Thursday, February 20, 2003

WILMINGTON, NC – Dr. Richard Huber, a professor of curricular studies in the Watson School of Education at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, was named the 2002 Carnegie Foundation North Carolina Professor of the Year.

Presented jointly by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, the award is designed to “reward outstanding professors for their dedication to teaching, commitment to students and innovative instructional methods.”

An example of Huber’s innovative teaching methods involves his work in environmental education. He designs Java applets to manage and interact with large data sets via the Internet. This project assists science teachers and their students to collect water quality data and post the results on the Web so that other classrooms across the state can view the data.

“I am flattered and humbled to receive this award,” said Huber. “I hope that my classes make a difference in the lives of my students, and I hope I can make a difference in the way my students view the world.”

MaryAnn Davies, chair of the Department of Curricular Studies, said Huber’s applications of technology in teaching are “at the forefront of his field.”

Huber developed data visualization tools (DVT) to represent scientific data from the Cape Fear Basin for the Web site www.uncw.edu/riverrun. DVTs use a database to display information through interactive color-coded graphs. Users can explore a combination of up to 13 water quality parameters collected from 15 sampling sites along the Cape Fear and Northeast Cape Fear rivers between 1995 and 2000.

The Carnegie Foundation and CASE select Professors of the Year for each state as well as the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Huber was nominated for the honor by former provost John Cavanaugh.



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For more information, contact Dr. Hubert at 910/962-3561.