Professors Win Teaching Awards

Three University of Rochester professors will receive teaching awards at this year's commencement ceremony May 28.

Celia Applegate, an associate professor of history, will receive the Edward Peck Curtis Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. Applegate joined the Rochester faculty in 1988 and quickly made her mark as an outstanding teacher of European history. Students praise her well-organized and well- argued lectures, her enthusiasm for the material and her fairness in grading.

Applegate's energy has taken her beyond the history department. In recent years, she has been director of the Susan B. Anthony Center for Women's Studies, as well as dean for freshmen and dean for sophomores.

Robert Morris, professor of composition and music theory at the Eastman School of Music, will receive the University Graduate Teaching Award. Morris, a 15-year faculty member, ranks among the world's top music theorists. Former pupils, many of whom have modeled their own successful teaching careers after Morris's, praise their mentor for the push he gave them to excel. So engaging are his courses that students are often drawn to audit them even after they have completed their degree requirements.

Frank Wolfs, assistant professor of physics, will receive the G. Graydon '58 and Jane W. Curtis Award, given to recognize nontenured faculty teaching excellence in honor of Professor Ralph Helmkamp.

Wolfs incorporates technology and computers in the classroom for demonstrations and homework assignments. Students say computer visualizations and individualized homework using computers push them to master basic concepts.

A nuclear physicist, Wolfs came to Rochester in 1989 from Argonne National Laboratory, where he was an Enrico Fermi fellow. He now co-coordinates that institution's APEX experiment and is involved in research at other laboratories.

Editors: Applegate and Wolfs live in Rochester, N.Y.

Morris lives in Penfield, N.Y.