NewsWatch: 2009: Teaching Prize

[Narrator:] From the University of California at Davis, this is NewsWatch.

[Paul Pfotenhauer:] As students listened intently to animal science professor Ed DePeters talk about dietary lipids for ruminants — in walked the chancellor with a number of UC Davis campus dignitaries. The reason?

[Chancellor:] Ed DePeters has won the UC Davis prize for scholarly effort and undergraduate instruction.

[Ed DePeters, UC Davis Teaching Prize Winner:] I am so pleased to get an award for something I love to do. So I thank everyone here and I thank the students and all the former students for everything you have done because you have made my life fantastic – thank you.

[Paul Pfotenhauer:] The $40,000 cash prize, created by donors and the UC Davis foundation, was presented along with cake --- and of course milk. DePeters' research, which has been widely applied in the dairy industry, has focused on how the composition of milk can be modified by changes in the cow's diet.

[Paul Pfotenhauer:] The UC Davis Chancellor said one characteristic that stands out is the professor's concern for students.

[Larry Vanderhoef, UC Davis Chancellor:] He really cares about them. They don't feel like a number. He knows all of these people by their first names. He really does care.

[Amber Rosenzweig, Animal Science Major:] This is a class you want to come to every day. It is not a lecture you have to go to. He really goes out of his way to make it interesting. He is always available to students, he's definitely one of the best professors I've ever had.

[Ed DePeters:] My goal is that I want to inspire the students to think broadly and to be imaginative.

[Paul Pfotenhauer:] Paul Pfotenhauer, reporting from UC Davis.

[Narrator:] For more information please log on to broadcast.ucdavis.edu.