The Mack Easton Distinguished Alumni Award is the CU Denver Alumni Board’s highest honor. It is presented to an individual who has demonstrated a long-term commitment to serving CU Denver, its students, and alumni. The award was developed by the CU Denver Alumni community in memory of D. Mack Easton, the Dean of the "Denver Extension Center" in the early 1960’s. His vision paved the way for the extension to become the diverse and dynamic urban research university CU Denver is today.

CU Denver is proud to honor Professor Charlie Ferguson ’85, MS ’87, PhD with the Mack Easton Distinguished Alumni Award for his long-term commitment to CU, and especially its students. Charlie is a three-time CU degree holder having received his BS in biology and his MS in biological science from CU Denver’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences before completing his PhD in ecology and evolutionary biology at CU Boulder. Charlie has been instrumental in the development of several K-12 pipeline programs, as well as post-baccalaureate programs designed to help students from disadvantaged backgrounds obtain a college education and pursue their dreams of entering the medical profession. 

Charlie was a faculty member at CU Denver from 1985-2019, which included serving as director of the Health Careers Advising Center, the BA-BS/MD program, and the BS/DDS UCD/Kuwait cooperative programs at CU Denver, and chairing the Health Careers Advisory Committee, all of which he helped develop. 

Charlie’s unwavering dedication to students was evident in his extended office hours offered to pre-health students when he was a professor, to authoring a cookbook for his students demonstrating the cost effectiveness and health benefits of eating at home, and writing countless medical and graduate school recommendations for students. 

In addition to providing continued support to his former students after they have graduated, Charlie also mentors local at-risk high school students. His commitment to access to education, particularly those from rural areas and underrepresented backgrounds, has greatly influenced the futures of countless students and their communities. As stated in his nomination, “Charlie's own winding path to CU Denver makes him uniquely empathetic to his students. His students were immediately aware that he gets it, and Charlie truly gives all he has to this campus and its students.”

Charlie’s past honors include Carnegie Foundation Professor of the Year for Colorado, CU System’s Thomas Jefferson Scholar, CU Faculty Feminist of the Year by the CU Women's Resource Center, and two College of Liberal Arts and Sciences awards for Excellence in Teaching.