NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Thirty-six retiring faculty members were recognized during Vanderbilt’s Commencement ceremony May 10, when the university honored their years of service and bestowed on them the title of emeritus or emerita faculty.
Jeremy Atack, professor of economics, emeritus
Atack came to the College of Arts and Science in 1993 from the University of Illinois, where he had already established a reputation as one of this generation’s most important scholars of U.S. economic history. His research focused primarily on the transformation of the American economy to an economic powerhouse. As a professor, Atack combined outstanding scholarship with exceptional mentorship of students and junior faculty. His undergraduate course in U.S. economic history was always popular with students and was a cornerstone of the economics and history major. He has published three books and scores of articles; he also served on editorial boards for various scholarly journals. Atack is a past chair of the Department of Economics and former director of graduate studies.
Vereen Bell, professor of English, emeritus
Bell joined the College of Arts and Science in 1961. Over the next 52 years, he would be professor, author, scholar, mentor, administrator and advocate for social justice. Popular with students, Bell taught a range of courses on modern and contemporary literature and poetry as well as literary theory. As a key member of the English department, he was among the leadership that reshaped the department into a top-ranked, diverse and engaged entity. Among the honors Bell won are the Alumni Education Award, Madison Sarratt Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, Outstanding Graduate Teaching Award, Chancellor’s Cup and Vanderbilt’s Affirmative Action and Diversity Initiative Award. The author of three books and various articles, he also was a Guggenheim Foundation fellow.
M. Fräncille Bergquist, professor of Spanish, emerita
Bergquist has been a member of the College of Arts and Science faculty since 1977. In 1983, she joined the dean’s office as associate dean of academic affairs. In that role, she was responsible for pre-major advising and monitoring and advising students on their academic progress. Bergquist also directed summer academic orientation, trained faculty to be pre-major advisers and chaired the administrative committee and the committee on individual programs. Active in many areas on campus, she was instrumental in the creation of McTyeire International House, Vanderbilt’s international living-learning community. She continued to teach in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, where her course on translation and interpretation was a student favorite. Among the honors she received are the Chancellor’s Cup and the Alumni Education Award.
Leonard Bickman, professor of psychology, emeritus
Bickman joined the faculty of Vanderbilt’s Peabody College of education and human development in 1981 and directed the Center for Evaluation and Program Improvement since its inception that same year. He is a nationally recognized leader in program evaluation and mental health services research on children and adolescents. He served as co-editor of two handbooks on social research methods as well as a social research methods series for Sage Publications; editor-in-chief of the journal Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Health Services Research; and has published more than 15 books and monographs and more than 200 articles and chapters. In addition to numerous national awards recognizing his contributions to social research, Bickman received Vanderbilt’s Earl Sutherland Prize for Achievement in Research. He served as chair of Peabody’s Faculty Council for two terms and as associate dean for research for seven years.
Germain B. Böer, professor of management in accounting, emeritus
Böer joined Vanderbilt’s Owen Graduate School of Management in 1977 following stints with Arthur Andersen & Co., the Institute of Management Accountants and two prior universities. He served as director of the Owen Entrepreneurship Center and championed entrepreneurship and innovation at Vanderbilt for more than three decades. His annual entrepreneurship conference consistently brought leading innovators to the school and opened doors for students and businesses. His experiential learning programs helped transform students into self-driven entrepreneurs. Böer was honored with several teaching awards and was named Small Business Research Advocate of the Year by the Tennessee District Office of the U.S. Small Business Administration. A leading business consultant, he also serves on the editorial boards of two journals. Böer was interim dean of the Owen School in 1986-87.
Charles A. Brau, professor of physics, emeritus
Brau had a distinguished career as a research scientist before joining the Department of Physics in 1988. At the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, he started a program to develop a high-powered free-electron laser that is still in place today. As director of Vanderbilt’s William P. Keck Free-Electron Laser Center, Brau oversaw the construction and commission of the university’s FEL, one of the most powerful in the world and instrumental in several remarkable discoveries in laser surgery. In the classroom, Brau taught introductory physics to undergraduates and advanced quantum mechanics, classical mechanics and electrodynamics to graduate students. He is the author of three books and more than 90 articles. He holds six patents related to free-electron lasers.
