Faculty Awards

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE WINNERS OF THIS YEAR’S FACULTY AWARDS!

• Dawn Bowen, Professor of Geography — Grellet C. Simpson Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching
• Mukesh Srivastava, Associate Professor of Management Information Systems — Graduate Faculty Award
• Rosemary Jesionowski, Assistant Professor of Art — Alumni Association Outstanding Young Faculty Award
• Gary Richards, Assistant Professor of English — Mary W. Pinschmidt Award

The winner of the J. Christopher “Topher” Bill Service Award will be announced at the opening General Faculty Meeting in August.

The nomination process for next year’s outstanding faculty awards will be launched sometime in January 2013.  The call for nominations will proceed in similar fashion to approach used in January 2012 to request nominations for this year’s awards.  The last call for nominations appears below; check back in January 2013 for details about the next request for nominations!

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MEMORANDUM to UMW Students, Faculty, and Staff

I encourage you to submit one or more nominations of candidates for our annual faculty awards —(1) the Grellet C. Simpson Award for excellence in undergraduate teaching, (2) the Graduate Faculty Award, (3) the Alumni Association Outstanding Young Faculty Award, and (4) the J. Christopher “Topher” Bill Service Award.

Last year’s winners of these awards were Teresa Kennedy, Professor of English (Grellet C. Simpson Award); Laurie Abeel, Associate Professor of  Education (Graduate Faculty Award); Krystyn Moon, Associate Professor of History and American Studies (Outstanding Young Faculty Award); and Ernie Ackermann, Professor of Computer Science (Topher Bill Award).

There is one other faculty award, the Mary W. Pinschmidt Award, and it is determined by the Student Government Association.  Last year’s winner was Chad Murphy, Assistant Professor of Political Science.  Please do not nominate anyone for the Pinschmidt award through this process.

A list of all recipients of these awards is available here.

Nomination Process

Nominations are welcome from any member of the University community.  Send a letter to me, indicating the specific reasons for the nomination.  The deadline for the receipt of nomination letters is Friday, March 2, 2012.  All nominations must be submitted electronically as either a word or pdf document (pdf preferred).  Send the nomination letter as a file attachment to Amy O’Reilly (aoreilly@umw.edu).

All full-time continuing faculty are eligible to be nominated for the Simpson Award or for the Graduate Faculty Award.  Keep in mind, though, that the Simpson Award is for outstanding undergraduate teaching.  Also, nominees for the Graduate Faculty Award must be persons who teach graduate students and have distinguished themselves as members of a graduate program at the University.

The Outstanding Young Faculty Award is presented to a full-time faculty member who has between two and five years of full-time teaching service at UMW.  Please consult this list of eligible faculty before nominating someone: Alumni Award eligibility list 2012

The Topher Bill Award recognizes outstanding faculty service. Nominees must have served a minimum of seven years as a member of the Mary Washington teaching faculty and must have been significantly and consistently involved in a variety of service roles through department, college, university, and/or community service activities.

Award Presentations

The Graduate Faculty Award will be presented at the Graduate Commencement ceremony on Friday evening, May 11.  The Simpson Award and the Young Faculty Award will be presented at the Undergraduate Commencement ceremony on Saturday May 12.  The Topher Bill Award will be presented at the opening general faculty meeting in August 2012.

Selection Process

The University Committee on Sabbaticals, Fellowships, and Faculty Awards will review all nominations and select the winners.  Members of this committee are:

• Chris Foss, Department of English, Linguistics, and Communication (Chair)
• Jean Dabb, Department of Art and Art History (Secretary)
• Teresa Coffman, Department of Curriculum and Instruction
• Bob Greene, Department of Management and Marketing
• Dawn Bowen, Department of Geography

Thank you very much for your attention to this important matter.  Please let me know if you have any questions.  Once again, the deadline for nominations in Friday, March 2, 2012.  All nominations must be submitted electronically to Amy O’reilly (aoreilly@umw.edu).  I look forward to receiving a nomination letter from you.