Herb Terry receives IU Bloomington Distinguished Service Award
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Herb Terry, professor emeritus of telecommunications, has been awarded the Indiana University Bloomington Distinguished Service Award for the 2014-15 academic year. Terry retired in 2012 but was elected president of the Bloomington Faculty Council for 2013-14.
First awarded in 1986, the Distinguished Service Award recognizes faculty leadership and dedication within the university, a discipline, and/or the community. Recipients are selected by a faculty committee under the auspices of the Office of the Vice Provost for Faculty and Academic Affairs.
"Herb Terry has been the face, the voice and the heart of faculty governance at IU Bloomington for decades,” said Tom Gieryn, vice provost for faculty and academic affairs. "I know well, from close personal experience, how deftly he negotiates the best interests of the university. He is a model for getting things done, and I cannot imagine a more deserving recipient of this award."
Terry joined the Department of Telecommunications in the College of Arts and Sciences as a lecturer in the fall of 1974. He was first elected to the Bloomington Faculty Council in 1983. He served many terms as a member and leader of the council and its committees and previously served as president in 2008-09. He also served the University Faculty Council, the faculty governance unit for all IU campuses, and led it as co-secretary in 2008-09 and 2013-14.
Over the years, Terry served repeatedly on committees in his department, on search and review committees for faculty and campus administrators, and on various task forces related to campus planning, enrollment and student services. He served on the Policy Committee of the College of Arts and Sciences from 1988-91, chairing it in 1990-91.
“While I am honored to receive this award, it is really an award for all of the people throughout IU that I’ve worked with for almost 40 years," Terry said. "I have mainly been a coordinator of the work of others on behalf of Indiana University and higher education in the state. Effective shared governance is crucial to the success of the university, and I’m pleased that it’s being recognized through this award.”
A first-generation college graduate, Terry developed a passion for service when he joined the American Association of University Professors at the urging of his Ph.D. advisor at the University of Minnesota. He has remained an association member for more than 40 years and often served on the executive committee of the IU Bloomington chapter.
He previously received the Michael Gordon Faculty award from the IU Bloomington Division of Student Affairs in 2009, recognizing his service to students and the office of the Dean of Students. In 1996, he was honored by the New York City-based International Radio and Television Society with the Frank M. Stanton award recognizing lifetime contributions to communications education.
Between 1994 and 2005, Terry frequently worked outside the U.S. in the former Soviet Union and other nations transitioning from government-controlled media. Working with universities, media practitioners, non-governmental organizations and government officials, he helped create environments favorable to independent media. Since 2005, he has annually reviewed applicants from Russian scholars for U.S. government Fulbright award to study in the U.S.
These international experiences, plus years of service on the advisory board of IU Bloomington’s Center for the Study of Global Change, led to his appointment as the founding director of the College of Arts and Sciences’ Global Village Living-Learning Center in Foster Quad. The center will celebrate its 10th anniversary in 2014-15. Terry has also served on the faculty committee for the campus’s Individualized Major Program since 2002.
Terry has applied his expertise in electronic media law and policy to national and local problems. Early in his career, in the summer of 1976, he edited Access magazine, published by the National Citizens Committee for Broadcasting. The magazine was a trade journal for people active in intervention in electronic media policy to promote the public interest.
Later, he intervened at the Federal Communications Commission when a Bloomington TV station was sold to Boston entrepreneurs. This intervention led to enhancements of local service by the station to Bloomington that lasted for many years. From 1984 to 1986, he served on the Bloomington Telecommunications Council and helped the city negotiate renewal of its cable franchise.
In 2001, Terry represented IU in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, where the university was guiding the growth of the American University in Kyrgyzstan, a liberal arts university intended as an alternative to Soviet educational institutions. His time there was cut short by the events on Sept. 11 in the U.S. but had long-term benefits as he got to know Diane Wille, a psychology professor from Indiana University Southeast who was also working in Kyrgyzstan. After returning to the U.S., they remained in touch and were married in 2010.
Terry continues as Bloomington Faculty Council president-emeritus in 2014-15 and will head a comprehensive study of shared governance at IU Bloomington and throughout the university. He anticipates bringing recommendations for enhancing shared governance forward by the end of 2014. Wille continues to teach at IU Southeast, so Terry anticipates continued association with IU through that campus. He hopes to contribute to the 2019-20 celebration of IU’s 200th anniversary and to the growth and success of IU, IU Bloomington and IU Southeast.
A reception to honor Terry will take place at 5:30 p.m. Nov. 18 in the Federal Room of the Indiana Memorial Union. RSVPs should be sent to vpfaa@indiana.edu.
