Library Staff Member and Historian Receives Prestigious MAGS Award

Tom Reich's 2003 graduate thesis about UWSP’s role in advising the South Vietnamese government on education,  Higher education in Vietnam : United States Agency for International Development Contract in Education, has been named as the Midwestern Association of Graduate Schools (MAGS) 2004 Distinguished Thesis Award! He will receive the UMI/MAGS ParamGun Sood (translated this means "supreme goodness" or "excellence") Thesis Award for 2004, and a $500 honorarium at the MAGS Annual Meeting, April 13-16 in St. Louis.  The other winners this year are Laurel Griggs from Washington University in St. Louis, and Karen Laird of the University of Missouri-Columbus.  The criteria for the award is for those receiving their Master’s during the previous academic year, and Tom received his MST-History in May of 2003.  This marks the first time a UWSP graduate student has received the award.

Tom's quality work is no stranger to recognition.  He is a recipient of the Chancellor's Leadership Award (2003) and, while working as Graduate Assistant in the History Department, the Graduate Council's Award for "Outstanding Research Assistant."  In 2003, the Awards Committee of the UWSP Graduate Council selected his thesis to be UWSP's nomination for the Midwestern Association of Graduate Schools (MAGS) 2004 Distinguished Thesis Award, and it was also chosen as the UWSP 2003 Distinguished Master's Thesis!  Congratulations are also due to UWSP's History Department and his thesis committee:  Bill Skelton, Neil Lewis, and Hugh Walker.  Bill Skelton, Tom's Advisor, will accompany him to the awards ceremony in St. Louis.

Tom is a Library Services Assistant Advanced in Government Documents, and has served actively in the Library, the community and at UWSP.   In addition to his service as graduate assistant for the History Department, he has been co-coordinator of the Central Region competition for National History Day in Wisconsin for five years, and during one year served as both state and regional coordinator.  The event is sponsored by the College of Letters and Science, the Department of History, the University Library, the Offices of Chancellor and Vice Chancellor, and the Wisconsin Historical Society.  The state history event, held in conjunction with National History Day, is a competition open to all Wisconsin students in grades 6-12. National History Day numbers over 400,000 participants from most of the 50 states, including Wisconsin.

The University and the Library extend a hearty congratulations to Tom!