2012 Teaching Excellence Award Winners

Robert S. Daniel Teaching Excellence Award

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The 2012 winner of the Robert S. Daniel Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding teaching at a 4-year college or university is David B. Daniel of James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Dr. Daniel received his BA in Psychology from San Diego State University and his MA and PhD from West Virginia University. He is currently professor of Psychology at James Madison University.

Dr. Daniel has taught many courses, ranging from General Psychology, Child and Adolescent Development, and Cross Cultural Psychology to Controversial Issues in Psychology and a graduate Seminar in College Teaching. He has also reached beyond traditional psychology classes to teach courses such as Learning and Cognition for Physics Teachers, The Brain and Learning (cross listed with Biology), and, at the Lower Brule Tribal/Community College, Lakota Thought and Culture.

Across all of these teaching endeavors, Dr. Daniel incorporates a wide range of teaching methods. He seamlessly blends television and movie clips, references to popular culture, and well-timed humor into his courses. He uses PowerPoint, but he presents little text, lots of ideas, and a series of critical thinking exercises, reflecting the lessons he disseminated in his widely acclaimed presentation, Using PowerPoint to Ruin a Perfectly Good Lecture: Where Student Learning, Cognitive Psychology and Educational Practice Collide. Additionally, Dr. Daniel consistently evaluates his own teaching, sometimes with outcomes that are published and sometimes with unpublished assessments that contribute to his own development as a teacher.

Dr. Daniel’s student evaluations include stellar quantitative ratings as well as overwhelmingly positive comments. Despite the possibility that teaching hard classes could negatively impact class evaluations, students overwhelmingly accept and embrace the difficulty of Dr. Daniel’s courses as a valuable challenge that encourages students to rise to his high expectations. He receives these accolades not only from committed psychology students in major-specific classes but also from students who take General Psychology to fulfill a university requirement.

His students note Dr. Daniel’s broad influence in their lives. His students discussed the education outcomes that resulted from their collaborative work with Dr. Daniel or even just his lecture classes, but students also note his wider influence in their lives. Rarely does a faculty member affect people so broadly. Several students expressed gratitude for his willingness to teach creatively and, after reviewing a student’s work, to ask what some called the most important question: “Could you do better?”

The list of teaching awards and honors, particularly student-nominated awards, on Dr. Daniel’s vitae further testifies to his success. For example, Dr. Daniel was the Faculty Member of the Year for 3 years at the University of Maine at Farmington. To be clear, Dr. Daniel did not simply win the award or repeat this impressive accomplishment; he won the award 3 times in a row before, with his help, the university retired him from eligibility. Among other accolades, he was nominated for U.S. Professor of the Year through Carnegie Foundation, he has been featured in Princeton Review’s Best Professors Publication, and he received the 2011 Outstanding General Education Teaching Award from the Department of Psychology at James Madison University. One writer noted that Dr. Daniel was at the University of Northern Colorado for only 2 years but that he “still managed to receive 2 major teaching awards from different student groups and once again was nominated for the campus wide Teacher of the Year Award.” At James Madison University [JMU], the writer continued, “David has been nominated each year for multiple awards including the General Education Distinguished Faculty Award and the JMU Alumni Association’s Distinguished Teacher Award, which unfortunately he is unable to meet the criteria for until he has been at JMU for 5 years.”

Dr. Daniel’s work with students has also inspired his colleagues. One colleague who chose to coteach with Dr. Daniel wrote “[H]e is very dedicated to his craft and he once told me that he treats each student and teaches each student like he wants his daughter to be taught and treated and that motivates him for excellence. A very committed and resolute man is David Daniel.” Another colleague noted that in her conversations with Dr. Daniel’s former students “These students not only remembered the demonstrations and examples that David used in class (and importantly, the point of those demonstrations and examples), but they also remembered how caring David was as a professor.” One psychology faculty member reported that she seeks to model her teaching on the experiences she had as an undergraduate in Dr. Daniel’s classes. His peer evaluations also note his amazing abilities to engage 300 students throughout his General Psychology class, even when teaching topics such as research methodology.

