DURANT, Okla. ­-- Southeastern Oklahoma State University will honor four Former Faculty Members as part of the Homecoming 2005 celebration.

Doris Andrews, Dr. Wade Baskin (posthumously), and Drs. John (posthumously) and Connie Taylor will be recognized as Distinguished Former Faculty members at the Homecoming Alumni Luncheon in the Student Union Ballroom. The luncheon is scheduled from 11:15 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 1.

"Honoring our former faculty members is one of the highlights of Homecoming," said Southeastern President Dr. Glen D. Johnson. "The four individuals we are honoring this year made a tremendous impact on the lives of many students at Southeastern. Our former students, alumni association, and the University community are proud to honor these outstanding educators who helped carry on our tradition of academic excellence at Southeastern."

Doris Andrews, assistant professor of English, served Southeastern 39 years in the Department of English, Humanities and Language.

She taught Freshman Composition, Introduction to Literature, Methods of Teaching English, and supervised student and entry-year teachers in area high schools. She transferred from Freed-Hardeman College (Tenn.) to Southeastern in 1950 and was graduated as the top honor student in 1953. She began her long tenure at SOSU as an adjunct faculty member in 1956. She received her master's degree in Education at Southeastern in 1964. 

Because of her numerous presentations at state and national conventions, she was named "Master Teacher" by the University of Texas College of Education. She was chosen Outstanding Teacher by Sigma Tau Delta in 1994.

Her poems have been published in West View Journal of Western Oklahoma; In Other Words: Poetry Anthology; Oklahoma Anthology and Voices of American Anthology. She also authored Legal Status of Women in Southeastern Oklahoma and Teaching the Research Paper in the Oklahoma English Journal.

She continues to be actively involved in professional, civic and community affairs, including the Oklahoma Shakespearean Festival Board, School of Arts and Sciences Scholarship Council and the Northwest Church of Christ, where she teaches ladies' classes.

Dr. Wade Baskin, one of only five faculty members in the SOSU Faculty Hall of Fame, joined Southeastern in 1959 as chair of the Modern and Classic Languages. He began his undergraduate studies at the College of the Ozarks (Ark.). After enlisting in the U.S. Army Medical Corps in 1942, he served overseas and earned several decorations.

He earned his master's and doctoral degrees at Columbia University, where he was in the personal service of General Dwight D. Eisenhower, then the University's president.  He published 40 books, his original works, some newly annotated editions and some translations from French, Spanish, Italian and German.

Baskin originated the Choctaw Bilingual Education Program at SOSU, and his portrait hangs in New York City's International Portraits Gallery, a collection of famous men and women of all nations and periods of history.

He was a humanitarian, motivator, and a leader in professional, civic and church affairs. 

Dr. Constance Elaine Southern Taylor earned her B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. at the University of Oklahoma. She was a member of the mathematics and botany departments at OU, taught in the Oklahoma City Public School System and in SOSUšs biology department from 1970 until her retirement in 1998.

A native of Washington, D.C., she was graduated from Ardmore (Okla.) High School in 1955 and married Raymond John Taylor in 1959. Among numerous awards, she and her husband won the 1993 Oklahoma Academy of Science Award for Meritorious Service to Science in Oklahoma.

She claimed the 1990 Burlington Northern Award for Excellence in Teaching as well as the Educator of the Year Award in 1975, presented by the Oklahoma Wildlife Conservation Organization, another honor shared with her husband.

She and her husband have two botanical species, a fern and an Indian Paintbrush, first collected in Costa Rica, named in their honor. Her research continues on Solidago (goldenrods), where she is considered one of the few authorities in the United States and Canada, and also on Euthamia, where she is the only authority on this genus.

Dr. John Taylor was a native of Ada, Oklahoma. He earned his B.S. in Education at East Central University, his masteršs and doctoral degrees at the University of Oklahoma. He taught in Pauls Valley and Oklahoma City Public Schools before coming to Southeastern, where he served  as an assistant professor from 1961-63.

He then served as a graduate assistant and instructor at OU for two years, and returned to SOSU as Professor of Biology, Graduate Faculty and Curator of the SOSU Herbarium from 1965-90.

He served as vice-chair and chair of the biological section of the Oklahoma Academy of Science and was involved in some form of biological research after he began teaching at SOSU, producing more than 50 professional papers during that time.

Honors and awards include Conservation Educator of the Year in 1975, presented by the governor on behalf of the Oklahoma and National Wildlife Federations. He served as Team Chief for one of two teams conducting an ecological survey of the interior of Alaska in the summer of 1965 and botanist on a survey of mammals of Zacatecas, Mexico, in 1966.