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2020-21 College of Science awards: Celebrating excellence in teaching and advising

By Cari Longman

On April 22, the College of Science gathered virtually to recognize academic, administrative and teaching excellence at the 2020-21 Combined Awards Ceremony – a merge of our annual Faculty and Staff Awards and Teaching and Advising Awards events.

The first half of the ceremony celebrated excellence in research and administration, and the second half the ceremony focused on outstanding teaching, advising and mentoring,

The College congratulates the Teaching and Advising Awards winners below who exemplify deep commitment, skill and effectiveness in mentoring and advising to ensure student learning and success within and beyond the classroom. Effective teaching, advising and mentorship are the very heart of the College of Science’s identity as a robust and thriving community of students and scholars.

Congratulations to all the nominees and especially to the award winners.

2021 Teaching, Advising and Mentoring Award Winners

Olaf Boedtker Award for Excellence in Academic Advising

Tiffany Bolman

BioHealth Sciences Advisor Tiffany Bolman

Tiffany Bolman, biohealth sciences advisor, won the Olaf Boedtker Award for her tireless support, efforts and advocacy on behalf of undergraduate students. Olaf Boedtker was a former professor in the Department of Physics for 23 years and served as head advisor in the College for 14 years from 1973 to 1987. This award recognizes exceptional and inspirational undergraduate advising.

More than ten students nominated Bolman for this award, praising her dedication and ability to connect and encourage students to achieve their goals.

One student nominator wrote of Bolman: “During one of the hardest years of my life, I met my new advisor, Tiffany. Changing your advisor in the middle of your junior year can be stressful. The first time I met her, my meeting lasted almost two hours because we spent time getting to know each other and talking about life. The way that Tiffany has been here to support me is incredible – as an advisor, a mentor, a friend and a support system. She's helped me in countless ways this past year, not just for school and for my future, but personally. I know I would not be where I am right now without her.”

“Tiffany has guided me in my fast-paced college experience and is always courteous when I talk to her,” wrote another biohealth science student nominator. “She has provided ample opportunities for me to get involved in health care and shadowing, even during Covid-19, in order for me to be a competitive applicant for medical school. I feel as though Tiffany wants the best for all of her students, including myself, and her heartwarming encouragement never lets me down.”

Another student had similar praises for Bolman. “I transferred to Oregon State and [Tiffany Bolman] was the first faculty member I had any interactions with. She seems to truly care about the future of the students she is advising and is overall an amazing person to talk to.”

Additional nominees for the Olaf Boedtker Award included

  • Allison Evans, instructor of microbiology
  • Kari Van Zee, senior instructor for biochemistry and biophysics
  • Maureen Leong-Kee, advisor for integrative biology
  • Vince Remcho, professor of chemistry

Loyd F. Carter Award for Outstanding and Inspirational Teaching (Undergraduate)

Corinne Manogue

Professor of physics Corinne Manogue

Professor of physics Corinne Manogue won this year’s Loyd F. Carter Award for Outstanding and Inspirational Teaching in Science. Manogue teaches the nationally-recognized Paradigm in Physics courses, which are a restructuring of the traditional upper-division curriculum for physics students to a more modern, flexible and inclusive model for learning physics.

Student nominees cited Manogue’s extra efforts to ensure her students understand content, her ability to teach complex topics, and her compassion with her students in an especially tiring year.

“She is an outstanding teacher who really works to understand how her students are approaching the material and provides numerous ways for the students to actively engage with the content,” wrote one student nominator. “She is very aware that each student has a different learning style and that content needs to be restated multiple ways and in multiple forms and that each version will resonate differently with each student.”

Other student nominators had similar praises for Manogue. "She is truly fantastic at explaining complex topics in ways that relate them to us students, and it was often that many would exclaim how well they understood ideas and techniques significantly better after having an explanation from her in class," said one nominator, and another added: "Corinne convinced me that there weren't such things as 'STEM people' and that success in STEM was available to me and other students who like me had been dissuaded by a perception of being inherently 'not smart enough' to become physicists."

Manogue has received recognition at multiple levels – Oregon State University, the state of Oregon and nationally – for her teaching excellence and has previously won a number of awards recognizing her teaching excellence, including the College of Science Frederick H. Horne Award for Sustained Excellence in Teaching in 2000, an American Association of Physics Teachers Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Physics Teaching in 2008, and the 2016 Oregon Academy of Science Outstanding Educator in Science and Mathematics award.

Additional nominees for the Loyd F. Carter undergraduate award included

  • Daniel Myles, senior instructor of chemistry
  • Daniel Rockwell, senior instructor of mathematics
  • Devon Quick, senior instructor of integrative biology
  • Kimberly Halsey, associate professor of microbiology
  • Linsday Biga, senior instructor of integrative biology
  • KC Walsh, senior instructor of physics

Loyd F. Carter Award for Outstanding and Inspirational Teaching (Graduate)

Charlotte Wickham with a black background

Senior Instructor of statistics Charlotte Wickham

Senior Instructor of statistics Charlotte Whickam received the Loyd Carter award for her inspirational and superb mentorship and teaching of graduate students.

