Distinguished Teaching Award recipients posed with President Bob Bruininks and Regent Clyde Allen before the ceremony on Monday, April 27. Photograph by Patrick O'Leary

Sixteen of the University of Minnesota’s best teaching professors were honored Monday, April 27, and to a person they expressed gratitude for their own influential teachers. The recipients of the Distinguished Teaching Awards, the University’s top honor for great teaching professors, also thanked colleagues for guidance and students for inspiration.

“No award for teaching is the result of a single person’s work,” said English Professor Josephine Lee, who received one of eight awards for outstanding graduate and professional teaching.

Horticultural Science professor Albert Markhart used the sanskrit phrase “namaste” to sum up his feelings about students, colleagues, and his own teachers. Markhart, a recipient of the Morse-Alumni Award for outstanding contributions to undergraduate education, translated it as: “The teacher in me honors the teacher in you.”

The University of Minnesota Alumni Association has helped fund the awards and organized the ceremony and reception honoring the teachers for several decades. Alumni President Bruce Mooty said that is because of the impact teachers have on the lives of their students. “One of the things alumni always want to talk about are their memories of their favorite professors,” Mooty said. “They are professors who challenged them and took a personal interest, and alumni never forget that.”

University president Bob Bruininks said great teachers are at the art of the University’s land-grant mission. “You go beyond the call of duty {and do} exceptional, dedicated work,” he told them. The future of future of the University, and of society as whole, he added, “is always tied to our teaching success.”

Pharmacy professor Jon Schommer summed up the mood of the event by quoting his own Ph.D. advisor: “ ‘An educator’s wealth is measured by the richness of the relationships that we have with our students and our colleagues.’ And when you think about it, those of us who are educators at the University of Minnesota can count ourselves to be among the wealthiest people on Earth.”

Image Gallery: 2009 Distiniguished Teaching Awards Ceremony
Sixteen of the University's best teaching professors were honored with Distinguished Teaching Awards on April 27, 2009. Photographs by Mike Lee
See all 5 images.