Provost’s Awards Recognize Outstanding Teaching, Advising and Civic Engagement
The Office of Academic Affairs recently recognized faculty and an academic unit for exemplary work in the areas of teaching, advising and civic engagement at the annual Provost’s Awards Reception. These areas remain vital to UNC Charlotte’s mission to educate and prepare students for chosen careers and to address community needs in the greater Charlotte region.
Provost’s Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Academic Advising
The Office of Teacher Education Advising and Licensure (TEAL) in the Cato College of Education (COED) is this year’s winner. This award is given to an academic department, office, or program in recognition of the collective responsibility of faculty and staff members for maintaining high-quality undergraduate academic advising. The award is intended to recognize sustained efforts that assist students to achieve their educational and lifelong learning goals. The monetary award can be used at the discretion of the recipient unit for any purpose authorized for state appropriations. A permanent plaque is given each year to the recipient unit in recognition of the award.
The TEAL office seeks to coach, advocate, and provide a comprehensive source of support for all of their students. During the pandemic, the TEAL office increased their communication with students to provide additional support and guidance to ensure students stayed on track and to help them navigate unique issues related to the pandemic.
TEAL advises students even before they enter a teacher education program, both at the undergraduate and graduate levels. They work with pre-education majors and majors from the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences seeking to pursue a minor in secondary education or a minor in foreign language education. TEAL advisors regularly connect with future transfer students, and they advise all students with a declared minor in child and family development and with students enrolled in the Charlotte Teacher Early College.
At the graduate level, TEAL works with applicants to the Graduate Certificate in Teaching, UNC Charlotte’s residency licensure program. TEAL also advises post-baccalaureate students completing undergraduate and graduate coursework to prepare for licensure.
Over the past six years, TEAL has developed a partnership with COED Prospect for Success (PFS) faculty. Entering freshmen who plan to major in education enroll in EDUC 1100 during their first semester. The course was co-developed by advisors and faculty to create assignments to help students be intentional about identifying campus resources, developing their long-term academic schedule, and planning professionally relevant experiences they wish to have over the next four years. TEAL advisors visit EDUC 1100 sections and meet several times each year with the PFS team to discuss the partnership and make refinements as needed. This partnership helps advisors connect more meaningfully with students to strengthen the student-advisor connection.
Bonnie E. Cone Professorship in Civic Engagement
Kim Buch, professor of psychology, is this year’s recipient of the Bonnie E. Cone Professorship in Civic Engagement. This is awarded annually to a tenured member of the faculty whose teaching and/or research embody the University’s commitment to civic involvement, and whose work profoundly and systematically affects the relationship between UNC Charlotte and the larger community in a positive and meaningful way.
This professorship comes with a three-year appointment and it includes the inscription of the professor’s name on a permanent plaque, a formal announcement at the first Distinguished Service Award ceremony of the professor’s term, and a stipend and faculty development funds annually for three years.
Buch has been an avid practitioner and scholar in the pedagogy of service learning for over two decades, and she has helped create and champion the institutional policies and programs that have supported a culture of community engagement at UNC Charlotte.
She was part of a faculty team that, in 2007, added community-engaged scholarship as an explicit category of research in the reappointment, promotion, and tenure process in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences. In addition, she was a founding member of the UNC Charlotte Campus Compact group that collected data on the University’s community-engaged activities. As a former chair of the Student Success & Retention Committee, she co-created learning communities at UNC Charlotte, which promote service learning in first-year experiences. She also co-created the service-learning course designation and co-founded the Service-Learning 101 faculty workshop and Service-Learning Showcase in 2010.
For the past 16 years, Buch has directed the Psychology Learning Community, which has engaged first-year students in service learning with an estimated 30 Charlotte organizations and nonprofits. Seeking an on-campus service learning site for students, she opened the Niner Student Pantry in 2014 with co-founder Sean Langley of the Division of Student Affairs.
Buch co-created the Charlotte Community Scholars Summer Research Program for Undergraduates to provide a community engagement-based sister program to the Charlotte Research Scholars Program. In addition, she was part of a faculty team that created the Civic Minor in Urban Youth and Communities, an interdisciplinary minor providing an immersive curricular experience in community engagement.
Buch estimates that she has engaged over 500 students in service-learning experiences, and that these students have completed an estimated 25,000 hours of direct, hands-on service to the campus and Charlotte communities.
Bonnie E. Cone Early-Career Professorship in Teaching
Erik Byker, an associate professor in the Department of Reading and Elementary Education in the Cato College of Education, is this year’s recipient of the Bonnie E. Cone Early-Career Professorship in Teaching. This is awarded annually to a member of the faculty who has been awarded tenure within the last three years. It recognizes a faculty member who has demonstrated a commitment to teaching at the beginning of their academic career.
This Professorship comes with a three-year appointment and it includes the inscription of the professor’s name on a permanent plaque, and a stipend and faculty development funds annually for three years.
Byker joined UNC Charlotte in 2014 and received tenure in 2018. Byker has demonstrated dedication to connecting his teaching with research and service and is known for developing students’ research skills and helping students grow as global citizens.
Byker often employs innovative teaching techniques to prepare students for the inquiry process and to help students develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills. His teaching strategies include research workshops, self-assessment checks, peer-writing sessions and the use of digital tools to enhance writing and communication. He has been part of UNC Charlotte’s Active Learning Academy since its inception. More than 90% of his students either “strongly agree” or “agree” that Byker’s course instruction is effective and that they learned a lot in the course.
In addition, Byker integrates global competency modules and content in many of the courses he teaches.He leads teacher candidates in investigations of what it means to be a global citizen by engaging them in interactive simulations and activities that incorporate global- and cultural-infused content. Recently, Byker facilitated a TEDx event that allowed his honors students to present their research related to sustainable development goals to the broader campus community. This work culminated in Byker being named a Global Teacher Education Fellow by the Global Teacher Education Group, a non-profit organization associated with the Longview Foundation.
Byker has taken the lead on several curriculum initiatives that have resulted in positive student outcomes. For example, he redesigned the Inquiry Project assignment for EDUC 1100 and developed the Inquiry Processing Cycle, which has been adopted by all faculty teaching EDUC 1100.
Byker is highly committed to undergraduate research and to Honors education. He served as chairperson for UNC Charlotte’s Undergraduate Research Conference committee for several years and has advised and mentored more than 50 student research projects. In addition, Byker was part of a faculty group that developed the edPASR Strategy, which provides an instructive method for preparing teacher candidates to successfully navigate the edTPA portfolio assessment which is required for professional licensure. The strategy has been a contributing factor to a departmental pass rate on edTPA that exceeds 90 percent.