Campus Connection

Eagle teaching excellence award winners announced

There is no doubt UWL faculty members make a major difference in the lives and academic experiences of students. This year the Provost Office received more than 600 nominations from UWL students to recognize excellent teachers.

From these nominations, a committee selected six faculty members as the 2019 Eagle Teaching Excellence Award winners. Their names were announced at the end of spring semester and as part of spring commencement. They will also be recognized among colleagues at the Chancellor’s All-University Address in fall.

The winners are:

Nilakshi Borah ~ Finance
Mary Hamman ~ Economics
Tom Jesse ~ English Education
Terry Smith ~ Communication Studies
Meredith Thomsen ~ Biology
Nathan Warnberg ~ Mathematics & Statistics

Nilakshi Borah, assistant professor, Finance

Started at UWL: Fall 2014

Teaches: Borah generally teaches principles of financial management and multinational financial management at the undergraduate level. She started teaching problems and cases in finance during the fall 2019 semester. In addition, she currently teaches fundamentals of managerial finance in the UW consortium MBA program. She has also team-taught managing strategically in a global environment course and decision framing and decision making in complex environments course previously.

Background: Borah worked as a visiting (fixed-term) assistant professor of finance at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota for two years prior to UWL. Over her tenure at St. Cloud State University, she taught three finance courses including International Finance, Business (Managerial) Finance and Entrepreneurial Finance. She earned her doctorate degree from Louisiana Tech University. She moved to the U.S. to pursue an MBA degree at the New Mexico State University after completing a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in India.

Favorite part of teaching?
Nilakshi Borah, assistant professor of finance, enjoys developing interpersonal relationships with “incredible students” in her classes. They are eager to learn and grow and she has a sincere interest in helping them do that. “I enjoy watching my students getting intrigued by different topics and applying their knowledge to real-world examples,” she says. “I am privileged to work with extremely curious and thought-provoking students, who constantly push me to be a better teacher by asking interesting and challenging questions in the field of finance.” For graduate (MBA) students she works with, Borah says it is rewarding to help working professionals better understand finance as it applies to their working environment.

Mary Hamman, associate professor, Economics

Started at UWL: Fall 2013

Teaches: Hamman teaches research methods and health economics.

Background: Hamman joined UWL after teaching at Michigan State University as a visiting assistant professor. She also “full-time mom-ed it” for two years before starting at UWL.

Favorite part of teaching?
Mary Hamman, UWL associate professor of economics, loves working with students on messy data projects or tackling tough policy questions where she can push them to think critically. “Students don’t always like going after problems that are abstract, complex, and require them to clearly acknowledge their assumptions. It can be intimidating,” she says. “I like to guide them past that initial inertia and watch them take ownership of their work.”

Thomas Jesse, assistant professor, English

Started at UWL: 2015

Teaches: Jesse’s “home base” is the English Department, but he is also affiliated with the School of Education. He regularly teaches courses in two subject areas: American Literature and English Education. These courses range from introductory general education offerings to specialized courses designed for English majors. Part of his teaching load is also dedicated to supervising English Education student teachers as they work with middle and high school students across the greater La Crosse area.

Background: Jesse spent five years teaching English at a large public high school outside of Orlando, Florida and pursing a doctoral degree. Jesse earned his degree in American literature at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas, where he also taught courses in introductory and advanced composition, American poetry, and contemporary American literature.

Favorite part of teaching?
Thomas Jesse, assistant professor of English, loves learning with his students — listening to their ideas, responding to their interpretations, and working alongside them to make sense of the texts and concepts they are studying. “In my classes, I want students to understand that knowledge is always negotiated, in process, under revision; it’s never fixed or stable,” he says. “So my favorite moments in the classroom are those where we all roll up our sleeves and dig into a dense reading or a complex cultural issue together, committed to a process of inquiry that incorporates multiple voices and perspectives in the search for meaning.”

Terry Smith, senior lecturer, Communication Studies

Started at UWL: various roles since 1995.

Teaches: He teaches primarily CST 110: Communicating Effectively. He has also taught other classes including CST 210: Presentational Speaking and CST 271: Media and Society. He has also served as director of UWL’s Public Speaker Center and as an academic advisor. He also co-lead a study abroad trip to Cape Town, South Africa in the summer of 2019.

Background: Smith received his undergraduate degree from UWL in English in 1998 and has worked at UWL in various capacities since 1995. He was a media specialist in UWL’s Information Technology Services starting in 2000. He started teaching part-time in 2007 and dedicated his life to being a full-time instructor in fall 2011.

Favorite part of teaching?
UWL alumnus Terry Smith says becoming a teacher changed his life. What he likes most about it is spending time with people who are “energetic and genuine.” “The students in the classroom and my colleagues throughout UWL make me smile … and when I start smiling, I can share that joy through teaching. I also love the time I get with the students before class, in the halls, and around campus. They teach me so much when we share stories and experiences,” he says. “I get to have fun, learn new things, meet new people, and make a positive impact on a daily basis.”

Meredith Thomsen, professor, Biology

Started at UWL: 2006

Teaches: At UWL, she frequently teaches in UWL’s Organismal Biology lecture and lab. Each fall she also teaches Quantitative Methods in Ecology. And she teaches a graduate-level course on science writing and communication.

Background: Thomsen came to campus after completing her doctoral degree at the University of California-Berkeley. There she gained teaching experience as a graduate student in a variety of courses in a National Science Foundation outreach program working with middle school students and leading workshops for natural resources professionals.

Favorite part of teaching?
Biology Professor Meredith Thomsen gets excited about the work happening behind the scenes to promote student learning at UWL. “I have always enjoyed the performance aspect of teaching — figuring out how to get and hold students’ attention, how to strike a balance between lecturing and discussion, how to present tricky concepts,” she says. “But my favorite part happens behind the scenes, in projects like the Organismal Biology redesign, or in CATL workshops. We have a lot of smart colleagues at UWL who are intellectually engaged with the question of how to best promote student learning. I love working with them to find new ways to meet that challenge.”

Nathan Warnberg, assistant professor, Mathematics & Statistics

Started at UWL: Fall 2014

Teaches: He typically teaches some general education math courses, along with calculus courses or other upper level math courses. He has also enjoyed teaching first year seminars and a tutor training course for Murphy Learning Center tutors. “The variety of courses that I teach is one of the things I like best about our department,” he says.

Background: Warnberg graduated from UW-Platteville in 2008 where he studied math and economics. He then took a year off to work before starting graduate school at Iowa State University. In college he had his first experience teaching and realized it was what he wanted to do. He graduated from Iowa State in Spring 2014.

Favorite part of teaching?
Nathan Warnberg, assistant professor of Mathematics and Statistics, likes watching students change from a mindset of ‘I don’t understand this,’ to ‘I don’t understand this, yet.’ “Basically, I like helping students believe that there is not a math gene (or writing, chemistry, art, biology, etc. gene). Instead, there are people that do a lot of math and people that don’t do a lot of math. This, in turn, helps students realize that their potential is typically much higher than they thought it was,” he says. “Watching this realization dawn on students over the course of a semester, or year or college career is a joy. Supporting them through this process with compassion and empathy is even better.”