Eberly College of Science Honors Three With Distinguished Service Awards

19 February 2002 --Two Eberly College of Science senior administrators and one faculty member have been named as recipients of the Eberly College of Science Alumni Society Distinguished Service Award. The award is the society's highest honor. The award recipients include Joanne Cahill, director of development and alumni relations in the Eberly College of Science; James Levin, director of advising and the Division of Undergraduate Studies programs coordinator for the Eberly College of Science; and Svetlana Katok, professor of mathematics. Established in 1979, theDistinguished Service Award is presented annually to individuals who have made exceptional leadership and service contributions to the college over a sustained period of time. Past recipients of the award have included active and retired faculty and administrative staff, alumni, and friends of the college.

Joanne Cahill, director of development and alumni relations in the Eberly College of Science, has served the university for 12 years in a development role. Cahill manages the advancement programs, including major-gift fund-raising and alumni relations for 33,000 alumni. She planned and directed the initial stages of the college's $50-million portion of the $800-million university-wide capital campaign, the goals of which have since been raised to $75 million and $1.3 billion, respectively. Prior to moving to the Eberly College of Science, Cahill worked in a similar capacity in the College of Agricultural Sciences, Penn State's oldest college. Before coming to Penn State, Cahill worked in development and alumni relations at Neumann College, her alma mater. She also held the development positions at Franklin and Marshall College and the Villanova University School of Law. In 1993, she planned and hosted at Penn State the national conference of the National Agriculture Alumni and Development Association. Cahill is a member of the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education and National Society of Fundraising Executives. She has completed studies at the Big Ten Fundraising/Alumni Institute, and the CASE Summer Institute in Educational Fundraising.
James Levin, '81 Ph.D CI, is director of advising, the Division of Undergraduate Studies programs coordinator for the Eberly College of Science, and a faculty member in the Graduate School of Education. He has spent more than 30 years combining his love of science with teaching, as a science and mathematics educator at the public-school and university levels. He started his teaching career as a mathematics and science teacher in both urban and suburban secondary schools in the Philadelphia area. For the past 20 years, he has taught courses in science and mathematics education and classroom management at Penn State, and has served as a consultant to more than 100 schools nationwide. In addition to math and science, Levin has always had a special interest in meteorology. He has served as an educational consultant to AccuWeather Inc., where he was instrumental in assisting with the design and development of an innovative educational program--"On-Line with AccuWeather"-- that employed the use of technology and real-time worldwide data. Levin has co-authored five textbooks: On-Line with AccuWeather, Meteorology, Principles of Classroom Management, The Self-Control Classroom, and From Disruptor to Achiever.

Svetlana Katok, a member of the Department of Mathematics faculty since 1990, has a combined career as a research mathematician, an educator of young mathematicians, and a contributor to the department, national, and world mathematics communities. Katok served as an associate chair for graduate studies in mathematics from 1994 to 2000. She played a key role in organizing Penn State's Mathematics Advanced Study Semesters (MASS) program, which assembles undergraduate mathematics majors from all over the country for a unique and mutually reinforcing blend of learning and research experiences. She designed and taught several courses in the MASS program, and developed the innovative Math 471 "Geometry for Teachers" course. She served as a member-at-large of the American Mathematical Society Council from 1993 to 1996, and since 1995 was a founder and managing editor of the first electronic-only AMS journal, Electronic Research Announcements of the AMS.

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