Endowment ensures legacy of Professor Martha Cooper   A newly established endowment recognizing outstanding graduate teaching assistants will honor the memory of Martha Cooper, a widely respected professor in NIU's Department of Communication who died in October at the age of 46.   Before her death, Cooper herself helped initiate the creation of the Martha Cooper Memorial Endowment for Support of Instruction in Graduate Teaching. With contributions flowing in from former students, colleagues and relatives, the endowment has grown to $20,000.   The endowment will fund an annual stipend recognizing outstanding performance and peer leadership of one or more graduate teaching assistants in NIU's Department of Communication. The first recipient of the recognition will be announced in late April.   The endowment also will support mentoring of first-year graduate assistants by their more experienced peers or faculty and will be used to sponsor programs that foster excellence in teaching.   "The goal is to enhance the quality of instruction of graduate students as it relates to teaching," said Cooper's husband, Charles Tucker, a retired NIU professor of communication. "Quite often it's difficult for departments to maintain their efforts and allocate resources to that function."   Martha Cooper loved to teach. A gifted lecturer, she possessed a unique ability to make the complex clear and was known to go the extra mile for students, often mentoring them one-on-one in both academic and personal matters. Their praise led to her being honored in 1999 with NIU's Presidential Teaching Professorship, the university's top accolade for teaching.   From 1989 to 2000, Cooper served as director of graduate studies in communication. More than half of the 30 graduate students she advised went on to earn Ph.D.s.   "Martha and I talked at some length about doing the endowment," Tucker said. "She considered the instruction of graduate students in teaching to be the most important graduate assignment other than director of graduate studies itself. I'm confident that the endowment fits the person it's set up to remember."   Students never forgot the lessons Cooper taught. After her death, many former students traveled from across the country to attend her memorial. They also established a Web site in her memory (http://www.robertbscollins.com/martha/legacy.htm).   Lois Self, chair of the Department of Communication, said one of her own career highlights was having an opportunity to team-teach with Cooper.   "She actively engaged her students and colleagues and prompted us to think about how much we care for the profession of teaching and what we could do to improve as teachers," Self said. "She was generous with her ideas, her tips and her mentoring of peers and students, so this seems like a fitting way to ensure her legacy."   To contribute to the Martha Cooper Memorial Endowment for Support of Instruction in Graduate Teaching, or for more information, contact Nora Clark in the NIU Development Office at (815) 753-1797. More news ...