Media Releases

U of T celebrates extraordinary scholars

April 28, 2011

TORONTO, ON – The Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to will con­fer hon­orary degrees on sev­er­al out­stand­ing schol­ars in the fields of med­i­cine, engi­neer­ing and medieval stud­ies at its Con­vo­ca­tion this spring.

“The Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to is delight­ed to rec­og­nize a num­ber of accom­plished indi­vid­u­als who have made sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions to research, knowl­edge and teach­ing,” said Pres­i­dent David Nay­lor.

Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to Pro­fes­sor Emer­i­tus Mladen Vran­ic, an inter­na­tion­al­ly renowned leader in dia­betes research, will receive an hon­orary doc­tor­ate of sci­ence June 1, 2011 at 2:30 pm. An Offi­cer of the Order of Cana­da, Dr. Vranic’s pio­neer­ing research in glu­cose metab­o­lism, exer­cise, hypo­glycemia and stress have trans­formed the land­scape of dia­betes treat­ment.

“Mladen Vran­ic has been an impor­tant part of the Uni­ver­si­ty since Pro­fes­sor Charles Best, the co-dis­cov­er­er of insulin, asked Dr. Vran­ic to be his last post­doc­tor­al fel­low,” said Nay­lor. “Through near­ly five decades of out­stand­ing schol­ar­ship and teach­ing, he has trained and men­tored many of the cur­rent lead­ers in the field.”

Pro­fes­sor Michael Lapidge, one of the world’s fore­most schol­ars in medieval stud­ies and one of the first Ph.D. grad­u­ates of the renowned Cen­tre for Medieval Stud­ies at U of T, will receive an hon­orary doc­tor­ate of let­ters on June 10 at 2:30 pm. Orig­i­nal­ly from Cana­da, Pro­fes­sor Lapidge is Emer­i­tus Fel­low of Clare Col­lege, Cam­bridge.

“Pro­fes­sor Lapidge is an influ­en­tial and pro­lif­ic author with more than 200 pub­li­ca­tions to his cred­it and has had a pro­found impact on the dis­ci­pline of medieval stud­ies. It is a pos­i­tive reflec­tion of the strength of the human­i­ties in Cana­da that so many lead­ers in the field have been edu­cat­ed here.”

Exec­u­tive direc­tor of Hatch Ltd., Bert Was­mund will receive an hon­orary doc­tor­ate of engi­neer­ing on June 15, 2011 at 2:30 pm. Was­mund is cred­it­ed with trans­form­ing the met­al­lur­gi­cal indus­try through a series of tech­ni­cal inno­va­tions that reduced ener­gy con­sump­tion and harm­ful emis­sions while improv­ing work­place safe­ty and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty.

“Through­out his dis­tin­guished career, Dr. Was­mund has had an extra­or­di­nary influ­ence on engi­neer­ing man­age­ment.  His con­tri­bu­tions have moved beyond advances in effi­cien­cy to address broad­er issues of sus­tain­abil­i­ty more gen­er­al­ly.” said Nay­lor. “The Uni­ver­si­ty is very pleased to rec­og­nize the excep­tion­al accom­plish­ments of this U of T grad­u­ate.”

Approx­i­mate­ly 12,500 stu­dents will grad­u­ate from the Uni­ver­si­ty at cer­e­monies tak­ing place from May 31 to June 17 in Con­vo­ca­tion Hall, 31 King’s Col­lege Cir­cle. Mem­bers of the media are wel­come to attend con­vo­ca­tion cer­e­monies but are asked to con­firm their atten­dance in advance by call­ing U of T media rela­tions at 416–978-0100.

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For more infor­ma­tion, please con­tact:

Jen­nifer Lan­thi­er
Writer & Spe­cial Projects Offi­cer
416–978-8362
jennifer.lanthier@utoronto.ca

Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to Media Rela­tions
416–978-0100
media.relations@utoronto.ca