Dr. Daniel blends his classroom expertise with strong, teaching-centered research that includes his students throughout the process. Although he has published across a range of topics, most of his research has focused on teaching, and he has published extensively in journals such as Teaching of Psychology, Computers and Education, and Perspectives on Psychological Science. His recent scholarship has reached audiences beyond psychology with thought-provoking pieces in Science and The Chronicle of Higher Education. His CV includes 38 peer-reviewed articles, invited print chapters, and electronic publications, 53 convention presentations, and a monumental 78 invited talks centered on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning [SoTL]; importantly, more than 30 of his publications and presentations involve student and junior faculty coauthors. Additionally, Dr. Daniel helped Ms. Robyn Kondrad (the 2012 Wilbert J. McKeachie Teaching Excellence Award winner described subsequently) develop her Graduate Teaching Program at the University of Virginia.

Dr. Daniel seamlessly blends service with his teaching and scholarship. He is a co-founder and Executive Director of the International Mind, Brain, and Education Society as well as the Managing Editor of the organization’s journal, Mind, Brain, and Education; additionally, he has organized their convention and received their Distinguished Service Award. He has served the Society for the Teaching of Psychology as member of several national committees including but not limited to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Grant Selection Committee, the Pedagogical Innovation Task Force, and the Diversity Task Force. He was also the founding coordinator of the Society for Research In Child Development's Teaching Institute and inaugural chair of their teaching committee.

Throughout all of the materials related to his teaching, a central theme is the care that Dr. Daniel has for his students. Dr. Daniel is, as one writer stated, “A transformative professor,” and he clearly embraces, publicizes, and lives evidence-based pedagogy. In recognition of his exceptional accomplishments as a teacher, mentor, and scholar of psychology, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology is pleased to honor Dr. David B. Daniel with the 2012 Robert S. Daniel Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding teaching in a 4-year college or university.

Wayne Weiten Teaching Excellence Award

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The 2012 winner of the Wayne Weiten Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding teaching at a 2-year college is Virginia B. Wickline of Miami University Middletown in Middletown, Ohio. Dr. Wickline earned her BA at Anderson University and her MA and PhD at Emory University. She is currently assistant professor of Psychology at Miami University Middletown, where she teacher a range of classes including Abnormal Psychology, Personality Theory, Introduction to Psychological Statistics, and Psychology Across Cultures.

Although she has only been at her university since 2009, Dr. Wickline has already earned a stellar teaching and service learning reputation. In her second year at her university, she received the 2011 Miami University Middletown Excellence in Teaching Award, and she was the Miami Middletown campus award winner for the Greater Cincinnati Consortium of Colleges and Universities Celebration of Teaching luncheon. Additionally, she was nominated by her colleagues for the 2011 State Teacher of the Year Award through the Ohio Association of Two-Year Colleges. These are among the six teaching and service awards she received in 2011.

Dr. Wickline’s amazing reputation is well-earned. Her quantitative student evaluations are very impressive across all of her courses, and students rave about her teaching. She views her classrooms as cultures that are composed largely of nontraditional, first generation students, and she encourages students to investigate their own and others’ cultural assumptions and to reach across perceived lines of national origin, ethnicity, income, abilities, and other differences.

Across all of her classes, Dr. Wickline emphasizes the scientific nature of psychology, and she challenges her students to meet these expectations about science and the integration of science and practice. She supports this scientific approach with strong emphasis on service in her local and larger communities, and she states in her syllabi that she expects students to improve their communication skills and to reach across cultural lines.

Dr. Wickline emphasizes experiential and service education in her classes. For her Psychology Across Cultures class, she paired her students from the United States with international students “to discuss stereotypes, cultural values, and cultural practices.” She also developed “Crossing Borders” with an English Composition instructor who was teaching English as a Second Language, and their students worked together to gain understanding across cultures.

