The Distinguished Graduate Mentor Award recognizes faculty members who have made outstanding contributions to the education and guidance of graduate students. Awardees receive $5,000.

David Notkin - Computer Science and Engineering

When Bill Griswold needs support, he knows he can count on David Notkin, his former adviser and mentor from his days as a graduate student in the University's computer science and engineering department.

And not just in the academic arena.

"I got married last summer, and David was one of my groomsmen," said Griswold, now an associate professor at the University of California, San Diego. "Under other circumstances, I might have had him as my best man.

David Notkin, center, talks with two of his graduate students, Vibha Sazawal, left, and Michael Ernst.

"I'd have to say that I count David among my very closest friends," he added. "I would do anything for him."

Griswold isn't alone. Again and again, Notkin's current and former students recount invitations to dinner, informal gatherings to celebrate milestones, social introductions and personal and career advice, in addition to exceptional academic guidance, as hallmarks of their time at the UW and important factors in their success after graduation. Some now collaborate with one another, even though they weren't at the UW at the same time. Notkin, they say, is the catalyst behind the network.

Such willingness to forge close ties and engage with students on an equal footing are qualities that have earned Notkin the 2000 Distinguished Graduate Mentor Award.

Notkin, whose specialty is software engineering, or ways to build better complex software systems, said that he adopted his mentoring philosophy from Nico Habermann, his adviser at Carnegie Mellon University.

"He used to say that you should focus on graduating terrific students, and then you'll have terrific research," Notkin said. "But if you focus on just the research, you might not get terrific students." Along those lines, he said he tries to get students to pursue topics that interest them rather than him.

"I try to talk with them at length about what they find horrible or distasteful about the way we now engineer software," he said. "Over time that helps me direct them to a research topic. I don't want to give them my own predispositions, even toward the technical material. If I did that, then they would make the same mistakes that I made."

Gail Murphy said she greatly appreciated that approach. She came to the UW in 1992 from a job in the software industry, determined to complete a master's degree in two years then return to the private sector. By 1996, she had finished a doctorate.

"Working with David on research projects was so much fun and so rewarding that I continued on to complete a Ph.D.," Murphy said. "He taught me to pursue problems that came from my own experience developing software."

She is currently an assistant professor of computer science at the University of British Columbia. "And I continue to receive advice, support and encouragement from him now," she said.

Notkin gives much of the credit for his mentoring success to his students.

"They're very bright. When they walk in, I assume I'm dealing with extremely smart people," he said. An open collegiality and flat hierarchy within the computer science and engineering department also helps. "We view the students as colleagues. We really like good ideas — we don't care where they come from."

In addition to being a friend and adviser, Notkin's students say he's also an exemplar. Griswold tries every day to replicate with his students what Notkin did for him. So far, he said, it's a goal he continues to reach toward.

"I'm still trying to hack the code and figure out how he did it," Griswold admitted. "As far as I can tell at this point, it's magic."

Rob Harrill, News & Information