Professor Reginald Golledge was recently selected as one of two 2005-06 Outstanding Graduate Mentors by the Academic Senate. The newly initiated UCSB Outstanding Graduate Mentor Award recognizes the contributions of up to three Senate or non-Senate faculty members each year whose mentoring is considered exemplary. The award program was initiated to encourage and reward excellence in mentoring, and its selection criteria include setting professional standards for graduate students, assisting them in obtaining financial support, encouraging the recruitment of underrepresented students, stimulating intellectual growth and critical thinking, promoting participation in professional conferences and the preparation of quality publications, and offering career guidance. The formal award ceremony took place during the Faculty Legislature meeting on March 9, 2006, with Professor Stuart Sweeney making the presentations.
Grad students Sarah Battersby, Meri Marsh, and Matt Rice initiated Reg’s nomination. Nine of Reg’s current and former PhD students and several more of his Masters students contributed letters of support for the nomination. The letters all reflected Reg’s desire for his students to succeed both academically and personally. One of his former students, Mei Po Kwan (PhD, 1994), now a Distinguished Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Joan F. Huber Fellow, and Chair of Graduate Studies at Ohio State, writes that “he is one of the best mentors one can ever find,” and that she “attributes her current success to his patience, care, and helpful advice.”
Scott Bell (PhD, 2000) summed up Reg’s contribution well when he wrote that “the work Reg has done as a graduate supervisor has made the University a better place, his department a stronger unit, and geography a richer discipline.”