Dr. Wickline’s community service at Miami Middletown University continues her successful earlier endeavors at Emory University and at her first teaching position at the College of Wooster. Through her time at these institutions, she has generated numerous small grants as well as a substantial United States Department of Housing and Urban Development Community Outreach Partnership Centers grant to work in a low-income Black community in northwest Atlanta. Through this grant that she received as a graduate student, Dr. Wickline created one of the Emory University Psychology Department’s first “theory-practice learning” classes, teaching a community psychology class where undergraduates held college continuing education classes for the school teachers and developed an after-school program for at-risk teenage girls as well as a series of free monthly family educational gatherings called Parents and Children Coming Together nights. She also helped to create a school psychology practicum for clinical psychology graduate students that served a charter school in another primarily Black, low SES neighborhood. For these and other activities, Dr. Wickline was one of five recipients of the Emory Humanitarian Award in 2005 from the Emory Office of University–Community Partnerships, and she continues these trends at her current institution.

In her current position, Dr. Wickline helped bring students and faculty from her university together with community members to celebrate the Ohio legislature’s decision to strike derogatory words from the now renamed Butler County Board of Developmental Disabilities (BCBDD). She and her students were involved throughout this grassroots effort. She also organizes semiannual social events in which students and community members have opportunities to meet and interact with people with disabilities to reduce stereotypes and increase interaction across groups. For these efforts, she was a Community Recognition Recipient from the BCBDD. These successes continue her service work related to individuals with disabilities. Since 2006, Dr. Wickline has guided more than 500 students in service learning projects with Special Olympics or community individuals with developmental disabilities.

Dr. Wickline is consistently involved in service to her university, the discipline, and her immediate community, and one consistent theme is that her service projects connect her students to the local, regional, and larger communities. In addition to her work described previously, she has conducted community outreach projects with her university Diversity Council and Regional Diversity Council, she is a member of the Regional International Initiatives Advisory Council, the group that advises the Miami University system regarding the expansion of globalization, study abroad, and international exchange student programs. Additionally, she founded and is one of four faculty members who advise students in local service learning projects through SERVE, Students Engaging in Real Volunteer Efforts. SERVE received Miami University Middletown Student Government’s Community Involvement Award in 2011; for these and other activities, Dr. Wickline received the Miami Middletown Student Government’s Advisor of the Year Award.

Despite her high teaching load and amazing catalog of service activities, Dr. Wickline presents at national teaching conferences, including NIToP, the International Lilly Conference on College Teaching, and others, and she has published several papers, including peer-reviewed teaching articles in Teaching of Psychology and Journal on Educational Psychology. Additionally, despite her recent arrival at her institution, she has several manuscripts in preparation regarding her teaching experiences, including collaborative papers with colleagues and students.

One writer said, “I can’t overstate Ginger’s value to the campus and community, not to mention her academic discipline. In her short time on the Middletown campus, she has proven to be an innovative educator and a leader for positive change.” As her Department Chair stated, “Although she is only in her third year at Miami University, Ginger has left an indelible mark on the university and has had a meaningful impact on the lives of her students and the community.” For these and other reasons, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology is pleased to present Dr. Virginia B. Wickline with the 2012 Wayne Weiten Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding teaching at a 2-year college.

Mary Margaret Moffett Memorial Teaching Excellence Award

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The 2012 winner of the Mary Margaret Moffett Memorial Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding high school teaching is Nancy S. Diehl of Hong Kong International School, in Tai Tam, Hong Kong. Dr. Diehl received her BS in Psychology from Tufts University and her MS and PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of North Texas. She has taught since 2007 at the Hong Kong International School, where she is the instructor for Advanced Placement [AP] Psychology.