Graham F. Carpenter, professor of biochemistry, emeritus
Carpenter started his career at Vanderbilt in 1973 as a research fellow in the lab of professor and future-Nobel Prize laureate Stanley Cohen. Since 1977, Carpenter held a faculty position in biochemistry and maintained his own research program as well as a secondary appointment in the Department of Medicine. His pioneering efforts in the study of epidermal growth factor in cellular proliferation have deepened understanding of the mode of action of EGF. He also was a tremendously effective teacher of students, post-docs and faculty colleagues and a terrific citizen in the biochemistry department, teaching, attending faculty meetings and retreats and taking on committee assignments. Carpenter obtained two multi-department grants from the National Cancer Institute—a program project grant, which was held with Cohen for 10 years, and a training grant, which is still funded. He has 224 publications and is an internationally recognized expert in the field of signal transduction, traveling nationally and internationally to present his research.
Clint E. Carter, professor of biological sciences, emeritus
Carter joined the College of Arts and Science in 1973 and became director of graduate studies for general biology in 1976. Over the course of his nearly 40 years at Vanderbilt, he also served as department chair and director of undergraduate studies and on the Faculty Senate. Carter’s research into biochemical and immunological interactions between protozoans and multicellular parasites and human hosts resulted in more than 90 scientific publications and a book on parasitology that is currently in its second edition. He served on advisory committees for the National Institutes of Health and U.S. Army, as well as on the editorial board of the Journal of Parasitology. As professor, mentor and adviser, Carter influenced and assisted his students, both graduate and undergraduate, in careers in the scientific field.
Vera A. Stevens Chatman, professor of the practice of human and organizational development, emerita
Chatman earned her Ph.D. from Vanderbilt’s Department of Psychology and Human Development and served Meharry Medical College in several capacities from 1975 to 1995. After visiting Peabody College while on sabbatical, she joined the faculty in 1995. Chatman was the founding director of the master of education program in Community Development and Action and served for 14 years as director of the health and human services track within the HOD major. In 1999, she was director of the Vanderbilt Tennessee Governor’s School of Health Sciences, and beginning in 2000 she served as a professor of medical education and administration at Vanderbilt’s School of Medicine. In 2003, she published an article on the health care partnership embodied in the Meharry-Vanderbilt Alliance, a project that has grown into a book, Bridging the Gap, about the complex history of relationships between Meharry Medical College and Vanderbilt School of Medicine from 1890 to 2010 (University of Alabama Press, 2013). In 2006, the Bishop Joseph Johnson Black Cultural Center at Vanderbilt established the Vera Stevens Chatman Award, given annually to an outstanding black graduate or professional student.
Robert D. Collins, professor of pathology, microbiology and immunology, emeritus
Collins received his B.A. and M.D. from Vanderbilt and joined the School of Medicine faculty in 1957 as an instructor, becoming professor of pathology in 1968. From 1996 through 2009, he held the John L. Shapiro Chair in Pathology and was designated Harvie Branscomb Distinguished Professor in recognition of his “distinguished accomplishment in furthering the aims of Vanderbilt University.” Along with his collaborator Robert Lukes, Collins developed one of the early taxonomies for lymphomas, the Lukes-Collins classification system, which distinguished different types of lymphomas based on their cell of origin. He also influenced generations of medical students as an iconic teacher and mentor; many credit him with being among their earliest and most influential role models regarding professionalism and what it means to be a Vanderbilt doctor. Collins received the Grant Liddle Award for Excellence in Research and the Vanderbilt Medical Alumni Association’s Distinguished Alumnus Award, as well as numerous teaching awards, such as the Shovel Award (four times) and the Jack Davies Award for Best Preclinical Teacher (seven times). The Robert D. Collins Award, given for excellence in teaching medical or graduate students or practicing physicians in the lecture setting, is named in his honor.
Edward G. Conture, professor of hearing and speech sciences, emeritus
Conture came to Vanderbilt in 1997 from Syracuse University. During his more than 40 years of academic service, he developed an international reputation for his groundbreaking contributions to a basic and applied understanding of developmental stuttering. His scholarly contributions—nearly continuously funded by the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Education since 1978—provided seminal information regarding the motoric, psycho-linguistic and emotional associates of childhood stuttering, and his many former Ph.D. students have conducted their own scholarly investigations at universities across the country. Conture served the NIH in Study Section and Advisory Council roles and was editor-in-chief of the Journal of Fluency Disorders. Among his many awards for scholarly and clinical contributions to the field are the Malcolm Fraser Award from the Stuttering Foundation of America, the Frank R. Kleffner Clinical Career Award from the American Speech and Hearing Foundation, and Honors of the Association from the American Speech, Language and Hearing Association. A Fulbright senior specialist, he received a Fulbright grant to share his experience and knowledge with the lay public and professionals in Bulgaria.
David S. Cordray, professor of psychology, emeritus
Cordray joined the faculty of Peabody College in 1989. During his tenure, he served in many administrative roles including co-director of the Center for Evaluation Research and Methodology, director of the Quantitative Methods Program, director of the Center for the Study of At-Risk Populations and Public Assistance Policy and chair of Peabody’s Department of Human Resources. Much of his administrative work had the effect of raising the profile of Peabody College as a place where excellent program evaluation research was being conducted. His research focused on estimating the numerical effects of social interventions directed at at-risk populations, such as the homeless and substance abusers. The products of his research were substantial: He authored or co-authored seven books, 25 book chapters, 35 articles in refereed journals and more than 10 technical reports for the U.S. Congress, and he was investigator or co-investigator on 16 federal grants or contracts, including pre- and post-doctoral ExpERT training grants, which resulted in important institutional and curricular changes in graduate education at Peabody.
Charlotte M. Covington, associate professor of nursing, emerita
Covington received her B.S.N. and M.S.N. from Vanderbilt University School of Nursing, and after 20 years of nursing practice, she joined the School of Nursing faculty in 1991. Her teaching contributions included creating, teaching and revising two of the major foundation courses in the master’s curriculum as well as lecturing in other classes on various primary care subjects. In 1995, she created the student clinical log for family nurse practitioner students, the current online version of which is used across the nursing practice specialties. Her longstanding commitment to students was recognized in 2004 with the VUSN Award for Excellence in Teaching. Covington served on the Faculty Senate and the Vanderbilt University Alumni Board of Directors, as president of the VUSN Alumni Board, and as chair of several VUSN committees throughout her career. She has served on the Julia Hereford Society Board of Directors since 2000.
Richard L. Daft, professor of management, emeritus
Daft, who came to the Owen Graduate School of Management in 1989, was the Brownlee O. Currey Jr. Professor of Management. He specialized in the study of leadership, organizational performance and change management and is one of the most highly cited academics in the fields of economics and business. A noted expert in organization behavior and organization design, he has published 12 books, dozens of articles and presented at more than 45 universities around the world. Daft also developed and managed the Center for Change Leadership, served as an associate dean at Owen, was an editor at two leading journals and participated in more than $500,000 in research grants. He is a fellow of the Academy of Management.
Paul R. Dokecki, professor of psychology and human and organizational development, emeritus
Dokecki earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Peabody College, and after a stint at the University of Houston, he returned to Peabody in 1970 as a faculty member in the Department of Psychology. During the 1970s, he directed the Demonstration and Research Center for Early Education and the Peabody Child Study Center. He was a founding member of the Vanderbilt Institute for Public Policy Studies and served as associate director of the John F. Kennedy Center from 1983 to 1992. In 2000, he co-developed the rationale for the Department of Human and Organizational Development and its doctoral program in Community Research and Action. Dokecki’s scholarly interests include the philosophy of science, values and ethics in public policy, early childhood intervention for children with handicaps and their families, community psychology intervention, and community development in the context of the church and spirituality. Most recently, he studied interfaith organizations, especially those including Muslims. He served Vanderbilt as chair of the Faculty Senate and chair of the editorial board of Vanderbilt University Press.
