Outstanding Workshop Award Recipients

Michael Hout, 2023

    • Michael C. Hout is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology, where he directs the Vision Sciences and Memory Laboratory. He also co-directs the Addison Care Virtual and Augmented Reality Lab. He is an Associate Editor at the journal Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics.  Michael recently finished a two-year position as Program Director at the National Science Foundation, co-directing the Perception, Action, and Cognition program as well as the  Cognitive Neuroscience program .  He has won several awards for research and teaching. He presented the workshop entitled, “Navigating NSF: Breaking Down Barriers," where participants learned how to navigate NSF and apply for federal funding.    

Monica Torres, 2018

    • Dr. Mónica Torres   has been in higher education for more than thirty years: as teacher, program coordinator, scholar, and administrator. She came to NMSU in 2002 as an assistant professor on the rhetoric faculty. She became head of the English Department in 2008. She moved to Doña Ana Community College in 2013 to serve as the vice president for academic affairs. She now serves as president.

      Over the course of Mónica’s career, she has developed a significant interest relative to the university’s teaching function. How do we ensure that students from a broad range of backgrounds have access to college opportunities? This interest has prompted her to use:

          • her own classroom to develop teaching skills
          • her scholarship to analyze diversity and equity issues
          • her administrative privilege to study access and success issues.

      Mónica tells us that her participation in Teaching Academy programs—as participant, mentor, and presenter—has been an important part of her continued development.

      In her role as Teaching Academy diversity fellow, Mónica prepares a different workshop every year. Her award-winning workshop was titled, “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: Emerging Issues in U.S. Higher Education.” To prepare for it she reviewed hundreds of articles from the   Chronicle of Higher Education,   and selected dozens for participants to read.

