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Prof. David A. Edwards has been awarded the 2018 YoUDee "Outstanding Advisor" award for his work with the UD Actuarial Sciences Club. This award "recognizes outstanding support and guidance by the volunteer advisor (full-time exempt staff member) of an organization. The individual must demonstrate devotion, caring and mentoring to the organization. This is a person who exceeds expectations, attends meetings/events on a regular basis and has a positive impact on the success of the organization and its leaders."
The Actuarial Sciences Club, which has a membership of 74, is dedicated to promoting the actuarial sciences on campus, including supporting the department's actuarial science majors as they prepare for actuarial exams, and apply for internships and careers. This year's activities have included:
- collection of study materials for actuarial exams,
- Excel training activities,
- resume and interview preparation,
- a wildly successful fall career fair, and
- the Actuarial Science and Risk Management Networking Event.
Nicole Panzitta, the club's president, said "It is quite possible that without Professor Edwards, the Actuarial Science Club would not have survived the past three years. He has helped us from our founding by acting as everything from a supporter of the club within the Math Department to a counterpoint when we begin to stray away from the big picture. He continuously works as a mentor of the executive board, club members, and all of his students which has helped us to develop into the leaders we are today. He has motivated the entire club to focus on our passion for the actuarial sciences and has shown us how we can adapt this passion into a career.
This past fall, Professor Edwards aided in the set up and running of our first, and remarkably popular, Actuarial Networking Night. He is responsible for the rise in traffic by companies seeing the club from having a single company come to speak with the students to having a large career fair type event. Dr. Edwards has also helped the Actuarial Science major by creating and instructing courses specifically asked for by club members such as Math 667 Introduction to Mathematical Finance. To say Professor Edwards goes above and beyond what is required of him as our advisor does not seem to cover it and we cannot express how thankful we are to have had the opportunity to work with and learn from him."
Prof. Edwards replied, "I am humbled to have even been nominated for such an honor, let alone to win! I am privileged to work with such a motivated group of students; they made advising a pleasure! The club's leadership had a great set of ideas this year, and I was happy to help put them into action. I look forward to helping the students build on this year's successes."
The department congratulates Prof. Edwards on this honor.
