saturday, March 31, 2001.

Information about becoming a member of the Board of Directors or questions or comments about the activities of the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society can be directed to Suzanne Grieb, assistant director of alumni relations, 430 Thomas Building, University Park, PA 16802-2112, by telephone at (800) 297-1429, or by e-mail at sds6@psu.edu.

LionLink Matches Alumni and Students

LionLink is a professional networking program sponsored by the Penn State Alumni Association. LionLink matches Penn State students with alumni volunteers based on the students’ occupational and geographic preferences. Students talk with alumni volunteers about jobs, career planning, resume preparation, and interviewing tips. LionLink is not a job placement service and students are not allowed to ask volunteers
for jobs. Volunteers set the parameters of their involvement: contact can range from a brief telephone conversation to an on-site visit.

One of LionLink’s long-range goals is to link alumni volunteers with other alumni for networking purposes.

You can enroll as volunteers through LionLink’s web site at http://www.lionlink.psu.edu. Volunteer enrollment forms also are available by mail.

For more information, contact the LionLink Coordinator in 406A Boucke Building, University Park,
PA 16802-5903, (814) 863-6014, E-mail: LMH11@psu.edu.

Obituaries

David H. Fishman, ’64 B.S. Chem, died on April 23, 2000 in Berkeley Heights, New Jersey.
He was president of Fishman Incorporated, a consulting firm serving the chemical industry.

William I. Gilbert, ’36 B.S. Chem, died on December 25, 1999. He was director of the
Petrochemical Division of Gulf Oil and retired in 1978.

Miles Greenland, ’33 B.S. Phys, of Blue Bell, Pennsylvania, died May 2, 2000.
Blair Saylor, ’36 B.S. P M, of Tucson, Arizona, died May 12, 2000. He was a long-time physician
in the Tucson area.

Alumni Notes

 1958

Rodway M. Bullock, M.S. Chem, is a retired research chemist for American Cyanamid Company in Bound Brook, New Jersey. He is enjoying his leisure time as
an investment consultant for technology stocks and is restoring an old Chevrolet.
 

 1964

Michael A. Goodrich, Ph.D. Ent, was named a Fellow of the Illinois State Academy of Science in recognition of the past three decades of his research on the systematics, ecology, and evolution of Coleoptera. He continues his research in entomology as professor emeritus at Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, Illinois.
 

 1967

Robert R. Karl, Jr., B.S. Chem, is a staff member, project leader at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico after receiving his doctorate degree from Cornell University. His work led the team that designed and built the first standoff Lidar system fielded by the U.S. Army. The Lidar system flies in a Black Hawk helicopter and by firing an invisible laser can detect biological warfare agents out to 300 kilometer ranges, thus providing warnings of threats to troops in the battlefield. Robert was presented with the U.S. Army Distinguished Service Award for his work with this project.

 1978

James G. Huard, Ph.D. Math, is professor of mathematics at Canisius College in Buffalo, New York. He is editor (together with Dr. K. S. Williams of Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada) of the collected papers of the late Dr. Sarvadaman Chowla, his doctoral supervisor. The three volumes are published by the Center for Mathematical Research at the University of Montreal. Dr. Chowla was research professor of mathematics at Penn State from 1963 to 1976, when he retired with the rank of professor emeritus.
 

 1979

Judd W. Moul M.D., ’79 B.S. PM, has been promoted to professor of surgery at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, Maryland, and has also been promoted to the rank of colonel in the U.S. Army Medical Corps. He continues as director of the Department of Defense Center for Prostate Disease Research in Rockville, Maryland.

Keith M. Weaver, B.S. Biol, received a doctorate degree in ecology from the University of Tennessee in December, 1999. His dissertation was titled “Ecology and Management of Black Bears in the Tensas River Basin of Louisiana.” Keith was selected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as the first refuge manager of the Nulhegan Basin Division in the Northeast Kingdom area of Vermont. He and his wife, Tamara, moved to Island Pond, Vermont, in January 2000.
 

