YORK, Pa. — Nominations are being accepted for the 2017 James H. Burness Award for Excellence in Teaching. The award is given annually to recognize any aspect of excellent instruction — lectures, demonstrations, classroom activities, handling of discussions, individual attention, laboratory instruction, etc. — that contributes to the academic quality of Penn State York. Fall nominations are accepted until Nov. 30.
The purpose of the award is to recognize excellence in instruction, not to identify the most popular faculty member. The teaching award is named in memory of the late James H. Burness in recognition of his outstanding teaching and service to the campus. Burness died in December 1999.
All faculty are eligible to be nominated, except for recipients of the award in the past four years: Anne Vardo Zalik and Christopher Rodkey (2013), Andy Landis and Jorge Santiago-Blay (2014), Deborah Eicher-Catt and Jon Price (2015), and Ali Kara and Walter Arnold (2016).
Two awards are given: one to a full-time faculty member and one to a part-time faculty member. Do not worry if you are unsure whether a faculty member is full-time or part-time, the Teaching Award Committee will divide the nominations accordingly.
This nomination form is for faculty who are teaching in fall 2016. Be as specific as possible with comments about nominees. When the committee receives something non-specific, such as "she's a great professor and definitely deserves the award," it doesn't help much in making a decision.
Nominations should be submitted by 5 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 30, using the online form.