Pitt Chronicle

Chancellor Mark A. Nordenberg has named the winners of the 2008 Chancellor’s Awards for Staff Excellence in service to the community and to the University.

Each awardee will receive a $2,500 cash prize and will be recognized during Pitt’s 32nd annual Honors Convocation on Fri., Feb. 29. Their names will also be inscribed on plaques to be displayed in the William Pitt Union.

An estimated 1,100 people gathered at Soldiers and Sailors Military Museum and Memorial on Feb. 1 to pay tribute to the remarkable history of the Tuskegee Airmen, who were America’s first Black military flyers. They provided tenacious and ferocious escort cover to American bomber planes, helping the United States win World War II. After fighting for their country, they fought segregation and discrimination upon their return home.

The University of Pittsburgh received a $1 million grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation to develop a groundbreaking method that will significantly advance nanoscale science and technology by allowing scientists to observe, probe, and control molecules.

When Canard Grigsby crisscrosses Pitt’s 132-acre campus on any given day, he doesn’t necessarily see the bricks and mortar of the buildings’ facades. Instead, he may be remembering the negotiating sessions that took place to keep the building’s construction cost within budget. Or the planning involved in the creation of a glass door transom that bears the signature of an esteemed Pitt alumnus.