Cantho University Honors Chris Wheeler (10/2006)

At the ceremony celebrating Cantho University’s 40th Anniversary on October 17th Christopher Wheeler received the Award of Merit for his many outstanding contributions to the development of education at the university. 

The award statement made during the ceremony reads as follows:

Dr. Christopher Wheeler is a Professor in the College of Education at Michigan State University. He earned his Ph.D. from Columbia University. He is widely recognized in the international community for his work in linking schools to community development. His publications are many. He has received numerous awards for his international work.  Since 1997 he has devoted enormous energy to developing a relationship between Cantho University and Michigan State.

In this capacity he is collaborating with Cantho faculty to carry out a project that integrates school reform with community development in very poor rural areas. This project is now in its fifth year and involves over 120 teachers, CTU faculty, community development workers and community organizations. He collaborated with CTU faculty in the School of Education to implement a Linkage Grant program to further improve the teaching in the School of Education over a three-year period. He has facilitated the development of a new CTU-MSU project in biotechnology at the undergraduate level at CTU, research projects in biotechnology between MSU and CTU researchers, professional development programs for CTU staff in the Foreign Language Center to improve the teaching of English and an active program to recruit and secure financial support for a number of CTU faculty to pursue doctoral studies at Michigan State.

For all these reasons, CTU is pleased to honor Prof. Wheeler with the Award of Merit for his distinguished contributions to the development of our university.

Representing Michigan State on this occasion was Dr. Karen Klomparens, Dean of the Graduate School and Associate Provost. In her remarks to the conference, she described MSU’s global commitment and connected Chris Wheeler’s contributions to this important mission.