A paper by Edward “Ned” Spang, program manager at the UC Davis Center for Water-Energy Efficiency, emerged with top honors in a Global Water Forum awards program for “emerging scholars”: Ph.D. recipients or candidates under 36 years old.

Each of the some 800 entrants from around the world submitted a brief article, and the judges selected Spang’s as the best. He received the first-prize Emerging Scholars Award of $500 for “A Thirst for Power: A Global Analysis of Water Consumption for Energy Production” — about his development and application of the first water consumption indicator for national-level energy systems.

Spang has degrees from Dartmouth College (bachelor of arts, geography with a focus on environmental studies) and the Fletcher School at Tufts University, where he studied international environment and resource policy, and development economics. His Fletcher degrees are a master of arts in law and diplomacy, and doctorate in international relations.

The Global Water Forum is an initiative of the UNESCO Chair in Water Economics and Transboundary Water Governance.

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Emiko Burchill, 31, of Sacramento, has been appointed special assistant for policy at the California Natural Resources Agency. Burchill, who grew up in Davis, was a contract attorney at Olson Hagel and Fishburn LLP in 2012. She was an executive fellow at the California Fair Political Practices Commission from 2011 to 2012 and was an intern at the office of Assemblymember Toni Atkins in 2011.

Burchill was a volunteer attorney at My Sister’s House from 2010 to 2011 and an attorney at the Law Offices of McDowall Cotter from 2007 to 2009. She earned a juris doctorate degree from the Santa Clara University School of Law.

This position does not require Senate confirmation and the annual compensation is $79,260. Burchill is a Democrat.

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Derek Nelson of Davis was named to North Central College’s Dean’s List of scholars for the 2013 winter term. To be eligible, undergraduate students must maintain a grade-point average of 3.6 for the term and be enrolled as full-time students.

Founded in 1861, North Central College is an independent, comprehensive college of the liberal arts and sciences in Naperville, Ill.

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The National Book Critics Circle recently presented its Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award to two scholars of women’s literature: English professor emeritus Sandra M. Gilbert of UC Davis and her frequent co-author and co-editor.

The critics circle board recognized Gilbert and English professor emeritus Susan Gubar of Indiana University “for their pioneering work in feminist thought, which revolutionized criticism.”

The Washington Post concurred, labeling Gilbert and Gubar “giants of the feminist movement” whose books, particularly “The Madwoman in the Attic” and “The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women,” “changed the shape of literary criticism and influenced generations of students and scholars.”

Gilbert and Gubar co-authored “The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination” (1979), described by the National Book Critics Circle as “a groundbreaking and nuanced study of the tenuous position of women writers and women characters within a patriarchal culture; and “No Man’s Land: The Place of the Woman Writer in the Twentieth Century,” a three-volume work (1989-94), as “a sophisticated and encyclopedic survey of modern women’s literature.”

They co-edited “The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women: The Traditions in English” (first published in 1985 and updated twice since then) described by the book critics circle as “a landmark attempt to establish a canon of women’s writing but also, by implication, to insist on the integral place of women within the canon of English literature.”

The award, named after a founding member and first president of the National Book Critics Circle, was presented Feb. 28 in New York City, at the organization’s annual awards program.

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Colin Carter of UC Davis is officially a “commodity-friendly professor,” one of 15 so named recently by Commodity HQ, an online information source for commodity-related news and analysis for investors.

Commodity HQ cited the commodity-friendly professors for being pioneers in the field and providing the public with a better understanding of the complex commodities market.

Carter, a professor in the department of agricultural and resource economics and the director of the University of California’s Giannini Foundation of Agricultural Economics, has done extensive research on China’s grain market and international trade. He is the author of a new book, “Futures and Options Markets.”

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The national Beef Quality Assurance program, which provides guidelines for beef cattle production, has recognized John Maas of UC Davis as 2013 Educator of the Year. Maas is a Cooperative Extension veterinarian in the School of Veterinary Medicine, as well as a cattle rancher himself.

The Beef Quality Assurance program noted Maas’ passion in educating California beef producers and their employees on best management techniques. In the sharing of state, regional and national curricula, he emphasizes the importance of disease prevention and animal welfare.

Additionally, he promotes consumer confidence as a frequent spokesman for the beef industry.

Maas has a long affiliation with the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association. He is chair of Producer Education, which oversees Beef Quality Assurance and other programs, and a member of the Quality Assurance Advisory Board.

He often represents the national association and the California Cattlemen’s Association on legislative and regulatory issues.

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