Peter J Denning PhD

Peter J. Denning has made extraordinary contributions to the ACM since 1968, in many different capacities. He was an ACM Council member (1970-84, 1992-98), and was ACM President (1980-82). He was Editor-in-Chief of the Communications of the ACM (1983- 92), chaired the ACM Editorial Committee (1986-92) and the Publications Board (1992-98), chaired ACM SIGOPS (1969), was the first chair of the ACM SIG board (1970-74), led the development of the ACM digital library, and chaired the ACM Education Board. Denning became an ACM Fellow with the inception of the designation in 1994. He received the ACM Distinguished Service Award in 1989 and the Karlstrom Educator Award in 1996.

Dr. Peter Denning has been awarded the 1996 ACM Karl V. Karlstrom Outstanding Educator Award for his long-standing efforts to shape our field and convey its nature to computer scientists as well as a broader scientific community. Professor Denning's vision, leadership, and early writings on Operating Systems played a key role in making that area a respected part of the core curriculum. His subsequent efforts advanced the entire curriculum by advocating the integration of an experimental component as well as proposing a new map for viewing the field. Finally, Denning's series of 47 bi-monthly columns in American Scientist brought Computer Science questions to the attention of the larger scientific community, long before such efforts were fashionable.