For release: Oct. 2, 2012
News and Media
Relations contact: Randy Weiler, 615-898-5616 or Randy.Weiler@mtsu.edu
Rhonda King (Homecoming 2012), 615-898-8198 or Rhonda.King@mtsu.edu
MURFREESBORO — Numerous
MTSU alumni bring the university prestige and recognition through their
groundbreaking efforts and faithful support.
From 1960 to present, MTSU’s Alumni Association has
recognized accomplished alumni with the association’s highest honor: the
respective Distinguished Alumni and Young Alumni Achievement awards.
This year is no different. The 2012-13 recipients, who will
be recognized during this weekend’s homecoming ceremonies and the spring
commencement in 2013, include:
• The late Dr. Larry Needham (class of 1968), of Lilburn,
Ga., a renowned chemist who spent 34 years working for the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention in Atlanta, who will be receiving the Distinguished
Alumni Award for Professional Achievement posthumously;
• Maria Salas (’85), of Nashville, a former MTSU Lady Raider
basketball player who owns her own bankruptcy law firm, who will receive the
Distinguished Alumni Award for Service to Community; and
• Deanna Meador
(’04), of Gallatin, Tenn., a noted research coordinator who has developed a
money-saving, paperless data collection system at Vanderbilt’s Peabody Research
Institute, who will be receiving the Young Alumni Achievement Award.
In the selection process, an anonymous committee reviews the
nominees, and then a final slate is recommended to the Alumni Association Board
of Directors to be voted on, said Michelle Stepp, Alumni Relations associate
director.
Salas,
Meador and Needham’s wife, Doris, are scheduled to ride in the Homecoming
Parade that begins at 10 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 6. All will be honored during
halftime of the Blue Raiders’ Sun Belt Conference game against visiting
Louisiana-Monroe, which has a 2:30 p.m. kickoff in Floyd Stadium.
Dr. Larry Needham, Distinguished Alumni Award for
Professional Achievement
Needham, who died in October 2010, earned his bachelor’s
degree in chemistry. He served as chief of the Organic Analytical Toxicology
Branch of the CDC, making peoples’ lives safer. He devoted much of his time to
the development of methods for assessing human exposure to a variety of
environmental toxicants and was considered to be one of the preeminent human
exposure assessment experts in the field.
Needham’s two most prominent works were demonstrating that
leaded gasoline was a major contributor to blood lead, which prompted the
Environmental Protection Agency to remove lead from gasoline and also he
produced data that prompted the Food and Drug Administration to remove the
reproductive toxicant bisphenol A, or BPA, from food-packaging containers, baby
pacifiers and bottles. In his career, he produced more than 350 peer review
publications and made more than 200 presentations internationally.
Maria Salas,
Distinguished Alumni Award for Service to Community
In addition to owning her own law firm, Salas, who graduated
with a bachelor’s in public relations from the College of Mass Communication,
devotes a large part of her time to community service. She has been a
practicing attorney for 20 years and, since 1995, her practice almost has
exclusively been representing debtors in Chapter 7 and Chapter 13 bankruptcy
cases. She frequently speaks to professional and community organizations on
consumer bankruptcy issues.
Salas has served or is currently serving on the board of
directors of Nashville Cares, Human Rights Campaign, Nashville Bar Association,
a founding member of the Stonewall Bar Association, Mid-South Commercial Law
Institute and the Tennessee Lawyer’s Association for Women. She is a recipient
of many volunteer awards, being named “Best of the Bar” by the Nashville
Business Journal and is an alumnus of Leadership Nashville. She has a daughter,
Owen, 7.
Deanna Meador, Young
Alumni Achievement Award
Meador, who graduated with a bachelor’s in interdisciplinary
studies has been in the midst of coordinating two, multimillion dollar,
grant-funded research projects at her work, focusing on self-regulation in
children. One of her most recent accomplishments was developing a paperless
data collection system that, on one research project alone, has saved more than
68,000 pieces of paper, months of data entry and thousands of dollars. The
system is being piloted by Peabody Research Institute and she presented it to
representatives of the Institute of Education Services.
Meador, a first-generation college student in her family,
grew up in Lafayette, Tenn., in Macon County. She and her husband, Jason, have
two children, Logan, 10, and Hayden, 3. During the past four years, Deanna
Meador has volunteered with children in foster care in Tennessee.
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The Carnegie Foundation for
the Advancement of Teaching has recognized MTSU for its outstanding curricular
engagement, community outreach and partnerships. As MTSU continues its
second century of service, Pride, Tradition and Excellence remain the
cornerstones of "Tennessee’s Best"! For MTSU news and information any
time, visit www.mtsunews.com.
For
MTSU news and information any time, visit www.mtsunews.com.
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