Extraordinary Service to the University in 2009

HENRI GRISSINO-MAYER
Henri Grissino-Mayer has been actively engaged at UT since he joined the faculty in 2000. His expertise in hurricanes, forest ecology, global change and dendrochronology—tree-ring dating—makes him a popular lecturer. Grissino-Mayer has led more than 300 public lectures in the past nine years. His specialty areas blend together to make interesting topics of discussion, such as his theory that climate change affects the sound of musical instruments, or the use of tree-ring dating to authenticate that the Messiah violin was made by Stradivari. He frequently appears in local, national and international media as an expert, and his UT Web site detailing the uses of tree-ring dating in science has had more than 1 million hits. Grissino-Mayer is a dedicated adviser to graduate students and serves the College of Arts and Sciences on a number of diverse committees.

John Haas
John Haas has been a member of the College of Communication and Information faculty for 20 years, including eight years as speech communications department head and five years as director of the School of Communication Studies. As director of the school, Haas has revitalized the program by hiring new faculty members with degrees from highly ranked communications programs. As a result of this, the school has a greater presence in the field, is aggressively pursuing sponsored research opportunities, and is well-positioned to become nationally ranked in select areas. Haas voluntarily has taken on more than his required share of the school’s teaching load, allowing students to get the courses they need to graduate and giving junior faculty members more time to develop their research record to reach tenure and promotion. He also advises the Communications Studies Club and oversees the internship program. In addition to all of this, Haas donates his royalties from a textbook he co-wrote back to the college.

BARRY REEVES
Barry is a University Housing student employee who has developed a three-phase apprenticeship program working with the UT Facilities Services department, the Knoxville Area Urban League and the Lincoln Park High School Technology Center. Reeves works to identify apprentice candidates and local businesses as clients. He has established job criteria and a training program with Facilities Services and Lincoln Park to ensure the apprentices receive the necessary on-the-job training. He also maintains contact with the apprentices and job supervisors to check on their progress and offers tutoring and positive reinforcement. Reeves’ apprenticeship program was not created as part of his job, but rather as a means to teach useful job skills to deserving community members.