Washington University’s Alumni Association will commemorate the institution’s founding at the annual Founders Day celebration Nov. 7 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel-St. Louis Riverfront.
A hallmark of the event is the presentation of Distinguished Faculty Awards, Distinguished Alumni Awards and the Robert S. Brookings Awards. David McCullough, the acclaimed historian and award-winning author, will deliver the keynote address.
Tickets are available to the WUSTL community and alumni and can be reserved by calling 935-7378.
McCullough, a two-time winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, has many bestsellers to his credit. His most recent book is “1776,” published in 2005.
His body of work covers a variety of subjects and characters, but all contain compelling narratives of American people.
His first book, “The Johnston Flood,” was published in 1968 to critical praise. Other works include “The Great Bridge,” a history of the Brooklyn Bridge; “The Path between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal”; “Mornings on Horseback,” which details the early years of Theodore Roosevelt; “Brave Companions,” essays on extraordinary Americans; and “Truman,” which became an HBO movie. In 2001, he released “John Adams,” which was made into a popular HBO miniseries.
McCullough has appeared in television shows and documentaries, including several by Ken Burns. He hosted PBS’ “American Experience” from 1988-1999.
Among McCullough’s many accolades are more than 40 honorary degrees; the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country’s highest civilian award; the New York Public Library’s Literary Lion Award; membership in the Guggenheim Fellowship and the Academy of Achievement; and the National Endowment for the Humanities Jefferson Lecturer.
His works have been published in 10 languages, and most significantly, all his books are still in print.
Distinguished Faculty Awards
The Distinguished Faculty Awards will be presented to four outstanding faculty members who have demonstrated a strong commitment to the intellectual and personal growth of their students.
They are: Laura Jean Bierut, M.D., professor of psychiatry in the School of Medicine; Michael R. DeBaun, M.D., the Ferring Family Chair in Pediatric Cancer and Related Disorders and professor of pediatrics, of biostatistics and of neurology in the School of Medicine; Elzbieta Sklodowska, Ph.D., the Randolph Family Professor, professor of Spanish and chair of the Department of Romance Languages & Literatures in Arts & Sciences; and Frank Yin, M.D., Ph.D., the Stephen F. and Camilla T. Brauer Distinguished Professor and chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering in the School of Engineering & Applied Science.
Laura Jean Bierut
While a student at the School of Medicine, Bierut was exposed to patients with severe mental illness and became interested in the field of psychiatry. Thus began her tenure as a teacher and researcher devoted to the study of psychiatric illnesses and addiction.
Bierut is among a handful of investigators whose work — studying the interplay of genes and environment in addiction development — is funded through the Genes, Environment and Health Initiative, part of the National Institutes of Health.
After earning a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry and molecular biology from Harvard University, Bierut attended Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, for a year as a Kosciuszko Foundation Cultural Exchange Scholar.
She earned a medical degree from WUSTL in 1987 and then began a residency in psychiatry. A year in Sweden followed as a postdoctoral research fellow. Bierut then joined the University of Washington faculty for two years before returning to Washington University.
Her many professional distinctions include a distinguished teaching award from medical school students and a Certificate of Recognition for Excellence in Medical School Education from the American Psychiatric Association.
She is the author or co-author of more than 120 peer-reviewed publications and book chapters and is sought after as a consultant for other universities. She serves the University as a member of several committees.
Michael R. DeBaun
Since joining WUSTL’s medical faculty in 1996, DeBaun has dedicated his research, teaching and practice to caring for children with sickle cell disease.
As a leading member of a team that established the Silent Cerebral Infarct Transfusion Trial, he helped establish the first international clinical trial in sickle cell disease. He also researches the epidemiology, clinical significance and genetic basis for asthma in children suffering from the disease. In the past 13 years, he has received more than $25 million from the National Institutes of Health to support his research.
DeBaun does not confine his work to just the classroom and laboratory; he has established many community-based programs in St. Louis to spread awareness about the disease and increase the number of African-American blood donors.
DeBaun earned an undergraduate degree in chemistry from Howard University. He received both a medical degree and a master’s degree in health services research from Stanford University Medical School in 1987.
Returning to his hometown, he began a pediatric residency at St. Louis Children’s Hospital and rose to pediatric chief resident and Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Fellow.
In 1993, DeBaun earned another master’s degree, in public health, from Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health; he also completed an epidemiology fellowship at the National Cancer Institute.
Locally, the medical school has honored DeBaun twice with the Pediatrics Clinical Teacher of the Year Award. At the national level, he has received many awards, including the Burroughs Wellcome Translational Research Award and the Doris Duke Clinical Scientist Development Award.
He is the author of 120 scholarly research journals and has been inducted into the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the American Association of Physicians.
Elzbieta Sklodowska
Sklodowska teaches, researches and writes about modern Spanish-American literature with a focus on Cuban culture and literature. As an undergraduate in her native country of Poland, she took a trip to Cuba and now visits there annually to continue her research on contemporary Cuban narratives.
Sklodowska earned a master’s degree in Spanish from the University of Warsaw and then moved to the United States to work on a doctorate, also in Spanish, which she earned from WUSTL in 1983.
Returning to Poland, Sklodowska taught at the University of Warsaw and then moved back to the United States in 1987 as a Mellon Postdoctoral Scholar at the University of Pittsburgh.
She joined the WUSTL faculty as an associate professor in 1991; she became a full professor six years later. As the chair of the Romance languages and literatures department, Sklodowska has demonstrated excellent administrative skills. She also has served on several academic committees and was recently appointed as a Faculty Fellow in the Office of the Provost.
A prolific author, Sklodowska has published seven books, including two edited volumes, and more than 70 scholarly articles and book chapters.
Among her awards are the Mexican literary award “Premio Plural” and the Northeast Modern Language Association’s Foreign Language Book Award.
Her most recent publication is “Espectros y Espejismos: Haiti en el Imaginario Cubano (Specters and Mirages: Haiti in the Cuban Imaginary).” In addition, she serves on the editorial boards of several scholarly journals and is general co-editor of Revista de Estudios Hispanicos.
Frank Yin
Originally from China, Yin came to the United States with his parents in 1948. He attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he earned both a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in aeronautical engineering.
He then went to the University of California, San Diego, where he earned a doctorate in bioengineering as well as a medical degree. Yin’s research spans the fields of biofluid and soft tissue mechanics, applying the concepts of structural analysis to blood vessels, heart muscle and valves, and cells.
After 19 years on the biomedical engineering and medical faculties at Johns Hopkins University, Yin was recruited in 1997 to head WUSTL’s department of biomedical engineering and direct the Institute of Biological and Medical Engineering.
Under his leadership, the fledgling department was awarded $15 million from the Uncas A. Whitaker Foundation to construct a new building and hire new faculty.
Today, the department continues to show dynamic growth, with more than 16 faculty, 100 graduate students and more than 300 undergraduates in teaching and research. The new Stephen F. and Camilla T. Brauer Hall, when completed next year, will adjoin Whitaker Hall on campus and provide room for growth.
Yin’s achievements have been recognized by many professional organizations. He is a founding fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering; a fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME); a member of the National Advisory Council of the National Institute of Biological Imaging and Bioengineering; and a past president of the Biomedical Engineering Society.
Yin is sought after by numerous academic and industrial advisory boards. He currently is editor-in-chief of the ASME Journal of Biomechanical Engineering.
This is the first of a two-part story on Founders Day. The next issue of the Record will profile the recipients of the Distinguished Alumni Awards and the Robert S. Brookings Awards.
For more information about Founders Day, including how members of the WUSTL community can submit nominations for future awards, visit foundersday.wustl.edu.