Three Boise State Faculty Named 2017 Foundation Scholars

Don Warner, Lisa Brady and Rick Ubic have been selected as 2017 Boise State University Foundation Scholars. They will be recognized at the Foundation’s annual board meeting on April 26.

The prestigious Foundation Scholar Awards honor Boise State faculty who have demonstrated ongoing commitment, expertise and accomplishments in teaching, research and creative activity, or professionally related service.

The award includes a $3,000 honorarium from the Foundation for each scholar. In addition, their names will be added to the display showing all recipients of the Foundation Scholar Awards since 1992. The display is located on the first floor of the Student Union Building near the main staircase.

Don Warner: Teaching Award

Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry

Warner was lauded as such an effective educator and “students feel compelled to actively search for ways to recognize his teaching abilities.” He has been nominated for, or received, an award for teaching in nine of the last 15 years. His traditional teaching methods such as lectures are augmented with active learning techniques that help students view difficult chemistry subjects as “fun puzzles” rather than a series of facts. He also has taken on the roles of Boise State Teaching Scholar, STEM Education Research Scholar and Mobile Learning Scholar. Warner has employed more than 90 students in his lab, guided the individual research projects of more than two dozen students and helped develop the Idaho Conference for Undergraduate Research as part of the Research Experiences for Undergraduates program. Through his participation in Project SEED, he helps low-income high school students get paid summer research positions. As one nominator put it: “He provides every opportunity for students to succeed and they rise to the occasion. There is no question the subjects Don teaches are difficult, but he presents them in ways that enable hardworking students to succeed.”

Lisa Brady: Service Award

Department of History

Brady’s field of environmental history was noted for its relevance to our current social and political climate. She was integral to the creation of the environmental history program at Boise State, having taught unpaid, overload courses in order to garner support for the program and has devoted herself to the university-wide Environmental Studies Program. In addition to her work on committees, leadership and administrative service at all levels, she has supervised numerous graduate committees, mentored McNair Scholars, advised honor societies, curated library exhibits and led field trips. Among her extensive community service, she has held leadership roles with the Idaho Humanities Council and helped establish the position of City Historian for the City of Boise. She also has devoted several years to editing Environmental History, the premier scholarly journal in her field.

Rick Ubic: Research and Creative Activity

Micron School of Materials Science and Engineering

Upon his arrival at Boise State in 2007, Ubic formed the Functional Ceramics Group to study structure-property relationships in functional ceramics, serving both undergraduate and graduate students. He serves as the director of the Boise State Center for Materials Characterization, as well as director of the NSF-funded Research Experiences for Undergraduates site in materials for energy and sustainability. He is known for his work on the structural evolution of nuclear graphite and recently has developed an empirical model that predicts structure and unit volume of perovskite ceramics. He has published 61 refereed journal articles and 24 conference proceedings, and given 24 invited presentations at international forums in 11 countries. In addition, he has received $4.3 million in external research funding. Ubic serves as secretary of the Electronics Division of the American Ceramic Society and is editor in chief of the Materials Research Bulletin.