(Posted May 1, 2001)

HUNTINGDON, Pa. -- Three Juniata College faculty members were honored Tuesday with distinguished teaching awards during the college's Spring Awards Convocation in Oller Hall. Honored for their work at the college were Dr. Klaus P. Kipphan, Charles A. Dana supported professor of history; Dr. I. David Reingold, professor of chemistry; and Dr. Belle S. Tuten, assistant professor of history.

Dr. Kipphan was honored with the thirty-fourth annual Beachley Award for Distinguished Teaching, while Dr. Reingold was named the recipient of the thirteenth annual Beachley Award for Distinguished Academic Service. Dr. Tuten received the Beachley Award for Distinguished Performance by a faculty member with fewer than six years of service.

The Beachley Awards were established by the late Donovan R. Beachley, Sr., a graduate of Juniata in 1921 and an emeritus member of the Board of Trustees; the late Mrs. Grace Rinehart Beachley; Donovan R. Beachley, Jr., a member of the class of 1947 and an emeritus member of the Board of Trustees; and Mrs. Mary Ellen Beachley, all of Hagerstown, Md. Support for the award for distinguished performance was approved by Donovan R. Beachley, Jr. and David C. Beachley, a 1977 Juniata graduate and current president of the Beachley Furniture Company of Hagerstown, Md.

The Beachley Award for Distinguished Teaching provides a $2,500 stipend to a professor who contributes to the development of the nominee's department and the college as a whole. Teaching effectiveness, scholarly activities, service beyond the campus, and length of service to the college are also important factors.

The Beachley Award for Distinguished Academic Service also provides a $2,500 stipend. The award is made to a professor showing outstanding service to students through advising, counseling or development of student-related activities, and outstanding service to the college through curriculum or department development, committee activities, or college wide activities.
The Beachley Award for Distinguished Performance recognizes excellence in teaching among faculty members who have been at Juniata College for fewer than six years. The recipient receives with the honor a $1,500 stipend.

Nominations for the awards are received from students, faculty, administrative personnel, alumni and trustees. The college president, the provost, the student government president, and the three most recent recipients of the award make the final selections.

The last three Distinguished Teaching Award recipients were Patricia C. Weaver, professor of economics and business administration [2000], Janet R. Lewis, associate professor of philosophy [1999]; and Elizabeth A. Cherry, professor of history (1998). The first academic service award was presented in 1989 to Mary Ruth Linton, professor of music emeritus. Last year's recipient was Dr. Dr. Douglas S. Glazier, professor of biology. The recipient of the 2000 Beachley Award for Distinguished Performance was Dr. Emil Nagengast, assistant professor of political science.

In introducing Dr. Kipphan, Juniata president Thomas R. Kepple noted, "The year 2001 recipient of the Beachley Award for Distinguished Teaching began his illustrious career at Juniata in 1965. He received his undergraduate education at Gymnasium Eberbach in Germany. He received his master of arts degree cum laude from Fairleigh Dickinson University in 1965 and his doctorate, also cum laude, from the University of Heidelberg in 1969."

A leading German scholar with early career interest in the study of German propaganda, Dr. Kipphan has, in recent years, developed what has been termed "a fatal infatuation with India." He coordinated for almost a decade "The Heart of India," a general education course on Indian culture. This year he taught, "The Holocaust," "Culture of India," "The Fascist Era," and "Erotic – Ascetic: The Culture of India."

In 1991 he was named a Charles A. Dana Supported Professor.

No stranger to this award, this year’s recipient received the seventh annual Beachley Distinguished Professor Award in 1974. In introducing the recipient, then president John Stauffer noted, "Dr. Kipphan has the unquestioned distinction of being a sound and productive scholar. At the same time, he receives the respect and gratitude of his students for being an unusually productive teacher. He is truly a teacher/scholar in the best sense of that coveted title; he makes that binary concept a unitary reality by the way in which he lives and works on this campus."

"Twenty seven years later," noted Dr. Kepple, "Dr. Kipphan remains a valuable and much loved teacher/scholar."

The year 2001 recipient of the Beachley Award for Distinguished Academic Service, Dr. I. David Reingold, came to Juniata in 1988 with a doctoral degree from the University of Oregon; an A.B. from Dartmouth College; additional research experience at the University of Alberta, Canada, and the University of Chicago; as well as more than ten years of college teaching experience.
He was awarded Juniata's Lindback Foundation award for distinguished teaching in 1992.

Dr. Reingold’s special interests include synthetic organic chemistry and molecules of theoretical concern. He has received grants totaling more than half a million dollars from the National Science Foundation, the Petroleum Research Fund, the Research Corporation, and the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation to support his research in the synthesis of non-natural products. He is author of numerous articles in such publications as the Journal of the American Chemical Society, the Journal of Organic Chemistry, Tetrahedron Letters, Synthetic Communications, and the Journal of Chemical Education. Many of these papers had undergraduate students as co-authors. This year, Dr. Reingold will publish a new chemistry text titled, "An Organic Chemistry Text for First Year Students."

Dr. Reingold is an active member of the American Chemical Society and the Council of Undergraduate Research. He is a proposal reviewer for the National Science Foundation and the Petroleum Research Fund, and an article reviewer for the Journal of Organic Chemistry and The Chemical Educator, an on-line journal.

This year’s recipient of the Beachley Award for Distinguished Performance, Dr. Belle S. Tuten, came to Juniata in 1997 as an assistant professor of history. Her main interests are in medieval culture and history and early modern social history, with a concentration in the history of women and family. She earned her masters degree in 1994 and her doctorate in 1997 from Emory University. She completed her bachelors degree in 1991 from the College of Charleston, in South Carolina. In addition to specialties in European history, this year’s recipient has pursued study in the history of Islam and Arab-European relations in the Middle Ages.

According to Dr. Kepple, "Dr. Tuten has been a tireless advocate for students. From taking on advising responsibilities her first year, to breathing new life into the student history club, Skulldiggers, she has become an integral part of the Juniata family. Her contributions to faculty committees, her understanding of Juniata’s past, her vitality, her warmth and her wit make her an outstanding candidate for this year’s award."

Over 700 people attended the Spring Awards Convocation.

Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.