Dr. Diehl has taken an atypical road to teaching AP Psychology. She completed her doctoral work in clinical psychology with clinical internships and a postdoctoral fellowship at the Medical University of South Carolina. She then became assistant professor in the Department of Rehabilitation Sciences and the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the university. In these roles, she provided counseling and psychological services and ran an internally and externally funded research program investigating physical activity, social physique anxiety, and related topics in sport and exercise psychology. She built and continues to extend an extensive presentation and publication record in these fields, and then she brought her successful psychological career to Hong Kong to teach diverse high school students at the Hong Kong International School.

Dr. Diehl’s success at the Hong Kong International School has been exemplary. She serves as the only AP teacher, and enrollment in the class has tripled since her arrival. As one writer noted, despite the growing number of students, the mean pass rate for her students across the past several years is 95%, a particularly impressive feat for her culturally and linguistically diverse students, many of whom are English learners. Many students and colleagues credit Dr. Diehl for these outcomes. Her success has been further recognized with the 2011 High School Psychology Excellence in Teaching Award from the APA Teaching of Psychology in Secondary Schools.

Dr. Diehl combines her emphasis on scientific psychology with a strong humanistic perspective. In her teaching philosophy, she argues that “the classroom should be a place which students look forward to entering—warm, inviting, creative, and collaborative” and that “A classroom is a place for exchanges of ideas (two-way or 20-way).” Dr. Diehl consistently implements many interactive learning exercises to engage her students and to help them apply psychology in their lives. For example, she had each student portray a historical psychologist and engaged in a “speed dating” activity to learn about these psychologists. In another example, she presents each student with a cupcake and then provides five pages of AP examination review questions related to the cupcake. Students must identify brain structures associated with hunger and satiety, explain a psychological model of pain control if a cupcake eater bites his or her tongue, describe a potential treatment for an individual who fears cupcakes, and more.

Her teaching success follows from her drive to improve her classes, to connect with her students, and to contribute to their success. Dr. Diehl has adapted her teaching and grading to the environment of her specific high school, and she created a no-stress testing policy that emphasized learning over grades. As one grateful student noted, “Given the highly competitive, grade-driven atmosphere . . . it was refreshing as a student to know that a teacher cared more about my success in learning the actual material than solely preparing me for a standardized test.”

The word “passion” appeared in nearly every letter of support and description of Dr. Diehl’s teaching. As one colleague stated, “Nancy cares about her students and they know it.” As one former student informed her, “In a beanpod: You cared, you made class fun and interesting EVERY day, [and] you inspired me.” Another former student wrote, “[Dr. Diehl’s] interest in the subject sparked mine.”

The influence Dr. Diehl has on her students extends far beyond her high school campus. As one colleague noted, “In addition to her success as a classroom teacher based on student evaluations, course selection, and outcome measures, Dr. Diehl’s students have continued on in Psychology in colleges and universities in the United States and around the world. [She] serves as an inspiration to the next generation of practitioners and scholars.” One former student described Dr. Diehl’s dedication to her students’ success beyond high school; Dr. Diehl arranged for the student to serve as a research assistant for a psychology professor at nearby university, and the student currently studies psychology at a university in the United States.

Dr. Diehl’s success extends to other teachers of psychology. One colleague noted Dr. Diehl’s passion and her willingness to share her teaching and content expertise with other teachers; the colleague noted that in their early interactions, Dr. Diehl said, “I love talking about psychology and how to teach it.” Her vita notes several presentations for other high school teachers of psychology in venues such as the APA/Clark University Workshop for High School Teachers and the East Asia Regional Council of Overseas Schools, in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia.

Despite her extensive success, Dr. Diehl continues her growth as a psychologist and a teacher. One writer noted that, “[Dr. Diehl] has sought out advanced education attending psychology specialty and teaching conferences in Taiwan, England, Malaysia and the United States to expand her knowledge and ensure that she continues to do the best job possible for her students in the classroom.” In addition to attending and presenting at teaching conferences, she sought and completed College Board AP Psychology Teacher Training, and she has served as a grader for AP examinations. An administrator wrote that “She models continuous personal and professional growth.”

