David H. Loyd Jr.
DISTINGUISHED FACULTY
All good teaching has in it “an element of performance,” says Physics Professor David H. Loyd Jr.
Since 1969 when he joined the faculty, Loyd has been performing well in the classroom, earning him this year’s Distinguished Faculty Award for the College of Sciences, which he served as dean from 1996 through 2006. Loyd loves the interaction with students.
“The most rewarding of all,” he said, “are the occasional ones who come back two, five or 10 years later and tell you what a difference you made in their lives.”
He attributes his own career to Central High School physics teacher Claude Wooley.
“I never had a better teacher,” Loyd said.
Wooley’s influence overrode that of Loyd’s own father, a plumber who wanted his son to become a mechanical engineer.
“I think he finally decided that a Ph.D. in physics was almost as good as a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering,” Loyd said.
Loyd holds his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Texas at Austin and his doctorate from the University of Wisconsin at Madison.