Jeff Loats, Assistant Physics Professor at Metropolitan State College of Denver received the Faculty Senate Teaching Award this August. “The ceremony was a combination of a ‘welcome back to the school year’ and a recognition of various award winners,” says Loats, who was very pleased and honored to be recognized. Loats, who was nominated last year but didn’t win, found it really nice to see, “smiling colleagues showing their appreciation for my work.” Colleagues and students have shared lots of positive feedback with the deserving Loats who finds himself lucky to, “enjoy my work and to be recognized for the effort I put into it.”
The rejection Loats received last year wasn’t all bad though. He says the rejection letter he received from the head of the committee was the “nicest” of his life. The letter explained to Loats that even though he didn’t win the award, the committee head hoped he would someday be “half the teacher” Loats is.
The nomination process for the Faculty Senate Teaching Award is two-fold. First, candidates are nominated by a colleague. After that, nominees have an application to fill out on their own. Loats had to complete essay questions and explain why his teaching style is unique or creative. Luckily, Loats relies on the skills he’s polished as a Faculty Advisor along with his usage of MasteringPhysics to set himself apart from his fellow nominees.
While Loats doesn’t believe being a Faculty Advisor made him more eligible for the award, he does feel that his, “talent for synthesizing ideas about teaching and learning,” has helped increase the value of his thoughts and philosophies for his peers. His own classes benefit as well since this talent enables Loats to pull in new ideas when working with faculty in his own department.
Other determining factors in the award nomination process for this award include how the candidate stays current in his or her own field. Information about assessment and even what a typical class period is like provided Loats’ evidence. His teaching philosophy for a physics course is all about giving students the opportunity to practice the necessary skills without fearing failure. Fearing failure isn’t the same thing as experiencing failure, though, and Loats wants students to fail on occasion in order to turn around and improve. “A lot of evidence tells us that learning something new requires that you build from your current knowledge base. I put this idea to work in my classes in many ways,” says Loats who uses MasteringPhysics within this model to assign homework. Combined with Just-in-Time Teaching and Peer Instruction, Loats uses MasteringPhysics to give students “safe opportunities” to develop their skills and get immediate feedback before they’re required to test skill mastery on an exam.
With a teaching philosophy centered on developing student skill mastery and a natural ease at communicating ideas about teaching and learning with colleagues, it’s no wonder Loats was an obvious candidate for this award, and Pearson congratulates his well-deserved win.
Have you been recognized by your peers/institution for your teaching efforts? Would you like to share your story with your fellow FAs (if so contact lesly.gregory@pearson.com)? How has your MyLab or Mastering product helped you become an innovator in your course?
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