Oscar Lang Award Funded

The Department of Animal Science has reached its goal of raising $10,000 needed to establish an endowment fund to support an annual award in memory of Dr. Oskar Lang. Income from the endowment will provide a stipend to the annual award recipient.

Trained as a veterinarian in Vienna, Austria, Oskar managed the department’s laboratory animal colonies from 1962 to 1984. During this time, the colonies came to be recognized, campuswide and beyond, for the superior animal care and superb quality of animals and as a place where students could learn about laboratory animals and their care. Oskar also was a Lecturer in Animal Science; his encyclopedic knowledge of many animal species, his courtly European manner and his warm personality made him an immensely popular teacher.

Memorial gifts received at the time of Oskar’s death were used to establish the Oskar Lang Award, given annually to a departmental undergraduate or graduate student with special interests in laboratory animal management. After the memorial gifts were spent, the department continued to sponsor the Oskar Lang award, in recent years through the generosity of Bob Ramus of Dean’s Animal Feeds. Contributions by Dean’s Animal Feeds were arranged by Sandra Weisker, the current manager of the Animal Science lab animal colonies.

Oskar’s teaching and research activities in laboratory animal science were continued by his successor, Kathy Bangs, and subsequently by Sandra Weisker, the manager since 1990. With demand for laboratory animal models to support research in other species, laboratory animal science continues to grow, as does the number of students interested in the field. The teaching program that Oskar started now includes both formal courses and hands-on internships with graduates frequently accepting rewarding positions as colony managers in private industry.

In 2000, Oskar’s widow and son, Lillian Lang Carter and Andrew Lang, proposed to make annual gifts to support the annual stipend, with Dean’s Animal Feeds, and to establish a fund that ultimately would be endowed to provide annual earnings for permanent funding of the award. In addition to Lillian’s and Andrew’s annual gifts, others were received in response to an earlier Highlights article that announced the fundraising  effort, including a major gift from Kathy Bangs, who now works as a senior research scientist in private industry. She stated, “The Department of Animal Science has many fond memories for me, both as a student and as a former employee. I want to help support the department that enabled me to have a career as challenging and diverse as I have had.”

Her gift put the fundraising campaign over the top and allowed the department to establish an interest-earning endowment.

The Department of Animal Science and Oskar Lang’s family thank donors whose gifts ensured the permanence of the Oskar Lang Award through establishment of an endowment. Future gifts to the fund will be used to increase the endowment fund’s principal, which in turn will increase the annual earnings and award stipend.

With significant numbers of undergraduate Animal Science students specializing in laboratory animal science, applying husbandry and management skills, the Oskar Lang Award continues to increase in prominence.

Alan Ekstrand was the 2002 recipient of the Lang Award. He worked at the Animal Science Small Animal colony for four years after being introduced to laboratory animals in an ANS 49 class taught by the colony’s manager, Sandra Weisker. There, he managed the teaching animals, a transgenic mouse colony, the rat and rabbit rooms and a mouse model for a human orthopedic disorder. To further his training, Alan enrolled in the Laboratory Animal Management internship. These experiences and his mastery of them made Alan an obvious choice for the Oskar Lang award.

Alan’s current position is with Environmental Health and Safety at UC Davis where he is staff representative to the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee. He also inspects animal facilities and laboratory areas, reviews animal care protocols, develops programs for the UC Davis animal care program and works with regulatory and accrediting organizations to ensure that UC Davis complies with current laws and regulations.

Alan attributes his success in obtaining the position to the training he received as an undergraduate at the Animal Science Small Animal Colony as well as to Sandra’s courses in animal handling, husbandry, laws and regulations and facility management. Several other students who also were active in the running of the Small Animal Colony and were recipients of the Oskar Lang Memorial Award have also found rewarding positions in laboratory animal care.