First recipients of Don G. Creamer Research Award named

Three graduate students in the Higher Education Program have been honored as the first recipients of the Don G. Creamer Research Awards.

The Don G. Creamer Fund for Excellence was created in 2005 upon Creamer's retirement to honor his 28-year career as a professor of higher education in the School of Education in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences at Virginia Tech. The award will be presented annually to graduate students in the Higher Education Program to acknowledge and support outstanding graduate research projects.

This year's award recipients are:

==> Beth Anne Zoe Zielinski of Fort Wayne, Ind., for her project; Length of Study Abroad on Level of Cross-Cultural Adaptability

==> Kristin Albright of York, Penn., for her project; Academic and Social Integration

==> Sharrika Davis of Blacksburg, Va., for her project; Women's Expectations to Enroll in Graduate Study

The Creamer Fund was made possible by alumni, friends, and colleagues of Creamer to support the Higher Education Program which he helped to create. The fund also supports research on contemporary issues in higher education including research on standards created by the Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education, and students and faculty members in the Higher Education Program at Virginia Tech. The selection committee included Creamer, Diana Ridgwell, director of student services for the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, and Ellen Plummer, chair of the committee and director of the Women's Center at Virginia Tech.

During his distinguished career, Creamer taught and mentored hundreds of students who have gone on to make contributions to higher education in their roles as college presidents, vice presidents of student affairs, deans of students, and government officials. He also served as the president of the Council on the Advancement of Standards, president of the American College Personnel Association (ACPA), and president of the board of trustees for the Educational Foundation of the ACPA.

Creamer has been the recipient of numerous professional awards, including the 2004 ACPA Lifetime Achievement Award, the 2000 ACPA Esther Lloyd-Jones Professional Service Award, and the 1998 National Association of Student Personnel Administrators Robert H. Shaffer Award for Academic Excellence as a Graduate Faculty Member. Creamer, who resides in Blacksburg, Va., received his doctorate degree from Indiana University, his master's and bachelor's degrees from East Texas State University.

Founded in 1872 as a land-grant college, Virginia Tech is the most comprehensive university in the Commonwealth of Virginia and is among the top research universities in the nation. Today, Virginia Tech's eight colleges are dedicated to quality, innovation, and results through teaching, research, and outreach activities. At its 2,600-acre main campus located in Blacksburg and other campus centers in Northern Virginia, Southwest Virginia, Hampton Roads, Richmond, and Roanoke, Virginia Tech enrolls more than 28,000 undergraduate and graduate students from all 50 states and more than 100 countries in 180 academic degree programs.