The Graduate and Professional Student Association is soliciting undergraduate student help to recognize excellent graduate teaching and research assistants.
The Associated Students of ASU's GPSA will award the Excellence in Teaching Awards to 15 outstanding graduate teaching and research assistants each semester, said Erin Mote, director of communications for the association.
The winners will receive a $100 honorarium to "expand the classroom experience," she added.
The award has been offered in the past, but the selection process has been redeveloped from previous years, Mote said.
"It's much more streamlined this year," she said.
Graduate students can be nominated for displaying excellence in seven different categories. They include:
- interaction with students
- quality of instruction
- engagement with students outside the classroom
- use of outside resources when teaching
- clarity of instruction
- application of research in the classroom
- ability to make a subject interesting.
For students who feel their outstanding teacher has qualities that go beyond these categories, the association welcomes student comment and further explanation on the nomination form.
"[Teaching assistants] might do things that we're not even aware of," Mote said.
Nominees will be asked to submit their curriculum and syllabus to GPSA. An eight-person selection committee will then observe their classroom performance, said Deirdre Hahn, vice president of internal affairs for GPSA.
While the association hopes to recognize teaching and research assistants from a variety of disciplines, the organization is limited to awarding only candidates who are nominated. Traditionally, most nomination forms are received for education graduate students, Mote said.
In order to recognize a variety of candidates, GPSA will concentrate more on differences in teaching style than on subject matter, Mote said.
While undergraduates are encouraged strongly to recognize outstanding graduate students, professors, advisers and other graduate students also are eligible to turn in nomination forms.
"There are certain things that graduate students do that don't stand out to undergraduates but do stand out to peers and those in the field," Hahn said.
Nomination forms can be picked up from the GPSA office on the third floor of the MU or by downloading a form from www.asu.edu/gpsa. Nomination forms for fall teaching and research assistants are due Nov. 3.
Reach the reporter at amanda.keim@asu.edu.