Beyond all of these activities, Dr. Diehl is currently extending her teaching to include service learning for her students by learning about Cambodian culture and history and by working with children at an orphanage in Cambodia; one of her early e-mail responses upon learning that she would receive the $1500 that comes with this teaching award was to exclaim that some of these funds would help her and her students continue this service learning project. In recognition of her passion and success as an international teacher of psychology and of her impact on psychology students who continue their learning around the world, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology is pleased to present Nancy S. Diehl with the 2012 Mary Margaret Moffett Memorial Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding high school teaching.

Wilbert J. McKeachie Teaching Excellence Award

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The 2012 winner of the Wilbert J. McKeachie Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding teaching as a graduate student is Robyn Kondrad from the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia. Ms. Kondrad earned her BS in Psychology at the College of William and Mary and her MA in Psychology at Arizona State University. She expects to complete her dissertation in 2012 in cognitive development at the University of Virginia.

Although Ms. Kondrad has yet to complete her doctoral program, she has already accumulated a diverse wealth of teaching experiences. She has served as a teaching assistant for several courses, and she has also succeeded as the instructor for many diverse classes, including some unique experiences that many faculty members have not faced. For example, through the Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies program at the University of Virginia, she developed and team-taught three courses for continuing education students, including Lifespan Development, Music and Cognition, and Social–Cognitive Development. She also sought and earned the opportunity to serve as a faculty member for the University of Virginia Semester at Sea program for which she developed and taught three courses, two of which were outside of her research areas, and she integrated course material into students’ classroom experiences for each of 11 ports of call.

Across all of these classes as well as her teaching assistantships, Ms. Kondrad’s evaluations are simply excellent and reflect her teaching philosophy that centers on “the power of showing students how fascinating psychology is compared to just telling them about it.” She seamlessly incorporates videos, cultural materials from around the world, community engagement, and service learning into her challenging, experiential courses.

Ms. Kondrad’s teaching successes are well recognized. Early in her graduate career, as a teaching assistant for a large lecture class of more than 300 students, her supervising professor admitted that expectations for attendance at outside review sessions were in or just above single digits, but the professor found that “Robyn's sessions proved me wrong—attendance was regularly above 100 and students raved about her.” As a teaching assistant, she was nominated by her students for the Teaching Resource Center Seven Society Graduate Fellowship for Superb Teaching. In the classes that she has taught as instructor of record, her quantitative course evaluations would be very impressive for any tenured faculty member with far more experience than she has, and students’ comments consistently glow. As one student said, “[Ms. Kondrad] put passion into [the course], [and] helped connect topics in meaningful ways . . . The way she encouraged us to do things that were good for us was extraordinary and will be helpful beyond this course.”

She has received Rebecca Boone Memorial Award for Excellence in Teaching and Service, and she is a two-time recipient of the Department of Psychology Distinguished Teaching Fellowship at the University of Virginia. She has also received several small grants for teaching from organizations such as the American Psychological Society Fund for Teaching and Public Understanding of Psychological Science, the University of Virginia Teaching Resources Center Tomorrow’s Professor Today, and various other programs at the University of Virginia.

Ms. Kondrad’s successes at these teaching endeavors have led to additional opportunities. The University of Virginia Teaching Resources Center selected five graduate students from across the university to participate in the Course Design Institute. The resulting syllabus aided Ms. Kondrad in earning her two Distinguished Teaching Fellowships, through which she taught Social–Cognitive Development as a new course at the University of Virginia. The impacts on her students are substantial for this class and beyond.

Ms. Kondrad has also influenced students as a research advisor. Since 2006, she has supervised undergraduate research assistants, including award-winning student research. She also incorporates students into her own cognitive developmental research projects on children’s perceptions, and her work includes several undergraduate student coauthors on her peer-reviewed convention presentations as well as her peer-reviewed publications and manuscripts in preparation.

