Honors
GAA Honors Cancer Center Director With Faculty Service Award
Dr. H. Shelton “Shelley” Earp III ’ 70 (MD), director of the
UNC Lineberger Comprehensive
DAN SEARS ’ 74
Cancer Center, has received the
GAA’s Faculty Service Award for
2010.
The award, established in 1990
and given by the GAA Board of
Directors, honors faculty members
who have performed outstanding
service for the University or the
alumni association. Earp received
the award at the GAA board’s
quarterly dinner meeting Jan. 8.
Earp also is a professor of pharmacology and medicine and
Lineberger Professor of Cancer
Research. In addition to his medical degree, he earned a master’s
degree in biochemistry from UNC
1977.
matters
membership
Besides being director of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, Dr. H. Shelton “Shelley” Earp
’ 70 (MD) has served Carolina on search committees, the Faculty Council and the GAA Board of Directors
and as an award-winning professor. “I’m not sure any faculty member on the Chapel Hill campus has done
more to serve the University than he has,” says medical school Dean William L. “Bill” Roper.
Number of GAA members*
66,725
Annual members
Besides his role as director of
the cancer center, Earp’s service to
the University includes chairing the committee for the
most recent provost search. He also has chaired a search
for a medical school dean and served on search committees for a chancellor and a provost.
31,728
Life members
34,997
Student members
Earp has served on Faculty Council and the steer-
ing committee for the self-study of the University’s
research mission. He chaired the Chancellor’s Advisory
Earp, an endocrinologist, has devoted more than
three decades to researching the behavior of cancer
cells and the signals that regulate cell growth and dif-
ferentiation. He still keeps an active lab and sees
patients once a month.
4,769
Committee on Naming of Facilities.
Total GAA membership
(by percent of graduates)
26
He was the faculty representative to the GAA Board
of Directors in 2001-02.
Spring 2010 reunion classes
(by membership percentage)
’ 60
42
’ 55
40
’ 50
39
’ 70
38
’ 65
37
At the award banquet, GAA President Doug Dibbert
’ 70 cited that broad history of service to UNC.
Earp also developed his political acumen early, having been student body president as an undergraduate at
the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. More
recently, he was instrumental in generating statewide
support for the new University Cancer Research Fund,
which provides $50 million a year toward research into
the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer.
“Shelley has shared his vision and his elbow grease
far north of South Road in service to a University
whose great strength is its ability to build broad coali-
tions among different academic disciplines,” Dibbert said.
The new N.C. Cancer Hospital, clinical home of the
Lineberger Center, opened last fall.
Lineberger director since 1997, Earp has served on
the board of the Association of American Cancer
U.S. noncontiguous
possessions
(by membership percentage)
U.S. Pacific Islands
33
Virgin Islands
27
Puerto Rico
18
Alaska
16
Hawaii
14
Earp has received several teaching awards, including
the Medical School Basic Science Teaching Award and
the Kaiser-Permanente Medical School Excellence in
Institutes, which comprises 95 leading cancer research
centers in the U.S. He was association president from
2005 to 2007. He also is a member of the American
Teaching Award. In 2008, he received the annual
Association for Cancer Research, the Association of
Top five N.C. cities
beginning with “S”
Thomas Jefferson Award, recognizing a UNC faculty
member who, through personal influence and perform-
ance of duty in teaching, writing and scholarship, has
best exemplified the ideals and objectives of Thomas
American Physicians and the American societies of
clinical oncology, hematology, cell biology, microbiolo-
gy and clinical investigation.
(by membership percentage)
Sealevel
75
Salvo and Stacy (tie)
50
Spencer
39
Skyland
38
Jefferson. UNC faculty members nominate candidates
for the honor, and a faculty committee chooses the
recipient.
Other recent recipients of the Faculty Service Award
include business professor James H. “Jim” Johnson Jr.
and former law school dean and faculty chair Judith W.
Wegner. ;
* as of Jan. 28, 2010
“I’m not sure any faculty member on the Chapel Hill
campus has done more to serve the University than he
has,” said medical school Dean William L. “Bill” Roper.
ONLINE: A complete list of Faculty Service Award winners
is at
alumni.unc.edu/awards.
