Behm Receives NTID Distinguished Alum Award

From: NTID - Dec 21, 2004

Contact: Karen E. M. Black
kebnmr@rit.edu
585-475-6840 voice/TTY

BEHM RECEIVES NTID DISTINGUISHED ALUM AWARD

ROCHESTER, N.Y., Dec. 18—Gary Behm, an advanced engineering system delivery project manager for IBM, was this year's winner of the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) Distinguished Alumni Award for the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID).

Distinguished Alumni Awards are presented annually to graduates with outstanding professional achievements.

Behm earned a bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering from NTID in 1981 and soon after began his career with IBM. He has worked for IBM in Virginia, Florida, Vermont, and New York, and is a leader in engineering project management, improving manufacturing efficiency, and customer satisfaction. He has represented IBM at semiconductor conferences worldwide, most recently in Germany.

He contributed significantly to helping NTID develop new curriculum in Automation Technologies, and for the past several years, has helped bring students and graduates to IBM for co-op and full-time positions.

Behm also has been a driving force behind IBM's "Take Your Children to Work Day," by teaching sign language classes and by teaming deaf and hard-of-hearing IBM employees with deaf children from a local school. He has received the IBM General Manager's Teamwork Award and a Silver Level Employee of the Year Award from the National Business and Diversity Council in honor of his efforts to bring new hires with disabilities to IBM.

NTID is the first and largest technological college in the world for deaf and hard-of-hearing students. One of eight colleges of RIT, NTID offers educational programs and access and support services to the 1,100 deaf and hard-of-hearing students from around the world who study, live, and socialize with 14,400 hearing students on RIT's Rochester, N.Y., campus. Web address: http://www.rit.edu./NTID.

For more NTID news visit http://www/rit.edu/ntid/newsroom.

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