Ms. Kondrad’s success at these endeavors reflects her larger interests in teaching and her impressive achievements in the teaching of psychology. Even as she is completing her doctoral studies, she is already affecting future teachers through her peer-reviewed convention presentations and invited teaching talks as well as through her involvement in the formal training of university instructors. For example, she initiated a program in partnership with James Madison University, the University of Virginia Teaching Resource Center, and the Department of Psychology at the University of Virginia to help graduate students become more effective teachers. In this process, she collaborated with several individuals, including Dr. David B. Daniel (the 2012 Robert S. Daniel Teaching Excellence Award winner described previously). This program incorporated workshops, speakers from outside the university, and opportunities for graduate students to record and critique their teaching effectiveness; Ms. Kondrad acquired two external grants to support this program. Additionally, she continued her growth as a teacher with a grant from the University of Virginia Teaching and Technology Support Partners to improve the uses of technology in classrooms.

Ms. Kondrad is already instructing other university teachers. Through the University of Virginia Teaching Resources Center Tomorrow’s Professor Today program, she was selected to teach the Teaching Pedagogy Seminar, a graduate-level seminar on the science of teaching, and she has taught a similar seminar to advanced undergraduates. These ideas reflect an integral part of her teaching philosophy: “To be an excellent teacher, one must continue to be a student.”

A constant theme through her teaching is her investment in students. As one student from the semester at sea stated, “Robyn genuinely cared about us. [The class] was organized and required a great deal of deep thinking. I retained a lot because [she] made me want to think about it outside class.” In recognition of Ms. Kondrad’s dedication to the teaching of psychology and her commitment to the dissemination of the science and scholarship of teaching at her university, in her region, and in the larger psychological community, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology is pleased to present Ms. Robyn Kondrad with the 2012 Wilbert J. McKeachie Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding teaching by a graduate student.

Jane S. Halonen Teaching Excellence Award

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The 2012 winner of the Jane S. Halonen Teaching Excellence Award for the first 5 years of teaching at any level is He Len Chung from the College of New Jersey in Ewing, New Jersey. She earned her BA in Anthropology at Washington University and her MA and PhD in clinical psychology at Temple University. She is currently assistant professor of Psychology at the College of New Jersey where she teaches traditional courses such as Methods and Tools of Psychology and Abnormal Psychology as well as a Collaborative Research course and several undergraduate seminars with titles such as Mental Health and Poverty and Psychosocial Interventions for Children and Adolescents.

Dr. Chung earns quantitative student evaluations that one writer called “stunningly high,” averaging above 4.85 on a 5-point scale for all items across all of her classes 2007–2011, all of which began as new preparations for her and three of which were new courses in her department. The written comments are similarly impressive, with students raving about organization, engagement, enthusiasm, and encouragement; as one student reported, “even when you did something wrong, she lets you know the right way in a positive manner.” Peer observers note that Dr. Chung makes each class fit her strengths and that “All of Dr. Chung’s courses involve impressive pedagogical innovation.”

Peer evaluators and students universally report high levels of engagement through every class session. Reviewers called Dr. Chung’s interactions with her students “exceptional,” “lively,” and “outstanding.” As one writer stated, “Dr. Chung cogently conveys her enthusiasm for and knowledge of the subject matter as well as its importance and value. Her manner is engaging and lively, and the students respond to her in kind.”

Students, colleagues who have observed Dr. Chung’s teaching, and administrators note that her extremely impressive organizational skills that start in her syllabi and continue through every aspect of every class session. Students and faculty also recognize Dr. Chung’s outstanding skills at the paradoxical task of letting students guide discussion while keeping the class firmly on topic. One writer reviewed conclusions from student evaluations and peer reviewers and noted that, “All of the evaluations indicate that students participate actively and in multiple ways and that Dr. Chung is able to provide feedback to student responses in a constructive and skilled manner.” As a student stated, Dr. Chung “encourages students to challenge themselves. She could not be better.”

Dr. Chung has earned teaching recognition and support from the larger community of the teaching of psychology as well as from her university. In the past 3 years, Dr. Chung has received a Faculty Development Grant and an Early Career Scholarship from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology. These awards are in addition to the five intramural grants she received to travel to present teaching papers, conduct collaborative research with students, or provide mentorship experiences to students through the summer.

Dr. Chung clearly views teaching as a lifelong learning endeavor; she clearly strives to improve and to challenge herself, and her teaching philosophy emphasizes regular reflection and evaluation of her teaching methods. One reviewer observed an advanced seminar and wrote, “Our form calls for ‘areas of growth or in need of improvement.’ I really have nothing to say in this regard.” Despite this and similar comments, Dr. Chung continues to push herself to greater heights.

Her teaching philosophy reflects her desires and skills to integrate research into her teaching (and teaching into her research) and to promote community-engaged learning for her students. For example, in her seminar on Mental Health and Poverty, students collaborate with a local juvenile correctional facility to provide assistance with substance abuse treatment. She has presented interactive sessions on community-engaged learning at a recent Council for Undergraduate Research convention to aid other instructors in the implementation of these successful teaching methods. As one writer stated, “Dr. Chung’s ability to bring scholarship into the classroom and teaching into her research embodies the Teacher-Scholar model.”

Dr. Chung engages in extensive research collaboration with students, and her successful outcomes include many completed honors theses, conference presentations, and creative collaborative research to evaluate the impacts of collaborative research. Additionally, her vitae is replete with students as coauthors and first authors, and, more specifically, she has a student coauthor on four of her peer-reviewed publications, including a paper recently invited for revision and resubmission. In addition to her classroom responsibilities, between 2007 and 2011 Dr. Chung closely mentored almost 50 students in research assistantships, internships, collaborative research, or honors theses. Her support for her students continues through the conclusion of their collaboration; she is a prolific writer of letters of recommendation, and more than half of her mentees have already been accepted into graduate and professional programs in psychology and related fields.

At her own institution, her Dean invited Dr. Chung to be the first chair of the College Undergraduate Research Council. As a writer described, “In this role, Dr. Chung shares her expertise on research instruction with faculty from other departments within the school and works to establish mechanisms and procedures for increasing opportunities for faculty-student collaborations on scholarly projects in a range of disciplines and which take a variety of formats.”

Beyond her endeavors at her own institution, she is an active participant in programming for the Society for the Teaching of Psychology, she has presented her teaching research at the Eastern Psychological Association meetings, and she is an elected Councilor for the Council of Undergraduate Research, Psychology Division.

As note writer noted, “In short, Dr. He Len Chung is a star.” In recognition of her excellent classroom teaching, her outstanding mentorship, and her collaborative research with students that extends from her classrooms into her community, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology is pleased to present Dr. He Len Chung with the 2012 Jane S. Halonen Teaching Excellence Award for the first 5 years of full-time teaching at any level.

Adjunct Faculty Teaching Excellence Award

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The Society for the Teaching of Psychology is pleased to introduce the Adjunct Faculty Teaching Excellence Award and to name the first recipient of this new honor, Dr. Hillary Hettinger Steiner of the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia. Dr. Steiner earned her BS in Education at Birmingham-Southern College, and she earned her MA and PhD in Educational Psychology at the University of Georgia. She was assistant professor of Psychology for 1 year in the Department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems at Florida State University. Since 2004 she has served as Adjunct Professor of Psychology at the University of Georgia where she teaches a wide array of traditional and online graduate and undergraduate courses including Cognition, Motivation, Research Methods, Learning and Development in Education, and Characteristics of Gifted Learners. She has recently begun to teach in the Georgia Center for Continuing Education, an independent distance learning program at the University of Georgia.

