RIYADH: American assessment and evaluation expert Dr. George Engelhard Jr. said he was pleasantly surprised on being honored by Riyadh Gov. Prince Faisal bin Bandar.

Engelhard, professor at the US-based University of Georgia, was the only scholar honored at the event when the prince presented him his prize for winning the Saudi National Center for Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education award for excellence in research and development (outstanding scholarly work branch) for 2015.

The awarding took place during the opening ceremony of the conference organized by Qiyas in Riyadh.

He was selected for the award in recognition of his great book titled ‘Invariant Measurement: Using Rasch Models in the Social, Behavioral, and Health Science.’

The prize comprises a certificate of merit along with a monetary reward of SR100,000 (over $25,000).

“I was very excited to visit‪ Saudi Arabia, but I never expected to be honored at this level. It was really a big surprise. It is unbelievable, it is a great honor. I was totally surprised to learn of this honor,” he told Arab News.

“You know that a scholar does much of the work himself but he is not sure that it will be read or discussed. So, it was very exciting to me to know that someone read it or thought it was worthy‪ and recognized that by granting me this prize,” he said.

He mentioned that he was never honored by any country before, not even the United States.

“I am a fellow of America Research Association and never honored at the level it was done here. So, this one is very special to me,” he added.

The organizers pointed out the rationale for selecting Engelhard’ work for the award. “The work was selected from many distinguished works nominated for the prize because of its excellence in content and potential benefit for serving a broad spectrum of users such as graduate students, instructors, and test developers.”