Congratulations to Dr. Joseph Ortiz, one of six Kent State faculty members presented with the 2020 President's Faculty Excellence Award, which recognizes exceptional performance that leads to the achievement of national or international recognition.
Joseph Ortiz, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Geology. His research focuses on paleoclimate change and water quality, particularly in the Great Lakes and Lake Erie. He research is widely known and has had major impacts on the impact of human influences on the water quality of Lake Erie and its neighboring watershed. His knowledge and research are truly impressive as documented by his consistent publications in very prestigious journals (Science, Nature Geoscience, Geology, and Paleoceanography) and his consistent funding from a wide range of agencies including NASA, the Ohio Space Grant Consortium, Ohio Sea Grant and multiple programs at NSF for a wide range of research. He has authored more than 70 highly cited publications, holds several patents and attracted $8.1 million in research and education grants; the latter has had many very positive impacts on student success at Kent State. Notably, his impact score of 37.03 places him in the top 95% of more than 5 million researchers on ResearchGate, a leading site evaluating impact scores of published scientific works. Because of his national attention, he is bringing positive attention and interest to Kent State at the national and international level through his pioneering and important work on national and international research projects with ecological, water quality and climate change themes. In 2018, he was elected as a Fellow of the Geological Society of America, the flagship society in his discipline. He is also an amazing mentor of graduate and undergraduate students, selflessly allowing his student and junior authors to have first authorship on publications. His 2019 awarding of Kent State’s Outstanding Research Award is indicative of his overall excellence.
See the rest of the President's Faculty Excellence Award winners here