Michèle Shuster, 2017
    • Michèle Shuster was an early adopter of clickers, and has collaborated with colleagues in the Biology Department to assess the impact of clickers on student learning. Her workshop at the Teaching Academy included an overview of the practical issues and positive learning outcomes associated with clicker use. She is now fondly known as the “Clicker Queen” at the Teaching Academy. She has many interests centered around teaching and learning, including facilitating many workshops at the Teaching Academy, and conducting on-going SoTL projects in her microbiology and cancer courses. She presented the Teaching Academy workshop, Engaging Students with Clicker Technology, that received the highest rating by participants.
Satya Rao and Liz England-Kennedy, 2016
    • Satya Rao is a professor, undergraduate program coordinator, and graduate public health certificate program coordinator in the Department of Public Health Sciences. In addition to teaching, she is involved in research and service initiatives focused on violence, mental health, and suicide in communities of color, rural, and border communities. Her work also explores the relationship between childhood trauma and suicide. She co-founded the Southern New Mexico Suicide Prevention and Survivors’ Support Coalition in 2011 to raise awareness, educate, and support families dealing with suicide. She has served as chair of the New Mexico Injury Prevention Coalition and as Co-President of New Mexico Public Health Association.
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      Liz England–Kennedy earned her MPH degree at NMSU and is a lecturer in the Kinesiology Department at California Polytechnic State University. Besides teaching, she performs research and service on trauma recovery, community mental health, and suicide prevention. Her work addresses the needs of veterans and their families, people currently or recently homeless, and individuals with hidden disabilities. She is a past member of the Southern New Mexico Suicide Prevention and Survivors’ Support Coalition. In this capacity, she co-developed an inter-university faculty workshop on suicide prevention with Satya Rao.
Laura Madson, 2015
    • Laura Madson received the Outstanding Workshop Award because her workshop, Daily Five-Minute Quizzes: A Key to Student Engagement and Accountability, received the highest evaluations from participants of any of the workshops given by NMSU faculty or staff at the Teaching Academy this year. Professor and Attorney Lizbeth Ellis joined the faculty at NMSU 25 years ago, after a number of years in private practice of law. In 2004 she became head of the Department of Finance, and she presently serves as interim associate dean in the College of Business. Ellis teaches several business law courses, but her bread and butter has been the Legal Environment of Business course required of all undergraduate business students. This course served as the proving ground for the teaching strategy that was the subject of her outstanding workshop.
Lizbeth Ellis, 2014
    • Lizbeth Ellis received the Outstanding Workshop Award because her workshop, Daily Five-Minute Quizzes: A Key to Student Engagement and Accountability, received the highest evaluations from participants of any of the workshops given by NMSU faculty or staff at the Teaching Academy this year. Professor and Attorney Lizbeth Ellis joined the faculty at NMSU 25 years ago, after a number of years in private practice of law. In 2004 she became head of the Department of Finance, and she presently serves as interim associate dean in the College of Business. Ellis teaches several business law courses, but her bread and butter has been the Legal Environment of Business course required of all undergraduate business students. This course served as the proving ground for the teaching strategy that was the subject of her outstanding workshop.
Jonathan Schwartz, 2013
    • Jonathan Schwartz received the Outstanding Workshop Award because his workshop, Working with Challenging People, received the highest evaluations from participants of any of the workshops given by NMSU faculty or staff at the Teaching Academy this year. Dr. Schwartz is a professor and department head in the Department of Counseling and Educational Psychology. He is a licensed psychologist with a focus on prevention of violence and conflict. This focus helped inform his outstanding workshop on working with challenging people. Dr. Schwartz has published in the area of men and masculinity, prevention, and intimate violence. He has written multiple articles and book chapters on the ethics of prevention. Dr. Schwartz received the 2011 Fritz and Linn Kuder Early Career Scientist/Practitioner Award. In 2003, he was named a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, Division of Counseling Psychology. He is supported by his wife, Marie, daughter Mazelle, and son Jayvin.
Sharna Horn, 2012
    • Sharna Horn has served as the coordinator for the Sexual and Gender Diversity Resource Center since the fall of 2009. Prior to coming to NMSU, she received her bachelor’s degree in psychology from Colorado State University and her master’s degree in counseling psychology from Western Michigan University. She is currently pursuing her doctorate in counseling psychology at New Mexico State University. She is writing a co-authored book chapter focusing on psychological practice with lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered women. Last academic year, she created the Safe Zone Training: Helping NMSU to Create a Safe Space for LGBTQ Students, Faculty and Staff. This training was adapted for the fall freshman ENLACE EXITO! course. Sharna wins the Outstanding Workshop Award because she received the highest ratings by participants for any workshop given by an NMSU educator in 2011–2012. She is the first-ever graduate student to win the Outstanding Workshop Award.
David Smith, 2011
    • David Smith received his Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the University of California at Berkeley in 1989 and joined the NMSU faculty in 1994. Teaching primarily in his department’s general chemistry program, he is actively involved in developing and evaluating formative assessment techniques especially as related to use of remote response devices (“clickers”) in large classes. He was the 2009 recipient of the Teaching Academy Innovation Award and now regularly speaks on the topic of using clickers for formative assessment. He and his wife Janine have been married 22 years and have three children, the oldest of whom is now an NMSU student. David presented Clickers in the Classroom: Involving Students and Informing Teachers, which received the highest ratings from workshop participants for the 2010–2011 academic year.
David Pengelley, 2010
    • David Pengelley’s mathematical research is in algebraic topology and history of mathematics, and he develops the pedagogies of teaching with student projects and with primary historical sources. David’s recent Teaching Academy workshop was titled We lecture because they don’t read, and they don’t read because we lecture: How to beat the lecture/textbook trap! about how he uses advance student reading, writing, and preparation to create higher level learning in the classroom, rather than merely passive first contact with new material. David was the 2009 recipient of NMSU’s Westhafer Award for Teaching, and the Mathematical Association of America’s National Award for Distinguished College or University Teaching of Mathematics.
Mary Prentice, 2009
    • Mary Prentice is assistant professor in the Educational Management and Development department. She began teaching 13 years ago as a psychology instructor at Central New Mexico Community College (CNM); she was also the faculty coordinator of the college’s service learning program. Before coming to NMSU, Mary was the Dean of Social Sciences and Public Service at Illinois Valley Community College. Since coming to NMSU, she has also served as the grant evaluator for the American Association of Community Colleges’ Community Colleges Broadening Horizons through Service Learning project, which focuses on service learning’s connection to civic engagement, learning outcomes, and retention.
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      She presented the Teaching Academy workshop, Students as Partners in Learning: Co-creating the Class Syllabus, which received the highest participant evaluation of any workshop presented by an NMSU faculty or staff member.
Michèle Shuster, 2008
    • Michèle Shuster was an early adopter of clickers, and has collaborated with colleagues in the Biology Department to assess the impact of clickers on student learning. Her workshop at the Teaching Academy included an overview of the practical issues and positive learning outcomes associated with clicker use. She is now fondly known as the “Clicker Queen” at the Teaching Academy. She has many interests centered around teaching and learning, including facilitating two sections of Team Mentoring for Graduate Students Who Teach Courses and Labs each fall at the Teaching Academy, and on-going SoTL projects in her microbiology and cancer courses.
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      She presented the Teaching Academy workshop, Engaging Students with Clicker Technology, that received the highest rating by participants.
James Caufield and Mardi Mahaffy, 2007
    • James Caufield is serving in his second year as library instruction coordinator at the NMSU Library, where one of his interests is helping faculty design assignments that include library research. Before coming to NMSU he taught philosophy at various universities and colleges in New York, and then served as reference librarian at St. Cloud State University (Minnesota). He holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. in philosophy, and also a master’s degree in library and information science.
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      Mardi Mahaffy holds a master’s of library science degree from Indiana University, and serves as the humanities librarian at New Mexico State University. She currently teaches a course in information literacy. Her research interests include the formation of collaborative partnerships between libraries and other university faculty or services. Prior to coming to NMSU, Ms. Mahaffy served as the government documents librarian at East Central University in Ada, OK. Together, they presented the Teaching Academy workshop, Designing and Managing Student Research Assignments, that received the highest rating by participants.