John W. Greene, professor of pediatrics, emeritus
Greene completed his residency at Vanderbilt, where he was chief resident in pediatrics in 1975-76. He joined the faculty of the Department of Pediatrics in 1977, with secondary appointments in Obstetrics and Gynecology and the School of Nursing. In 1979 he established the Division of Adolescent Medicine at Vanderbilt, the first comprehensive program of health care services for adolescents in Tennessee. This referral service continues to thrive and is highly valued by pediatricians at Vanderbilt and in the community for the assessment and treatment of adolescents with eating disorders, chronic illness, complex medical problems, alcohol and drug issues and chronic pain syndromes, as well as adolescent gynecology and reproductive health issues. Greene also served as director of Vanderbilt’s Student Health Center from 1981 to 2006. In this capacity, he provided a developmental perspective for parents and contributed to programs to enhance adjustment to college by undergraduate students. His emphasis on parent-student relationships added a new dimension to Vanderbilt’s orientation program for first-year students and their parents. Since 2006, he served as associate dean for student health and wellness.
Kathleen V. Hoover-Dempsey, professor of psychology, emerita
Hoover-Dempsey joined the faculty of Peabody College in 1973. Her research focused on parental engagement in children’s and adolescents’ education and its influence on students’ learning outcomes, which was grounded in a model she developed in collaboration with her colleague Howard Sandler. Her published scholarly work includes 25 peer-reviewed journal articles, more than 10 book chapters and two books. Hoover-Dempsey received awards for teaching and work with students, including Vanderbilt’s Chair of Teaching Excellence Award, Chancellor’s Cup, Ellen Gregg Ingalls Award for Excellence in Classroom Teaching and Peabody College’s Outstanding Professor Award. She served on the Faculty Senate, the Graduate School Faculty Council and its Executive Committee, the Peabody Faculty Council and as Peabody associate dean for academic affairs and graduate and professional programs. She received the university’s Exemplary Effort Recognition for affirmative action and equal opportunity in 1988 and the Thomas Jefferson Award for distinguished service to the university in 1999.
Carolyn Hughes, professor of special education, emerita
Hughes came to Peabody College in 1991 and was a professor of special education and a Vanderbilt Kennedy Center investigator. Her research focused on transition to adult life, self-determination, support strategies for students with intellectual disabilities and autism, and social interaction among general education high school students and their peers with disabilities. She is co-author of the Supports Intensity Scale, an instrument used to measure the support needs of adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities published by the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. She was principal investigator or co-principal investigator on multiple research grants funded by the U.S. Department of Education, including the Metropolitan Nashville Peer Buddy Program, Promoting Inclusion through Self-Directed Learning, and Project OUTCOME, a program for high school students with disabilities from high-poverty backgrounds. She published numerous books, chapters and articles addressing social interaction and self-directed learning skills among high school students as well as improving outcomes for youth from high-poverty backgrounds.
Jane Kirchner, associate professor of flute, emerita
Kirchner earned her bachelor and master of music education degrees as well as the specialist in education from George Peabody College. Formerly a member of the Nashville Symphony on flute and piccolo, she is a charter member of the Blair Woodwind Quintet and a founding member of the WindStrum Trio. She served 18 years as the Blair School of Music’s associate dean, and her administrative duties included the research, development and implementation of the first bachelor of music degree at Vanderbilt as well as preparing accreditation and re-accreditation proposals for the National Association of Schools of Music. Kirchner is an established recitalist, chamber performer, clinician and adjudicator throughout the South and Midwest and has judged both flutes and chamber groups for the Tennessee Music Teachers Association as well as regional and national levels of competition for the Music Teachers National Association. At Vanderbilt, she served on a multitude of committees for the Blair School and the university at large.
