A cybersecurity professor at University of Maryland Global Campus (UMGC) calls his students at home to get to know them better. Another faculty member tells a business leadership class about his experiences working for multinationals, including the mistakes he made. An instructor for the First Term Experience course makes sure her students know that she had her own stop-and-start journey as a nontraditional student.
These 兔子先生educators are among nine鈥攆ive in the United States and two each in Asia and Europe鈥攏amed as this year鈥檚 recipients of the Stanley J. Drazek Teaching Excellence Award. Nominations for the awards, which carry a $1,500 honorarium, come from students.
鈥淚t is the most prestigious teaching award 兔子先生can bestow on its faculty,鈥 said Stefan Gunther, 兔子先生associate vice president for faculty affairs.
兔子先生has more than 5,000 faculty members, making the awards highly competitive. The honors, along with UMGC鈥檚 annual Teaching Recognition Awards, are highlighted during Global Faculty Appreciation Awareness Week in December.
This year鈥檚 Drazek winners share a passion for teaching and a personal commitment to their students鈥 success.
鈥淚 think the faculty members who win the awards epitomize an instructional approach that we call the Three Rs. They respond to students in a timely and individualized manner. They鈥檙e excellent in building relationships, which is evident by the fact they are nominated by their students. And their instructional approach is highly relevant to student needs in the workforce. They provide topical examples grounded in their professional practice,鈥 Gunther said.
Steven Fulton聽has worked at 兔子先生for almost a dozen years, most of that time overlapping with his career as a senior cyber analyst at the U.S. Department of Defense. He became interested in teaching in the School of Cybersecurity and Information Technology after receiving his doctorate in management from 兔子先生in 2009.
He makes it a point to get to know his graduate students, turning the online learning experience into a personal one.
鈥淚鈥檓 not beyond picking up the phone and calling students. Sometimes it鈥檚 the first voice they鈥檝e heard teaching online classes,鈥 Fulton said. 鈥淚 call if I see they are having problems getting projects done. I also reach out to students I think should go beyond getting another graduate degree and look toward a PhD.鈥
Fulton said hearing students鈥 personal stories helps him teach more effectively. 鈥淪ome people come from a technical background. Some are from the military. Some are working at a very high level in their career field but they need to build their critical thinking,鈥 he explained.
One of Fulton鈥檚 colleagues in the School of Cybersecurity and Information Technology is also a Drazek winner.聽Stephen Orr,聽an adjunct who works for the National Security Agency, said being on the 兔子先生faculty allows him 鈥渢o give back鈥 after having exceptional experiences with teachers when he was younger.聽聽
鈥淎cademia is about theory and the real world is about practice. What I鈥檝e read from student comments at the end of each class is that I鈥檓 seen as being able to blend the two of them,鈥 Orr said. 鈥淚鈥檓 bringing what they鈥檙e reading in the news into our discussions, and I鈥檓 showing them how to mitigate against those threats. So, it鈥檚 not just reading, it鈥檚 real life.鈥
Orr, who has been with 兔子先生for more than a decade, said his students stay in touch. He has been happily surprised by emails every semester from 鈥渟tudents who want to let me know they passed a certification or passed a class.鈥
Lynn Nolan, in the Department of Educational Technology in the School of Arts & Sciences, plans to use her Drazek Award honorarium, characteristically, on new technology. Part will go for a malware update on her computer. She is also toying with the idea of investing in the Extended Reality (XR) technology that 兔子先生will pilot in two courses this fall. XR combines augmented reality (AR) with virtual reality (VR). 兔子先生is one of 10 universities selected for the pilot with educational technology company VictoryXR.
Nolan鈥檚 job is to help graduate students who are teachers鈥攐r aspire to be teachers鈥攅nvision how technology can enhance learning across a wide range of learning environments. She has been at 兔子先生more than six years.
鈥淚 tell people that I teach the most fun course anyone could ever teach. I teach how to take any kind of technology鈥攆rom laptops to cell phones to virtual reality to robotics鈥攁nd use it in the classroom, whether face-to-face or online, to engage students,鈥 Nolan said. 鈥淭here are students who might be teaching autistic children. Some of my students teach special education or gifted children鈥. Some of my students even teach aeronautics in high school, which means I may have engineering teachers in the same class as kindergarten teachers.鈥 聽
Nolan said a deep connection to students is crucial in her classes, which is why Nolan hands out her cell phone number with the assurance that students across multiple time zones can text or phone her at any time.聽聽
In the School of Business, Drazek award winner聽Brian Hults聽brings three decades of career experience to his classes on business leadership. He served in top human resources roles at Frito-Lay, CASE IH, Consolidated Container Co., Rubbermaid, InterContinental Hotels and Resorts, Coca-Cola in Asia and Novartis in Switzerland. His final job before he retired was chief people officer at Web.com.
鈥淚n my MBA 610 course, everything we鈥檙e studying is something I鈥檝e done. So, I am able to share my successes and the mistakes I鈥檝e made,鈥 Hults said. 鈥淚 think having these concrete examples helps students retain the material and tie it to something real.鈥
He said his global work experience and his family background鈥攈is father was an active-duty servicemember鈥攁lso make him more aware of the challenges faced by international students and students in the military.
