Yale Bulletin &Calendar, March 17, 2000

Professors and former trustee are honored by Phi Beta Kappa 

Two faculty members and a Yale trustee were honored at this year's Phi Beta Kappa dinner. 

The William Clyde DeVane Medal, the oldest and highest award for distinguished scholarship and teaching in Yale College, was presented to William R. Bennett Jr. and Peter Salovey at the Feb. 28 event. Bennett is the C. Baldwin Sawyer Professor Emeritus of Engineering and Applied Science, and Salovey is professor and director of undergraduate studies in psychology, and professor of epidemiology and public health. 

Established in 1966, the medal is named for William Clyde DeVane, who was dean of Yale College from 1938 to 1963, as well as a longtime president of the Yale Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa and former president of the United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa. 

Each year, graduate members of the society vote to present the medal to a retired faculty member, while members of Phi Beta Kappa in the senior class elect an active faculty member to receive the award. Jack Sandweiss, the Donner Professor of Physics, presented the award to Bennett, and Silliman College senior Man Wah So, the undergraduate president of the chapter, awarded the medal to Salovey. 

Bennett is one of the country's leading researchers in the field of lasers and is a specialist in atomic and molecular physics. He co-invented the first gaseous laser and invented the dynamic spectral phonocardiograph, a device that converts the heart's sound waves into computer images. 

Bennett joined the Yale faculty in 1957, briefly leaving to work at Bell Telephone Laboratories 1959 to 1962, and became a full professor in 1964. He served as master of Silliman College 1981 to 1987. His honors include the 1994 Eli Whitney Award from the Connecticut Patent Law Association for being an "outstanding Connecticut inventor.

In presenting the DeVane Medal to Bennett, Sandweiss described Bennett's numerous original contributions to scientific research and scholarship. He highlighted one experiment in particular for its "ingenuity and resourcefulness." When the revolutionary possibility arose that the familiar law of gravity would not hold over short distances, Bennett designed an experiment with canal locks. "The result achieved world-class accuracy," Sandweiss said, "and became one of the defining experiments, which, unfortunately for revolution in science, showed that the good old inverse square law was valid on terrestrial as well as celestial scales.

Sandweiss went on to note Bennett's "skill and devotion to teaching," which was recognized when Bennett was listed as one of the 10 best teachers at Yale 1974 to 1976 in the Yale Student Course Critique. 

Salovey, whose research focuses on the psychological consequences of mood and emotion, earned M.S. (1983), M.Phil. (1984) and Ph.D. (1986) degrees in psychology from Yale. He joined the faculty in 1986 and was promoted to full professor in 1995. The goal of much of his recent research is to investigate the role of persuasion, message framing and social influence in encouraging prevention and early detection behaviors relevant to HIV/AIDS and cancer. He received a National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Award and is a member of the National Institute of Mental Health Behavioral Science Task Force. 

"As a teacher, Professor Salovey inspires in his students the same enthusiasm and dedication to knowledge he possesses," So said in presenting the DeVane Medal. "His 'Introduction to Psychology' course has been offered in 12 of the last 14 years, and has attracted more than 4,000 students in the past decade. The 1992 version of his course, 'Psychology and Law,' had 1,052 students and was the most popular course in Yale College history.

So described Salovey's teaching philosophy of interacting on multiple levels with his students, from serving as chair of the 1996 committee that initiated the teaching fellow training program to improve the overall quality of undergraduate teaching, to playing bass with other faculty members and students in the band Professors of Bluegrass. 


Honorary membership 

In addition to Bennett and Salovey, the Yale chapter of Phi Beta Kappa also honored Richard J. Franke '53, who served on the Yale Corporation for 12 years and was its senior fellow. Franke was elected to honorary alumnus membership for his outstanding contributions to the support of the humanities at Yale and in his hometown of Chicago. He is the founder of the Chicago Humanities Festival which attracts 50,000 visitors annually. 

Frank M. Turner, the John Hay Whitney Professor of History and graduate president of the chapter, was master of ceremonies of the event and John Lewis Gaddis, the Robert A. Lovett Professor of Military and Naval History, was the featured speaker. Rosanna Phelps Warren '76, the Emma MacLachlan Professor in the Humanities at Boston University, recited a poem she composed for the occasion; her poem is the fifth in a series of original poems commissioned by the Yale Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa.