36, no. 3 (Spring 2005): 4-4
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ADFL Update
Michael Katz to Receive ADFL Award
The eleventh ADFL Award for Distinguished Service in the Profession will be presented to Michael Katz, the C. V. Starr Professor of Russian and Dean Emeritus of the Language Schools and Schools Abroad at Middlebury College. The award honors eminent scholar-teachers for exceptional contributions to the field of foreign languages and literatures at the postsecondary level, and Michael Katz has illustrated, as few can, extraordinary dedication coupled with outstanding accomplishments to the field of foreign languages. A gifted administrator, when he was chair of the Department of Slavic Languages and director of the Title VI Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies at the University of Texas, Austin, Michael Katz instituted a PhD program in Slavic, established a tenure-track position and a doctoral track in the area of Russian language acquisition, and was instrumental in securing an endowed chair in Czech. He secured funding from the NEH to take twenty-six Texas high school teachers of Russian to Moscow for language and pedagogy training over the course of three years. His extraordinary administrative skills led him to create a new language school in Portuguese at Middlebury College, expand the Arabic School, and open the Language Schools to researchers in second language acquisition. He is recognized for having strengthened Middlebury’s agreement with historically black colleges and universities that send students to participate in the programs of the Middlebury Language Schools. During his tenure as dean at Middlebury, Katz provided critical support for a statistical analysis of learning outcomes in the Language Schools, a study of pragmatics in Spanish in the context of oral proficiency assessment, and the development of an adaptive computer-based Chinese reading test and proficiency-based tests in all four skills and grammar for Russian. He has served as president of the American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European languages and been on the board of the American Council of Teachers of Russian. He has been on the Executive Committee of the ADFL, the MLA Editorial Board for the Texts and Translations series, and the planning committee for the MLA–NYU conference on The Relation between English and Foreign Languages in the Academy. He has taught all levels of Russian and, in 1990, was named teacher of the year by the Texas Language Teacher’s Association. Former students praise his dedication and generosity both in and outside the classroom. He has encouraged Russian studies in yet other ways by making ten major texts in Russian available to English speakers in translation, offering scholarly commentary on nineteenth-century Russian fiction, and editing Tolstoy’s short fiction for the Norton Critical Edition series.
The colleagues who nominated Michael Katz for the ADFL Award for Distinguished Service in the Profession write uniformly of him with personal warmth that transcends professional admiration. It is notable that his nominators do not only come from Slavic languages: they are also professors of German, Portuguese, and Spanish. One writes, “Whether he is teaching Russian literature, conducting a seminar for K–12 teachers, or sitting on the floor with local kindergarten kids, Michael Katz’s enthusiasm and energy are contagious.” And a colleague at Middlebury concludes, “It can be said that the best dean is one who listens, understands, and then gets out of the way to let the faculty members do what they do best. Michael Katz has been an exceptional dean who listens, understands, asks critical questions, helps faculty members reformulate their ideas, and then supports them in ambitious projects. . . . Michael’s impact has been remarkable: he is a force in the foreign language field.”
ADFL welcomes nominations for this award. Criteria specify that the award is given for outstanding service to the profession in the larger community, not fame from publication. Anyone wishing to nominate a candidate should write a letter of no more than two typed pages, gather three supporting letters, and forward these materials, together with the nominee’s vita, to Nelly Furman, Director, ADFL, 26 Broadway, 3rd floor, New York, NY 10004-1789 (adfl@mla.org). The ADFL Executive Committee acts on nominations at its spring meetings and confers the award only in years when a particularly outstanding candidate is nominated.
© 2005 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
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