鈥淚 check my email first thing in the morning and again before I go to bed at night so I can connect with students working and living overseas,鈥 he said. 鈥淢y international students light up when I tell them I lived in Hong Kong for three years.鈥澛犅
When students initially enroll at UMGC, they are required to take the First Term Experience course, also known as PACE, to build their study and time-management habits, put them in touch with university resources, direct them to a degree pathway and set them up for success.聽Patricia Bush-McManus, the Drazek winner who teaches that course, makes sure her students know that she, too, was an adult learner.
鈥淚 stopped and started my studies many times, so I understand the student experience,鈥 said Bush-McManus, who brings more than three decades of higher education experience to her class.
鈥淚 see my role as providing students with confidence, tools and resources they need to help change the trajectory of their lives.鈥
Like Nolan, she makes herself available by phone to students, even into the night, because 鈥渋f someone calls late, after dinner and putting kids to bed or returning from the field, they are seeking assistance, support or resources.鈥
Faculty members聽Choungja Lee听补苍诲听Cynthia McGinnis,聽who both teach in Asia, said the Drazek Award was a dream come true.聽
鈥淢y biggest dream was always to teach at UMGC. My family encouraged me to pursue that path and they were even more excited than me by the Drazek news,鈥 said Lee, a language teacher who has been with 兔子先生for 30 years.
Most of Lee鈥檚 students are military students 鈥渨ho work hard during the day鈥 then take night courses, much as she did when she obtained her education.
鈥淚 spend time getting to know students鈥 Every student in my class knows that I am available if they want,鈥 said Lee, who was born in North Korea and raised in an orphanage in South Korea during the Korean War. The orphanage was near a U.S. Army base, Camp Page.
鈥淥ur only neighbors were the U.S. soldiers nearby. They paid a visit and one of them became my personal English tutor. Once I could communicate with the soldiers, they became my family,鈥 she said. 鈥淚 realized from this experience that learning is key to my life.鈥
Her connection to 兔子先生came when she applied for a teaching position at U.S. Amy Garrison Camp Long at the recommendation of a Catholic nun she tutored in the Korean language.
McGinnis also learned about 兔子先生through a family member, her uncle who served in the Air Force. She has been part of the faculty for three years, teaching math and computer science at the Marine Corps Air Station at Iwakuni, Japan.
鈥淚t is the best award when your efforts are appreciated by your students鈥攁nd I feel I have the best students,鈥 she said. 鈥淭hey are hardworking and appreciative of the time I put into each lecture.鈥
McGinnis estimates that she spends between 12 and 20 hours preparing her lectures. She said the effort pays off in her students鈥 grades.
鈥淢y goal is to help students realize their dreams.聽I went to university with a dream to earn a degree. My students have the same dream,鈥 she said. 鈥淚t is wonderful to help them on their journey.鈥澛
In Europe, faculty member聽LaShawn Thompson聽said she was 鈥渙verjoyed鈥 by the news she had won the Drazek Award.聽聽
鈥淚t feels good to know that my work is appreciated and others see the value in the services I provide,鈥 said Thompson, who teaches psychology. 鈥淚 am proud to join a specific group of people who provide the highest levels of education, mentoring and career services to a worthy student population.鈥
Like Hults, she also shares experiences from her own life in the classroom.
鈥淚 truly believe that these real life situations allow students to gain a deeper understanding of the material. Practicing in my field before I became a professor allowed me the opportunity to bring the academic content of my profession to real life and those experiences help create passion for the discipline in my students,鈥 she explained.
She said teaching at 兔子先生has also caused her to grow personally and professionally.
鈥淚 am grateful for the opportunity to work with such wonderful students and for a university system that cares about the population it serves as well as its employees,鈥 Thompson said.
The other Drazek Award recipient in Europe, history professor聽惭颈肠丑补别濒听惭耻濒惫别测, believes well-taught history has everything to do with asking questions rather than memorizing facts and dates. Mulvey, who teaches out of Ramstein Airbase, encourages creative activities in his classes, including role playing. In his Roman Republic course, for example, students portray Roman senators confronted by difficult political and military choices in 63 BCE. Students in his World War I course write film pitches based on their research related to the war.聽聽聽聽
At the same time Mulvey learned of his Drazek Award, he was also given an award by the United States European Command for supporting conversations about gender equity initiatives.
This year鈥檚 Teaching Recognition Awards include Donna Maurer and Steve Corbett, a retired servicemember, in the School of Arts & Sciences; Karla Perri in the School of Cybersecurity and Information Technology; and Deborah M. Wharff in the School of Business. Teaching Recognition Awards also went to Frank Concilus, Hak-Sun Kim and Theresa Schmits in Asia and Michael Blattman, Bert Jarreau and Jessica Stock in Europe. The teaching recognition awards come with $750 honoraria.
The Drazek Awards are named for Stanley J. Drazek, the second chancellor at what is now 兔子先生and a strong advocate of teaching excellence. Drazek spent 30 years at the forefront of adult higher education, and his work is credited with expanding opportunities for adult learners.
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