“Charlotte is an extremely talented statistician and teacher. You can tell she is extremely passionate about the things she teaches and is invested in her students learning. She is also very approachable, despite teaching an online course,” wrote one graduate student nominator. “The material I have learned in her class has been useful and applicable to all of my work as a statistician,” they added.

“Dr. Wickham really took the time and got involved with my term project topic. She understood my skill level and was really great on providing feedback,” wrote another nominator.

A specialist in R training, Wickham teaches courses in data visualization and the foundations of data analytics. In 2020 Wickham received the Oregon State Ecampus Excellence in Online Teaching and Student Engagement Award. Wickham has developed multiple Ecampus courses built around students and their learning, leveraging open source materials and engaging texts from the Valley Library at Oregon State University.

Frederick H. Horne Award for Sustained Excellence in Teaching Science

Senior Instructor for biochemistry and biophysics Kari Van Zee

Senior Instructor for biochemistry and biophysics Kari Van Zee

Senior Instructor for biochemistry and biophysics Kari Van Zee won the Frederick H. Horne Award for her exceptional qualities as a teacher and mentor. This award is named after Fred Horne, OSU Professor Emeritus of Chemistry and the former College of Science Dean for 13 years, from 1986 to 1999.

Kendra Jackson (’20, biochemistry and biophysics), praised Van Zee in her nomination letter, writing, “Kari made a great impact on my education at OSU and has empowered me to be an independent learner.”

Jackson interacted with Van Zee as a student, mentee, teaching assistant and advisee. She added in her letter that “Kari is compassionate and deeply cares about the well-being of her students.” This quality was especially apparent during the 2020-2021 school year with remote learning. “Kari constantly checked up on struggling students in each section, offered solutions for students who could not access technology or adequate study spaces, and adapted the class based on student feedback.”

Tanushri Kumar, a 2020 biochemistry graduate and Ph.D. student at the University of Washington, also wrote a nomination letter. She praised Van Zee’s personal connection with her students: “Kari is a fantastic teacher, a scholar, and a devoted mentor to all her students. It is truly rare to find a teacher as talented and as compassionate as she is. Without her guidance, I would have never discovered my own passion for research, and without her support I would not have had the courage to apply for graduate school. The impact she has had on my life has been huge, and I am incredibly grateful for having her as a mentor and instructor.”

College of Science Whiteley Faculty Scholar for Teaching Excellence Award

Devon Quick

Senior Instructor of integrative biology Devon Quick

Senior Instructor Devon Quick in the Department of Integrative Biology received this award which recognizes excellent teaching and learning innovation. This award will provide Quick with an annual stipend of $12,500 for three years.

Widely commended for her teaching of biology, human anatomy and physiology courses, Quick has received awards for her exceptional teaching in the past. In 2020, she received the Loyd F. Carter Award, and in 2016 she received university-wide recognition by receiving the OSU Faculty Teaching Excellence Award.

Quick is a co-founder of the Learning Assistants Program, which puts high-achieving undergraduate assistants in large enrollment, often first-and second-year STEM classrooms to facilitate and strengthen undergraduate learning. She also collaborated with fellow biology instructor Lindsay Biga to adapt an open source biology textbook that is freely accessible to OSU students and learners worldwide.

OSU Faculty Scholars for Teaching Excellence Award

KC Walsh

Physics instructor KC Walsh

Physics instructor KC Walsh won the Faculty Scholars for Teaching Excellence Award. This award for a three-year faculty scholar position supports excellence and innovation in teaching and carries an annual stipend of $12,500.

Walsh helped to transform OSU’s introductory physics classes by reversing the traditional learning environment. In flipped classrooms, students receive course content online outside of the classroom, freeing up classroom time for active learning. He then pioneered the flipped classroom in the online environment long before the pandemic forced all instructors and faculty to adjust to all-online teaching. The results of the flipped classroom model have been dramatic: the withdraw rate from introductory physics class dropped from 36 percent to only 12 percent with a marked increase in course satisfaction.

Walsh previously received the OSU Faculty Teaching Excellence Award for his significant and meritorious achievement in teaching and scholarship that enhances effective instruction. And in 2018, the Department of Physics received the American Physics Society (APS) Award for Improving Undergraduate Physics Education, due in part to Walsh’s pioneering flipped classrooms and his early use of online resources to increase student success.

The OSU and Whiteley Faculty Scholars for Teaching Excellence awards are made possible thanks to the generous philanthropic support of our alumni and friends and matching funds invested by the Provost’s Office.

Read more about the winners of the 2020-21 graduate and undergraduate research and administration awards.