News of Note From Pitt: News, Awards, and Developments at the University of Pittsburgh

PITTSBURGH—Behind the larger stories about the University of Pittsburgh are other stories of faculty, staff, and student achievement as well as information on Pitt programs reaching new levels of success. The following is a compilation of some of those stories.

Pitt Anthropology Lecturer Kathleen Allen Receives the 2012 Ampco-Pittsburgh Prize for Excellence in Advising 

Allen, director of the undergraduate anthropology program in the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of Anthropology, is the recipient of the 2012 Ampco-Pittsburgh Prize for Excellence in Advising from Pitt’s Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences.  

The award—a $4,000 cash prize established five years ago by the Ampco-Pittsburgh Corporation—honors outstanding faculty achievement in undergraduate advising and recognizes the many contributions advisors make to help students maximize their educational experiences. 

The letter announcing the recipient of the award stated: “For almost 20 years, Allen’s extraordinary energy, passion, and dedication to higher education have greatly influenced the academic excellence of her students. Many students she has worked closely with have received prestigious undergraduate research awards through Pitt and have gone on to graduate school with funding.” 

Through advising procedures she established, Allen was able to significantly increase the number of majors, particularly in the honors program, resulting in improvements in and expansion of the curriculum. In addition, through her development of an advising model for the department, undergraduates have been able to more easily connect with faculty members active in research and teaching, allowing these students to better structure their coursework, fieldwork schools, study-aboard opportunities, internships, direct research experience, and independent study. 

Allen’s commitment to undergraduate student success extends to her involvement as faculty advisor for Pitt’s Anthropology Club; Lambda Alpha, the Pitt chapter of the anthropology honor society; and the anthropology newsletter Panthropology. 

Allen earned her BA, MA, and PhD degrees from the University at Buffalo, State University of New York. She has published in national peer-reviewed journals and has presented more than 50 papers on her areas of interest—Native American tribal societies, household archaeology, gender and identity, regional settlement patterns, and contact studies exploring the interface between anthropology, history, ethnohistory, and archaeology. 

The Ampco-Pittsburgh Prize for Excellence in Advising is given annually to a full-time faculty member who has served as a department advisor on the Pittsburgh campus for at least three years. 

Additional information about the Ampco-Pittsburgh Prize can be found at www.as.pitt.edu/teaching/ampco-pittsburgh-prize.

Pitt Law Student Selected a David A. Winston Health Policy Fellow

Yajuan Lu, a JD candidate studying health law and policy in Pitt’s School of Law, has received a David A. Winston Health Policy Fellowship. Lu, one of only three fellows selected nationally, will spend 12 to 16 months in Washington, D.C., learning about the political system through direct experience with both public and private sectors in health policy development.

The fellowship also provides a unique postgraduate opportunity by affording recipients with direct access to members of the David A. Winston Health Policy Board of Trustees, which comprises key health care policymakers. Past Winston Fellows have gone on to successful positions at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Senate Budget Committee, health care organizations, and law partnerships specializing in health care policy.

As a second-year law student at Pitt, Lu has served as the president of the Pitt Health Law Society. In 2010, she received Pitt’s Center for Global Health Travel Scholarship for her research proposal on migrant workers’ health care-seeking behaviors. She also received a Pitt Law Alumni Association Scholarship. Lu’s law school internships include the Corporate Legal Department of UPMC and Pan American Health Organization. 

A graduate of Peking University in Beijing where she studied medicine and English, Lu expects to graduate from Pitt law school in May.

For more information about the David A. Winston Health Policy Fellowship, visit www.winstonfellowship.com.

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