 1981

Peter M. Collins, B.S. Biol, formerly a high school science teacher, is now a commercial fisherman in Stonington, Maine. Peter worked for three different environmental consulting firms in the 1980s in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in southern Texas, and on the eastern shore of Maryland.
 

 1983 

Janice Gonda Newell, B.S. Micrb, and her husband, Robin Newell, ’79 B.S. Agro, announce the birth of a daughter, Allison Janice Newell, on July 15, 1999. Allison joins brother and sisters Nicole, Scott, and Christine. The family lives in Hummelstown, Pennsylvania.
 

 1984 

Craig Brackbill, B.S. Math, a licensed civil engineer, was admitted to the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and awarded its Diplomate Environmental Engineer specialty certification in drinking and wastewater engineering. He is employed with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
 

 1986 

Sandra Farmer Kelly, B.S. Math, and her husband, Chris, announce the birth of their son, Sean Randal, on May 4, 2000. Sandra is a computing manager for Shell Services International. The family resides in Sugar Land, Texas.

James J. Staudenmeier, B.S. Sc, a major with the medical corps of the United States Army, has moved to Hawaii along with his family where he will be working at Tripler Army Medical Center. In addition, he will have faculty appointments in psychiatry at the University of Hawaii and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland.
 

 1990

Mark E. Lavallee, B.S. PM, ’94 M.D. Med, was boarded in family practice medicine in 1997 and was admitted to the board in sports medicine in 1999. An avid weightlifter himself, Mark was medical director for the 1999 World Masters Weightlifting Championships in Glasgow, Scotland; was the event physician for the United States Weightlifting Olympic Trials in New Orleans in July 2000; was the medical director of the 2000 World Fencing Championships in South Bend, Indiana; and served as the medical director of the Sunburst Race in South Bend Indiana. He was also the 1999 medical advisor and a charter member to the Michianna Branch of the Ehlers-Danlos National Foundation and is a member of the board of directors of Ehlers-Danlos National Foundation in Los Angeles, California.
 

 1991

Gregory Quinn, B.S. Math, ’97 M.S. IE, recently formed a company with Mark
Symanovich, ’76 B.S. EE, ’81 M.S. EE, in State College, Pennsylvania. Greg was named vice president of the Quinn & Symanovich Corporation in charge of new business and strategic relations. The company focuses on consulting and products for resource management in manufacturing and service industries.

Carol A. Stevenson, B.S. Math, has been named a Fellow of the Casualty Actuarial Society (CAS). Director and associate actuary at CGU Insurance in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Carol was awarded the Fellowship designation by successfully completing fifteen examinations and additional coursework administered by the CAS. The CAS, formed in 1914, is dedicated to the advancement of knowledge of actuarial science applied to property, casualty, and similar risk exposures.
 

 1992

Julie Y. Farley Reuther, B.S. Micrb, received a doctoral degree in genetics and molecular biology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in November 1999. She is currently a postdoctoral research fellow at the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of North Carolina.
 

 1993

Matthew M. Collins, ’93 B.S. Biol, was awarded the doctor of osteopathic medicine degree from Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine on June 4, 2000. He was the recipient of the William F. Daiber D.O. Memorial Award, an award presented to a member of the graduating class who is selected on the basis of exceptional ability in the field of cardiology. He is pursuing an internship at Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine.
 

 1995

Akash Patniak, B.S. Bioch, is beginning his sixth year in the M.D./Ph.D. Program at Hershey Medical Center. His work toward his doctorate degree led to the discovery of an active role of the ubiquitin gene in retrovirus budding. In recognition for this work, he received a Young Investigator Award from the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) and received a third place award in the national M.D./Ph.D. Medical Scientist Student Forum. His findings were accepted in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Journal (PNAS). Following his doctorate work he will transition back to the clinics to complete the last two years of medical school.
 

 1996

Bruce Booth, B.S. Bioch, received his doctorate degree from Oxford University. He is employed by McKinseys, a strategic management consulting firm in New York City that works with senior management on overall strategy in many different industries, ranging from banking and finance to biotechnology and pharmaceuticals.

Back to Science Journal Spring 2001 Index

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