FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Four professors from the U of A's Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences were recently selected winners of college-level awards at the annual University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture Awards Luncheon.

Kris Brye, Lanier Nalley, Larry Purcell and Jill Rucker were presented awards at the Don Tyson Center for Agricultural Sciences on Jan. 12.

Brye, professor of applied soil physics and pedology in the Department of Crop, Soil, and Environmental Sciences, won the Bumpers College Alumni Society Outstanding Advising Award.

Nalley, associate professor of agricultural business in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, won the Jack G. Justus Award for Teaching Excellence.

Purcell, Distinguished Professor of crop physiology and holder of the Altheimer Chair for Soybean Research in the Department of Crop, Soil, and Environmental Sciences, won the Spitze Land Grant University Faculty Award for Excellence.

Rucker, assistant professor of agricultural communications in the Department of Agricultural Education, Communications and Technology, won the John W. White Outstanding Teaching Award.

Kris Brye

Brye, a CSES faculty member since 2001, has worked with students from multiple departments on the U of A soil judging team for the last 16 years. His teams have won regional competition three of the last five years and earned a spot in the national competition eight straight years. He has hosted regional competition for more than 40 undergraduates in the region twice in the last 10 years.

Brye also provides leadership and undergraduate advisement for the CSES internship program and mentors students through completion of internships. Two honors program students who have graduated received Student Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) and Bumpers College grants, and National Science Foundation (NSF) fellowships to pursue doctoral degrees along with publishing their honors research in peer-reviewed journals. He has mentored four non-honors students in research projects, with all four appearing in Discovery Journal, and has served on five Bumpers College and one Fulbright Honors student committees with all six graduating.

In summer 2016, he also hosted two exchange undergraduates from the Scottish Rural College for nearly three months as they conducted research for honors projects.

Lanier Nalley

Nalley makes a point to get to know his students, and examples and lessons in class are based on student goals, needs and aspirations. He has been recognized for his teaching with induction into the U of A Teaching Academy in 2015, the 2017 Outstanding Teaching of a Course award (for AGEC 4163) by the Southern Agricultural Economics Association and the U of A Agribusiness Club Excellence in Teaching award in 2009 and 2010. Nalley has received average teaching evaluations of 4.78 and 4.81 for his undergraduate and graduate courses, respectively, and graduate students often refer to his graduate course as the best in their M.S. program.

Nalley helped create the Mozambique study abroad program, which continues to grow and was featured in a U of A Short Takes video. Based on success of that program, he and professor Amy Farmer in the Economics Department have created a minor in international development.

Winner of the 2013 Bumpers College International Education Award, Nalley has directed 10 master's theses, one doctoral dissertation and secured research opportunities in nine countries for students under his guidance.

Larry Purcell

A CSES faculty member since 1993, Purcell has graduated 15 students from his lab, mentored six post-doctoral associates, 10 visiting scholars and three undergraduates working on research. He has served on 40 master's and 24 doctoral graduate student advisory committees.

As a researcher, he has bridged the gap between crop breeders, plant biochemists, plant physiologists and field-oriented agronomists. An expert on the response of soybean to drought, particularly the response of nitrogen fixation, he has been among the first to identify germplasm and molecular markers associated with prolonged nitrogen fixation, delayed wilting and water use efficiency. His research has been documented with 106 peer-reviewed manuscripts (five more in review), three patents, 20 book chapters and more than 150 abstracts.

Purcell has served for 16 years on both the CSES promotion and tenure, and curriculum committees; and as co-chair of the Arkansas Soybean Promotion Board Review and Funding committee for the last nine years. A member of the Advisory Committee for the 2017 World Soybean Research Conference, he has also served on the USDA Soybean Germplasm Committee, was elected to the board of directors of the Crop Science Society of America, and been an editor of Crop Science and Plant Production Science.

Jill Rucker

Rucker created the new 15-hour agricultural leadership minor/concentration, which enrolled 28 students from multiple disciplines and colleges during the fall semester. She has created three new courses, redesigned the curriculum for three others and worked with the Global Campus to offer three courses through the AG*IDEA consortium.

Named U of A Outstanding Faculty member by the Associated Student Government in 2016, she has been part of a multi-institutional team receiving a USDA Higher Education Challenge Grant to develop 16 leadership curriculum supplements in National Institute of Food and Agriculture priority areas.

She has earned Quality Matters, Birkman Leadership Assessment Facilitator, Merit Profile Facilitator and True Colors Facilitator certification, and attended 14 teaching and advising improvement workshops, training sessions and webinars.

Rucker has attended, presented and mentored 37 undergraduates and four graduate students at 16 national conferences. In addition, she serves as advisor to Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow, Alpha Delta Pi Sorority and Sigma Alpha. Rucker also serves on the college's scholarship committee, the U of A's Academic Advising Committee and is a U of A First Generation Student Faculty member.

About the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences: Bumpers College provides life-changing opportunities to position and prepare graduates who will be leaders in the businesses associated with foods, family, the environment, agriculture, sustainability and human quality of life; and who will be first-choice candidates of employers looking for leaders, innovators, policy makers and entrepreneurs. The college is named for Dale Bumpers, former Arkansas governor and longtime U.S. senator who made the state prominent in national and international agriculture.

About the University of Arkansas: The University of Arkansas provides an internationally competitive education for undergraduate and graduate students in more than 200 academic programs. The university contributes new knowledge, economic development, basic and applied research, and creative activity while also providing service to academic and professional disciplines. The Carnegie Foundation classifies the University of Arkansas among only 2 percent of universities in America that have the highest level of research activity. U.S. News & World Report ranks the University of Arkansas among its top American public research universities. Founded in 1871, the University of Arkansas comprises 10 colleges and schools and maintains a low student-to-faculty ratio that promotes personal attention and close mentoring.