The award is presented annually by the ACM Special Interest Group in Computer Science Education to an individual in recognition of a significant contribution to computer science education, including curriculum design, innovative teaching methods, textbook authorship, and the development of new teaching tools.
Bruce joined the Williams faculty in 1977, and was largely responsible for the design and implementation of the college's computer science major and department. He also has been involved in several different projects involving the design of national computer science curricula at the college level over the last 25 years.
These include membership on the ACM-IEEE Computer Science task force that developed Curricula 1991, as well as chairing the Programming Languages Knowledge Area Focus Group for Curricula 2001.
As a member of the Liberal Arts Computer Science Consortium, he also contributed to the design of several computer science curricula designed for liberal arts colleges. He is the co-author with Andrea Danyluk and Tom Murtagh of the forthcoming introductory computer science text, "Java: An Eventful Approach."
In addition to his work on computer science in higher education, his many publications have addressed programming language design and semantics as well as mathematical logic. He is the author of "Foundations of Object-Oriented Programming Languages: Types and Semantics" (M.I.T. Press), which focuses on programming style and the object-oriented languages such as C++ and Java that enjoy wide use in academia and industry.
He has grants from the National Science Foundation supporting both his programming languages research and his work on developing educational materials for introductory courses in computer science.
He taught mathematics at Princeton before coming to Williams, returning to Princeton 20 years later for a term as a visiting professor in computer science. He has been a visiting professor or researcher at M.I.T., Stanford, Cambridge University, the University of Pisa, and the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, as well as consulted for DEC's System Research Center in Palo Alto, Calif., Prime Computer, NEC, and 15 colleges and universities.
He is currently a visiting professor in computer science at the University of California Santa Cruz, where he is also studying linguistics.
He received his bachelor's degree from Pomona College and his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Wisconsin.
Williams College is consistently ranked one of the nation's top liberal arts colleges. The college's 2,000 students are taught by a faculty noted for the quality of their undergraduate teaching. The achievement of academic goals includes active participation of students with faculty in research. Admission decisions are made regardless of a student's financial ability, and the college provides grants and other assistance to meet the demonstrated needs of all who are admitted. Founded in 1793, it is the second oldest institution of higher learning in Massachusetts. The college is located in Williamstown, Mass. To visit the college on the Internet: www.williams.edu
Media contact: Jo Procter, news director; tele: 413-597-4279; email: Jo.Procter@williams.edu