The University of Colorado at Boulder Alumni Association will honor 12 outstanding members of the campus community at the 77th Annual Alumni Awards Ceremony on May 9.
The public is invited to attend the free event at 7 p.m. in Old Main Chapel on the Boulder campus, which also will commemorate the 125th anniversary of the CU-Boulder Alumni Association.
The George Norlin Award honors outstanding alumni for their careers and service to society. Recipients of the 2007 Norlin Award are Peter Henning Jr., a nuclear physicist, dairy farmer and real estate developer from Bellevue, Wash.; Walter Koelbel Sr., a Denver real estate developer who has donated time and generous gifts to CU and the Leeds School of Business for 60 years; Leonard LaPointe, a nationally recognized expert on human communication disorders at Florida State University; and Alan Stern, executive director of the space science division of the Boulder-based Southwest Research Institute, who is principal investigator for NASA's New Horizons mission to explore Pluto, Jupiter and the Kuiper Belt and became NASA's associate administrator for space science in April.
Three CU-Boulder faculty and staff members will receive the Robert Stearns Award in recognition of their extraordinary contributions to the university: Daniel Baker, director of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics and a professor of astrophysics and planetary sciences, oversees 336 faculty, staff members and students; Polly McLean, professor of journalism and chair of Women and Gender Studies, who is cited for her teaching, research projects, service to the campus and as an adviser to the King of Swaziland; and Uriel Nauenberg, a CU-Boulder professor of physics for 37 years who's been honored at the highest levels of the campus and his profession for his teaching and research in high-energy particle physics.
The Alumni Recognition Award will be presented to Jeannie Thompson and Rolan Zick of Boulder for their many contributions to the university. Thompson served on the Alumni Association board for four years, is vice chair of the CU Foundation board and serves on the advisory boards of the Graduate School and College of Music. Zick, the retired director of the Wardenburg Student Health Center, served on the association's Directors Club board and was instrumental in placing a flag atop Old Main in 2002.
The 2006 Kalpana Chawla Outstanding Recent Graduate Award will go to James Tighe, of Lancaster, Calif., who was chief aerodynamicist of SpaceShipOne, the privately funded manned spacecraft that won the $10 million Ansari X Prize.
Alumnus Scott Wood of Erie will be presented the Leanne Skupa-Lee Award as the top student recruiter for the National Alumni Admissions Assistance Program.
Denver attorney John Jacus will receive the Board of Directors Award for his service to the Alumni Association, having been chair of the board from 2003 to 2005 and a board member for six years.
This year's ceremony recognizes the Alumni Association's founding by the first four CU graduates on June 9, 1882, the day following the university's first commencement exercises.
The awards ceremony will be followed by a reception with dessert in the CU Heritage Center on the third floor of Old Main.
To attend the May 9 event, please make reservations by calling (303) 735-2893 or e-mailing allyson.frusciano@cufund.org.