Kassian A. Kovalcheck, professor of communication studies, emeritus
Kovalcheck joined what was then the Department of Drama and Speech in 1969. Over the next 44 years, he was instrumental in shaping what today is the Department of Communication Studies. His Vanderbilt career has been distinguished by contributions to program building, undergraduate education and university governance. Over the decades, Kovalcheck taught almost every course in the rhetorical studies curriculum and since 2005 served as the department’s director of undergraduate studies. He also served on Vanderbilt’s Faculty Senate and the faculty council of the College of Arts and Science, marking nine years as parliamentarian and serving 28 times as a faculty marshal at Commencement. In 2011, his accomplishments were recognized with the Thomas Jefferson Award for distinguished service.
Konstantin V. Kustanovich, professor of Russian, emeritus
Kustanovich started his career as a mechanical engineer in the Soviet Union. Coming to the United States in the early 1970s, he pursued his love of Russian literature. A year after earning his Ph.D. in 1986, he joined the College of Arts and Science. Kustanovich is a specialist in 20th-century Russian literature and culture, whether in Russia or the émigré diaspora. He authored two books, including a collection of essays, and numerous articles on Russian literature and culture. In addition to teaching Russian language, culture and literature, he was a contributor to the European Studies, Jewish Studies and Film Studies programs. Kustanovich also served as director of undergraduate studies in Russian and as acting chair of the Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages.
Andrea Maneschi, professor of economics, emeritus
After joining Vanderbilt in 1969, Maneschi taught hundreds of students about the interplay of technology, resources and opportunities for exchange and economic growth. His popular courses included international trade, globalization, the history of economic thought and recently, environmental economics. A scholar for whom teaching and research went hand-in-hand, he produced numerous works on the economics of international trade, including important scholarship on the history and evolution of economists’ ideas about why nations trade what they do. His book, Comparative Advantage in International Trade: A Historical Perspective, made a major contribution to the field. Maneschi served as the economics department’s director of graduate studies and director of the Graduate Program in Economic Development. He also served as director of the Vanderbilt-in-Germany program in Regensburg.
John A. McCarthy, professor of German and comparative literature, emeritus
McCarthy had already earned an international reputation as a teacher and scholar before coming to Vanderbilt in 1991 as professor of German and comparative literature. In addition to teaching, he served as director of graduate studies and later as director of undergraduate studies in the Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages. In 2005, he served as associate director of the Center for European and German Studies, then became the first director of the Max Kade Center for European and German Studies in 2006. McCarthy published 13 books, authored more than 90 articles and book chapters, and served on leading national and international editorial boards. Active as a reviewer and lecturer on both sides of the Atlantic, he also held appointments as professor of European studies and professor of religious studies.
Robert L. Mode, professor of history of art, emeritus
Mode taught thousands of students in a career spanning more than four and a half decades. As a scholar of Italian Renaissance art, he produced foundational articles that helped to define the field. He was published in the most esteemed journals in art history, including The Burlington Magazine and The Art Bulletin. In recent years, he expanded his research to 18th-century Britain and is continuing his scholarship regarding the artist William Hogarth. Mode has served as department chair, director of graduate studies and director of undergraduate studies and in a variety of roles for the College of Arts and Science and Vanderbilt. He also was active in public art issues with the Vanderbilt Institute for Public Policy Studies and the Curb Center for Art, Enterprise and Public Policy at Vanderbilt.
Jeanette J. Norden, professor of cell and developmental biology, emerita
Norden received her Ph.D. from Vanderbilt and joined the faculty in 1978. For 20 years she conducted research on regeneration, development and neuroplasticity, detailing cellular and molecular events that occur following optic nerve damage in a variety of animals. Her lab was the first to demonstrate that a specific protein expressed during optic nerve regeneration in amphibians plays a role in brain development and in new synapse formation in the adult mammalian brain. Norden’s passion, however, was teaching. Since 1982, she directed the core neuroscience course taught to medical students. She won the Shovel Award three times and the Jack Davies Award for Teaching Excellence in the Basic Sciences eight times. She was awarded the first Chair of Teaching Excellence at Vanderbilt as well as numerous other faculty awards. In 2007, she completed a 36-lecture DVD, Understanding the Brain, for The Teaching Company in an effort to help inform the public about the brain and common neurological disorders. In recognition of her impact in outreach activities, the Vanderbilt Brain Institute at Vanderbilt established the annual Jeanette J. Norden Outreach Lectureship in her honor.
Thomas N. Oeltmann, associate professor of medicine, emeritus
Oeltmann came to Vanderbilt in 1979. His research focused on the glycoliology of human parasites, specifically the human pathogen T. cruzi. More than 30 medical and undergraduate students carried out research projects in his lab. As a dual appointee in biochemistry and medicine, he played a pivotal role in developing both undergraduate and graduate courses at Vanderbilt. He was a primary lecturer in the first-year biochemistry course for medical students for more than 25 years, co-director of the Diabetes Research and Training Center’s Summer Research Program for 10 years and director of the Pre-Health Professions Program in the College of Arts and Science for 13 years. Oeltmann also directed the Vanderbilt Minority Undergraduate Summer Research Program and served on several university and medical school committees addressing diversity issues.
Ralph N. Ohde, professor of hearing and speech sciences, emeritus
Ohde joined the Vanderbilt faculty in 1981. His research provided much of our basic understanding of the acoustic properties of typical and atypical speech sound development in children and adults, specifically essential information regarding sounds often misarticulated by children, which can contribute to difficulties in academic, emotional, social and vocational development and accomplishments. Ohde’s excellence in scholarship was complemented by his excellence in the classroom. He educated generations of master’s- and doctoral-level students at Vanderbilt, and his teaching ability was recognized with the Freeman McConnell Outstanding Teaching Award in 2006 from Vanderbilt’s Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences, as well as the Robert D. Collins Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2010, among other honors.
Daniel M. Patte, professor of religious studies, New Testament and Christianity, emeritus
Patte joined the Department of Religious Studies in 1971 and went on to become one of this generation’s most productive scholars in New Testament studies. He is an internationally acclaimed academic who helped to create the new field of semiotics applied to the study of the New Testament. In recent years, he has explored multicultural interpretations of the New Testament. Patte has produced two major encyclopedias, 13 monographs, 13 edited volumes or special issues of journals and nearly 200 articles, book chapters and encyclopedia entries in peer-reviewed publications. He also mentored and taught students who have gone on to be professors, preachers, deans, writers and leaders of church denominations. He served as chair of religious studies for nearly two decades, and in 2005, took over as director of undergraduate studies.
James Lee Ray, professor of political science, emeritus
Ray already had a worldwide reputation in international relations when he joined the Department of Political Science in 1996. An intellectual leader in the field, Ray has advanced new theories in political science, and his work has been widely published in the discipline’s most distinguished journals. His influential Democracy and International Conflict is in its second edition, and his textbook, Global Politics, is in its 10th edition. In the classroom, Ray was known for his sense of humor and ability to impart knowledge to undergraduate and graduate students alike. He was honored with the College of Arts and Science’s Ernest A. Jones Faculty Adviser Award in 2006. A former chair of the department, Ray served as director of undergraduate studies for 13 years.
Howard M. Sandler, professor of psychology, emeritus
Sandler joined the Peabody College faculty in 1970. His research focused on areas such as adolescent pregnancy, child abuse, chronically ill children, Head Start, and parental involvement in the schools, bringing at least four major grants to the university. He co-authored two books and numerous book chapters and articles, and served as a reviewer, board member and ultimately associate editor for Psychological Methods, the premier methodological journal for the American Psychological Association. Sandler received the Ellen Gregg Ingalls Award for Excellence in Classroom Teaching, the Chancellor’s Cup and the Thomas Jefferson Award. His list of contributions to the life of Peabody College and the university is prodigious. He chaired the Department of Psychology and Human Development from 1983 to 1993; was a member of the Faculty Senate, holding several offices; and served on several college- and university-wide advisory committees. He also served as associate provost for special projects for a number of years.
