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Promoting Academic Excellence at UNL

Faculty Awards and Honors Othmer Chairs

In 1998, the University of Nebraska accepted a gift of $136.5 million from the estate of alumna Mildred Topp Othmer. Her late husband, Donald, also an NU alumnus, was a renowned engineering professor who spent the bulk of his career at Polytechnic Institute of New York. Some $12 million of the gift was pledged toward matching funds to create up to 24 new $1 million endowed chairs. Faculty filling these chairs are senior faculty recruited through nationally competitive searches.

  • Luchezar Avramov, Dale M. Jensen Chair of Mathematics
  • Mary Uhl-Bien, Howard Hawks Chair in Business Ethics and Leadership
  • Thomas Borstelmann, Elwood N. and Katherine Thompson Professor of World History
  • Christopher Fielding, Mr. and Mrs. J.B. Coffman Chair of Geosciences
  • Janet Harkness, Donald and Shirley Clifton Chair of Survey Science
  • David Henderson, Robert R. Chambers Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and the Moral Sciences
  • Michael James, Ardis James Professor of Textiles, Clothing & Design
  • Sally Mackenzie, Ralph and Alice Raikes Chair of Plant Sciences
  • David Olson, James and H.K. Stuart Chancellor's Distinguished Chair
  • Kenneth Price, Hillegass Professor of 19th Century American Literature
  • Larry Rilett, Keith W. Klaasmeyer Chair in Engineering and Technology
  • Gregory Rothermel, Dale M. Jensen Chair of Computer Science
  • David Sobel, Robert R. Chambers Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and the Moral Sciences
  • William G. Thomas III, John and Catherine Angle Chair in the Humanities and Professor of History
  • Donald Umstadter, Leland J. and Dorothy H. Olson Chair in Atomic, Molecular, & Optical Physics
  • William Velander, D.R. Voelte and N.A. Keegan Chair in Engineering
  • Leslie Whitbeck, John G. Bruhn Professor of Sociology

 

This page was last updated 10/8/09.