The Robert Foster Cherry Award is a prize given biennially by Baylor University for "great teaching". [1] [2] The Cherry Award honors professors at the college or university level, in the English-speaking world, with established track records of teaching excellence and the ability to inspire students. Robert Foster Cherry, a graduate of Baylor University (A.B., 1929), made an estate bequest to establish the award. In a typical award cycle, three finalists are selected based on nomination packages. The finalists then compete for the award by giving a series of lectures at Baylor University. Each finalist receives $15,000 and the award recipient receives an additional $250,000 prize.
Jeb Barnes, University of Southern California (Political science and international relations)
Randy W. Roberts, Purdue University (History)
Nancy F. Dana, University of Florida (Education)
Reuben A. B. May, Texas A&M University (Sociology)
Heidi G. Elmendorf, Georgetown University (Biology)
Clinton O. Longenecker, The University of Toledo (Leadership)
Teresa C. Balser, Curtin University (Soil and Water Science)
Lisa R. Spaar, University of Virginia (English)
Joan B. Connelly, New York University (Art History and Classics)
Michael K. Salemi, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (Economics)
Heather Macdonald, College of William & Mary (Geology)
Allen Mattusow, Rice University (History)
Roger Rosenblatt, Stony Brook University (English)
Elliott West, University of Arkansas (History)
George E. Andrews, Pennsylvania State University (Mathematics)
Rudy Pozzatti, Indiana University (Art)
Robert W. Brown, Case Western Reserve University (Physics)
William R. Cook, SUNY Genesseo (History)
Harry Stout, Yale University (Religious Studies)
Nicholas Wolterstorff, Yale University Divinity School (Religion)
Stuart Alan Rice is an American theoretical chemist and physical chemist. He is well known as a theoretical chemist who also does experimental research, having spent much of his career working in multiple areas of physical chemistry. He is currently the Frank P. Hixon Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus at the University of Chicago. During his tenure at the University of Chicago, Rice has trained more than 100 Ph.D. students and postdoctoral researchers. He received the National Medal of Science in 1999.
Richard Alfred Tapia is an American mathematician and University Professor at Rice University in Houston, Texas, the university's highest academic title. In 2011, President Obama awarded Tapia the National Medal of Science. He is currently the Maxfield and Oshman Professor of Engineering; Associate Director of Graduate Studies, Office of Research and Graduate Studies; and Director of the Center for Excellence and Equity in Education at Rice University.
Chemistry education is the study of teaching and learning chemistry. It is one subset of STEM education or discipline-based education research (DBER). Topics in chemistry education include understanding how students learn chemistry and determining the most efficient methods to teach chemistry. There is a constant need to improve chemistry curricula and learning outcomes based on findings of chemistry education research (CER). Chemistry education can be improved by changing teaching methods and providing appropriate training to chemistry instructors, within many modes, including classroom lectures, demonstrations, and laboratory activities.
Martin Karplus is an Austrian and American theoretical chemist. He is the Director of the Biophysical Chemistry Laboratory, a joint laboratory between the French National Center for Scientific Research and the University of Strasbourg, France. He is also the Theodore William Richards Professor of Chemistry, emeritus at Harvard University. Karplus received the 2013 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, together with Michael Levitt and Arieh Warshel, for "the development of multiscale models for complex chemical systems".
Kenneth W. Harl is an American scholar, author, and classicist. He received his B.A. in Classics and History at Trinity College, and his M.A. and PhD at Yale University. He was a Professor of History at Tulane University in New Orleans until his retirement in 2022.
Mary Jo Nye is an American historian of science and Horning Professor in the Humanities emerita of the History Department at Oregon State University. She is known for her work on the relationships between scientific discovery and social and political phenomena.
Edward Bruce Burger is an American mathematician and President Emeritus of Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas. Previously, he was the Francis Christopher Oakley Third Century Professor of Mathematics at Williams College, and the Robert Foster Cherry Professor for Great Teaching at Baylor University. He also had been named to a single-year-appointment as vice provost of strategic educational initiatives at Baylor University in February 2011. He currently serves as the president and CEO of St. David's Foundation.
Peter John Stang is an American chemist and Distinguished Professor of chemistry at the University of Utah. He was the editor-in-chief of the Journal of the American Chemical Society from 2002 to 2020.
Ching Wan Tang is a Hong Kong–American physical chemist. He was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2018 for inventing OLED, and was awarded the 2011 Wolf Prize in Chemistry. Tang is the IAS Bank of East Asia Professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and previously served as the Doris Johns Cherry Professor at the University of Rochester.
Meera Chandrasekhar, is a Curators’ Teaching of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Missouri, United States. She is the recipient of the 2014 Baylor University's Robert Foster Cherry Award for Great Teaching. Her research focuses on optical spectroscopy of semiconductors and superconductors under pressure. Meera has also developed several hands-on physics programs for students in grades 5–12, and summer institutes for K-12 teachers.
Elliott West is an American historian and author. He studies the history of the American West.
Neil K. Garg is currently a Distinguished professor of chemistry and holds the Kenneth N. Trueblood Endowed Chair at the University of California, Los Angeles.
John B. Boles is an American historian. He retired as the William P. Hobby Professor of American History at Rice University in 2019.
Robert Huntley Bell is an American academic.
The University College of Science, Technology and Agriculture are two of five main campuses of the University of Calcutta (CU). The college served as the cradle of Indian sciences by winning the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1930 and many fellowships of the Royal Society London.
Hollylynne Stohl Lee is an American mathematics educator and statistics educator who describes herself as an "educational designer" focusing on technology-based learning. She is a professor of mathematics education in the College of Education at North Carolina State University, where she directs the Hub for Innovation and Research in Statistics Education in the William and Ida Friday Institute for Educational Innovation.
Michelle (Mikki) Rae Hebl is an applied psychologist whose research focuses on workplace discrimination and barriers experienced by stigmatized individuals. She is the Martha and Henry Malcolm Lovett Professor of Psychological Sciences at Rice University and affiliated with the Jones Graduate School of Business.