J. PETER EUBEN, a professor of politics at UCSC, won the Distinguished Teaching Award for 1998. Former students and current colleagues wrote letters to the Alumni Association in support of his award nomination, describing Euben as an enormously popular teacher and a mentor to undergraduate and graduate students alike.

Euben received praise for his energetic, fast-paced, and often uproariously funny lectures, for his commitment to challenging his students intellectually, and for his generosity in teaching, mentoring, and supporting undergrads over more than three decades at UCSC.

One of his former students wrote, "His teaching has inspired so many hundreds of students that UCSC's reputation, I expect, would be poorer without him."

BRENT CONSTANTZ, who won the Alumni Achievement Award for 1998, is the founder and former president and chief executive officer of Norian Corporation, a company that makes a paste that dramatically speeds the healing of broken bones.

Norian SRS could ease pain and cut medical bills for hundreds of thousands of Americans--especially those with age-related fractures of hips, wrists, and other joints. It is already in use for facial and skull fractures in the U.S. and has been approved for use with fractures of the arms, legs, and other bones.

Currently a visiting scholar at Stanford University's biomechanical engineering division, Constantz received a Ph.D in earth sciences from UCSC in 1986. While at UCSC, he conducted research on how corals make their skeletons. That research helped lay the theoretical framework for his company's invention of Norian SRS.

PAM LAWSON, manager for UCSC's Department of Literature, won the Outstanding Staff Award. The staff and faculty colleagues who wrote letters supporting her nomination praised her leadership abilities; her dedication and commitment to students, faculty, staff, and the university's mission; her good humor; her productivity; and her tact.

Lawson came to UCSC in 1973 and worked in the steno pools for Cowell and Stevenson Colleges before joining the Department of History in 1977. Seventeen years later, she joined the Executive Vice Chancellor's Office, and moved to her current job with the Department of Literature in 1995.

Recommending Lawson for the award, a UCSC professor wrote: "Pam is one of those delightful people who seem naturally to have their sights on the right target, who have a sense of proportion about what is going on around them, who are able to treat others with effortless decency, and who approach the tasks of the day with a positive desire to make things better and yet the capacity to remain exuberantly cheerful when less than desired is achieved."