Eric Schechter, professor of mathematics, emeritus
Schechter came to Vanderbilt from Duke University in 1980. His areas of expertise include mathematical analysis, set theory and logic. Calling himself a pure mathematician at heart, Schechter started in differential equations before turning to existence theorems and the more abstract questions of mathematics. He is the sole author of two well-reviewed books and the author or co-author of more than 20 research articles. One of the early users of the Internet, Schechter was the departmental webmaster for years and served as a valuable resource for his colleagues in matters regarding new technology. He also served as student adviser to the undergraduate mathematics club and as adviser for students participating in the prestigious William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition.
Ronnie J. Steinberg, professor of sociology, emerita
Renowned for scholarship in the area of women and work, Steinberg was recruited to Vanderbilt in 1997 as professor and director of the Women’s Studies Program. During her seven years as director, she was instrumental in the development of an undergraduate major and graduate certificate for the program. Her classes in sociology and women’s studies were student favorites. Steinberg’s research was geared toward policy-making in support of equal pay for equal work, and more recently, to the experiences of workers and residents in eldercare settings. She edited a long-standing book series, Women in the Political Economy, which resulted in 57 books and significantly expanded scholarship on women and gender. She is the author of three books and more than 75 articles.
Hans R. Stoll, professor of finance, emeritus
Stoll came to the Owen Graduate School of Management in 1980 from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, where he had been a faculty member since 1966. He was the Anne Marie and Thomas B. Walker Jr. Professor of Finance at Vanderbilt. Stoll is best known for developing put-call parity and for seminal work in market microstructure, which has become a major subfield within finance. The breadth and depth of his work have earned him one of the industry’s most stellar reputations. Stoll, who was also director of the Financial Markets Research Center and faculty director of the master’s in finance program, has published several books and more than 60 articles. He founded and led the FMRC annual conference, which just marked its 26th year. In 1996, he received the Earl Sutherland Prize, Vanderbilt’s top award for outstanding research.
Mary Theresa Urbano, professor of clinical pediatrics, emerita
Urbano joined the Vanderbilt faculty in 1999 following a career as a public health nurse in Illinois and Florida. She has more than 30 years’ experience in the field of neurodevelopmental disabilities as a clinician, faculty member, researcher, author and administrator. Most recently, she served as the director of training and the director of health for the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities Education, Research and Service and was the director of the Vanderbilt LEND (Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities) training grant. As a dean in the School of Nursing, Urbano demonstrated a remarkable ability to bring together teachers from a variety of disciplines and professions to meet the learning needs of children and adults with disabilities and to provide support for their families.
Michael R. Waterman, professor of biochemistry, emeritus
Waterman joined Vanderbilt as chair of the Department of Biochemistry in 1992 and served in the position until 2010. He was awarded the Natalie Overall Warren Distinguished Chair in Biochemistry in 1995. He led an independent research laboratory for 42 years, with much of his work focusing on structure, function and regulation of P450 monooxygenases, a very large superfamily of enzymes required for biosynthesis of many different biological compounds and the metabolism of drugs and xenobiotic compounds. He maintained grant support for his laboratory for 40 years from the National Institutes of Health and other agencies. He trained 12 graduate students and served on 53 continuing committees. He published 278 peer-reviewed articles, 79 symposia publications, 61 invited articles and three book chapters and edited five books, among other professional service. Waterman trained more than 50 research fellows, for which he received the 2011 F. Peter Guengerich Award for Excellence in Postdoctoral Mentoring from Vanderbilt.
Mark Wolery, professor of special education, emeritus
Wolery joined the faculty of Peabody College in 2000 after three decades as a teacher, administrator and researcher in public schools and universities across the Southeast. His research focused on instruction for children with disabilities, particularly those in inclusive preschools. With colleagues, he developed and evaluated response-prompting procedures and instructive feedback. Wolery is co-author or editor of nine books, more than 25 chapters in books and more than 165 journal articles. He served as editor of the Journal of Behavioral Education as well as Topics in Early Childhood Special Education and as co-editor of the Journal of Early Intervention. He also served as an investigator or principal investigator on funded research, personnel preparation and service/model demonstration grant projects. Wolery diligently served the Department of Special Education, most notably in his three-year term as department chair.
