In her first year as head coach of the UBC women's volleyball team, Erminia Russo has been named the Canadian Interuniversity Athletic Union women's volleyball Coach of the Year.

A former Thunderbird, Russo guided the 1997/98 team to its first Canada West title since the 1977/78 season.

The 'Birds finished the regular season with a 16-6 record, and went on to beat three-time defending national champion the University of Alberta Pandas to win the conference title.

Fisheries biologist Michael Healey has joined a group of eminent fisheries experts who will create a "living blueprint" for saving dwindling B.C. salmon stocks.

The volunteer task force will produce a report by May to provide government with independent recommendations on how to protect existing salmon habitat and optimize salmon production.

The group has a budget of $60,000 from the non-profit Pacific Salmon Foundation, which funds habitat preservation projects in B.C. Half of that funding will be used to publish the final report.

F. Graeme Chalmers, a professor in the Dept. of Curriculum Studies, has won the National Art Education Association's 1998 Pacific Higher Education Art Educator of the Year Award.

The annual award recognizes outstanding achievement by association members, who include art teachers, college and university professors and others in Canada, the U.S. and 65 other countries.

Chalmers is the graduate adviser in the Dept. of Curriculum Studies, where he teaches courses in art education and curriculum theory. He has published widely on art education, cultural diversity and the history of art education.

He currently serves as senior editor of the research journal Studies in Art Education.

History Prof. David Breen has won the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Petroleum History Society, a group of academics, corporate representatives, archivists and others based in Calgary.

The award was presented to Breen for his professional scholarship and dedicated investigation into the history of Canada's petroleum industry.

Breen is responsible for the first scholarly work that takes a comprehensive look at the industry from its early days to the 1960s. He has also written an award-winning history of Canadian ranching.