The University of the West Indies, Mona Campus held an Awards Ceremony last Friday to recognize outstanding researchers at Mona. Organised by the Office of the Principal, the ceremony served to end the annual Research Day activities on a high note. In the Faculty of Humanities and Education Awards for Best Publications went to Professor Maureen Warner-Lewis of the Department of Literatures in English for her book, Central Africa in the Caribbean: Transcending Time, Transforming Cultures; and to Dr. Swithin Wilmot of the Department of History for his article A Stake in the Soil: Land and Creole Politics in Free Jamaica – the 1849 Elections. The award for Outstanding Researcher went to Professor Maureen Warner-Lewis, while that for Outstanding Research Activity went to Yow, the Edutainment Television 10-part Series for Youth Now produced by Yvette Rowe, Lecturer at the Caribbean Institute of Media and Communication. In the Faculty of Medical Sciences Awards for Best Publication went to Dr. Maria Jackson, Dr. Maureen Samms-Vaughan and collaborator received an award for their paper, Nutritional Status of 11 – 12 year old Jamaican Children: Co-existence of under and over- nutrition, while Dr. Affette McCaw-Binns, Dr. Aileen Standard-Goldson and collaborators received an award for the publication Access to Care & Maternal Mortality in Jamaican Hospitals: 1993 – 1995. Dr. Maolynne Miller and collaborator also received a best publication award for Chronic Renal Failure in Jamaican Children. Awards for Outstanding Researcher in the Faculty went to Dr. Monica Smikle, Department of Microbiology, Dr. Horace Fletcher, Department of Obstetrics, Gynaecology & Child Health and Professor Kathleen Coard, Department of Pathology. The award for the Project Attracting the Most Research Funds was presented to the HTLV-1 Project with Professor Barrie Hanchard as Principal Investigator.
In the Faculty of Social Sciences Best Publication awards went to Professor Alvin Wint for his book Competitiveness in Small Developing Economies: Insights from the Caribbean; to Dr. Damien King and Collaborator for the article, The Welfare effects of Balance of Payments Reform: A Macro-Micro Simulation of the Cost of Rent-seeking; and to Dr. Orville Taylor for the edited collection Re-thinking and Re-searching our Blackness. Awards for Outstanding Researcher or Research Activity were presented to Dr. Anthony Harriott, and Professor Stephen Vasciannie both of the Department of Government. The project recognized for Attracting the Most Research Funds was the UWI/National Housing Trust Census of West Kingston Communities led by Dr. Patricia Anderson, Mr. Roy Russell and Mr. Horace Levy.
In the Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences the Best Publication Award went to Dr. Michael Taylor, Professor A. Anthony Chen & Collaborator for the publication Influence of the Tropical Atlantic Versus the Tropical Pacific on Caribbean Rainfall and to Dr. Willem Mulder and Collaborator for Theory of the Salt Effect on Solvatochromic Shifts and its Potential Application to the Determination of Ground-State and Excited-State Dipole Moments. The Outstanding Researcher/Outstanding Research Activity Award was presented to Professor Tara Dasgupta for his work on Mechanisms Involved in the Generation & Reactions of Nitric Oxide. The award for Research Project Attracting the Most Research Funds was presented to Professor Ishenkumba Kahwa for National Hazardous Materials and Waste Inventory and their Management Policy Options. The Discovery Bay Marine Laboratory Chemical Analytical Facility led by Dr. Anthony Greenaway was recognized as the Most Successfully Commercialized Research Project in that Faculty. The Principal’s Awards for Outstanding Contribution to Public Policy went to Dr. Denise Eldemire-Shearer of the Department of Community Health and Psychiatry and for Outstanding Contribution to Research at the UWI, Mona to Ian Randle Publishers Ltd.