Across this wide range of courses, topics, and formats, Dr. Steiner earns impressive quantitative student evaluations that are consistently at the top of the scale, and these comments reflect the variety of instructional techniques she incorporates into classes, including, as one student noted, “small discussion groups, power point presentations with lectures [i.e., with recorded narration in online classes], individual and group assignments, papers, projects and exams.” The student added that “All assignments are accompanied by comprehensive rubrics.” Other students’ comments further demonstrate Dr. Steiner’s teaching skills. One student wrote, “the information I learned in this class will be information I take and remember when I have my own classroom. I enjoyed coming to class and I enjoyed my teacher.” Another student noted, “She presented information clearly, encouraged discussion, and provided an environment conducive to true learning. Because of this class and Hillary’s example, I have decided to pursue a Masters and Doctorate in Applied Cognition and Development.”

As a graduate student, Dr. Steiner received the Owen Scott Award for the graduate student most likely to succeed in a faculty career, and she has carried these expectations and her infectious enthusiasm into her current teaching positions. Dr. Steiner notes that she teaches many classes online and does not have the opportunity to meet many of her students face to face; despite this, she has earned a reputation of being an extremely caring teacher who is willing to walk the extra mile for students inside or outside of the classroom. She responds quickly to students via a variety of communication media, and she is clearly invested in her students’ success. As further evidence of her commitment to her students, she serves on many doctoral and master’s committees, even though these commitments remain outside of her formal job duties as an adjunct instructor.

Students recognize her intense dedication. About her online classes, a student wrote, “This class was 100% online, but it didn't feel that way. Dr. Steiner was always talking to us on the web, and she was always available to answer questions.” Dr. Steiner’s reputation precedes her. On an online class evaluation, another student wrote, “Dr. Steiner, you are as good as advertised. [I heard that] you were a tremendous professor and now I concur. Your speedy replies to everyone’s posts were . . . instructional while being academically non-threatening.” Another typical student comment stated, “Content was fascinating, method of delivery was effective, and most constructs studied were both applicable and pragmatic.” Students embrace Dr. Steiner’s extremely effective teaching. One student who served as a teaching assistant for Dr. Steiner noted how lucky the student felt and how envious student colleagues were, and the student emphasized that, “Whenever Dr. Steiner’s name is mentioned, it is always followed by a string of compliments.”

Dr. Steiner’s shining reputation emerged quickly and has continued to grow. A faculty colleague from the institution where she worked for only 1 year noted that “I observed her teaching and found her poised, professional and engaging” and that “Faculty and students alike were saddened when Hillary announced that she was” changing her career plans.

Despite her part-time status, Dr. Steiner contributes substantially to the larger goals of her department. One faculty member in her department noted the diverse and changing student populations in Dr. Steiner’s Educational Psychology courses, including traditional and nontraditional undergraduates, educational psychology graduate students, and teachers seeking continuing education. The faculty member wrote that “Hillary helped us figure out the relative course demands for on-campus versus on-line versions and allowed us to develop these offerings in a way that are both rigorous and that meet the changing needs of the students enrolled in them.” Another colleague noted that “Despite being adjunct faculty in our department, Dr. Steiner has become a departmental leader in online teaching in our department.” Dr. Steiner’s involvement commitment to her department and university is clearly above and beyond her formal adjunct status.

Dr. Steiner stays current in her fields as an active member of APA Division 15 (Educational Psychology), and she continues to publish in relevant peer-reviewed journals in her field, including Learning and Individual Differences, Gifted Child Quarterly, and Educational Psychology Review. She also regularly attends the Southeastern Teaching of Psychology conference hosted by Kennesaw State University in Georgia to stay current on pedagogical developments.

To provide a concise overview of Dr. Steiner’s teaching, one writer simply stated, “Hillary has always showed an engaging ‘rock star-like’ quality in her teaching.” In recognition of Dr. Steiner’s dedication to the teaching of psychology, to her students, and to her university, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology is pleased to present Dr. Hillary Hettinger Steiner with the first Adjunct Faculty Teaching Excellence Award for outstanding teaching by an adjunct faculty member.