The ASU Sun Devils have been surprisingly good this season on the football field, but staff members at ASU’s Office of Research Publications have been even better in their field of expertise.

The writers, editor and illustrator went undefeated in this year’s Awards of Excellence program, which is sponsored by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education’s District 7.

Work by director Conrad J. Storad and his staff was entered in four categories. The staff went four for four, bringing home medals of excellence for magazine writing, publication design, illustration, and Web site design.

Winning an award from a professional peer organization is satisfying on many levels.

“It’s kind of like getting a hearty slap on the back from your colleagues for a job well done,” Storad says. “Our awards add to ASU’s national prestige. They also make the boss smile.”

The latest awards won by Storad and his staff represent the very best of work produced by professional communicators working at more than 100 institutions of higher education in the West. CASE District 7 includes all of the public and private universities and colleges located in California, Hawaii, Utah, Nevada, Guam and Arizona.

This year’s CASE District 7 awards will be presented in early December at the annual conference in Las Vegas. ASU Research Magazine won the medal of excellence for best magazine writing. Six articles from two different issues were evaluated by the judges. The winning entry included stories by ASU writers Diane Boudreau, Skip Derra and Adelheid Fischer, and by freelance writers Melissa Crytzer Fry and Jessica McCann.

Art director Michael Hagelberg won the award for illustration for “The Complex Bee.” The illustration was the cover of the summer 2006 edition.

Storad and Hagelberg won the excellence medal for best specialty publication in their roles as editor and art director for Chain Reaction. The publication is ASU’s science magazine written and designed for young readers. Chain Reaction is the only publication of its kind being produced by a university in the United States. Hagelberg, Boudreau and Web site designer Stephanie Mabee also won a medal of excellence for their work on the ASU Research “e-zine” Web site.

For more information, visit ASU Research Magazine’s Web site http://researchmag.asu.edu and Chain Reaction’s Web site http://chainreaction.asu.edu.