Highlighting the exceptional teaching and research by faculty at Central, Eastern, Southern and Western Connecticut State Universities, the Board of Trustees of the Connecticut State University System plans to recognize eight outstanding faculty members this week.
One faculty member from each university – from disciplines including finance, history, physics, world languages, visual arts, psychology and English – will be acknowledged as recipients of the Trustees Teaching Award or the Norton Mezvinsky Trustees Research Award. Two of the eight — one in each teaching or research category — will receive additional recognition as system-level award recipients.
The Board of Trustees is expected to approve the selections and present the awards – including announcement of the system-level honorees – on Thursday, April 7, at 10 a.m. at Southern Connecticut State University.
“The caliber of teaching and research at Central, Eastern, Southern and Western is quite impressive, and the scholarship demonstrated by these faculty members makes a difference in their classrooms and their respective fields,” said Board Vice Chairman Richard J. Balducci.
“These awards recognize the exemplary work of the highest promise being done by our up-and-coming faculty. They are all demonstrating an impact on their academic fields, our students and our state,” added John A. Doyle, chair of the Academic Affairs Committee.
Receiving the Trustees Teaching Award at the university level, will be:
JOSEPH B. FARHAT - Dr. Farhat, an associate professor in the Department of Finance at Central Connecticut State University, is highly regarded for his effectiveness and commitment to the evidence-based improvement of teaching and learning, for his effective use of technology to engage students and maximize their learning, and for his ability to make relevant and effective linkages between learning in the classroom and the current world of business and finance.
CHRISTOPHER J. TOROCKIO - Dr. Torockio, an associate professor in the English Department at Eastern Connecticut State University, is widely recognized for his ability to connect teaching with his thriving fiction writing career, for his contributions to curriculum development, for his inclusive and empowering teaching style, particularly effective with first-generation students, and for his success in making fiction writing a means of further writing, including the supervision of Honors Thesis work.
MISTY M. GINICOLA - Dr. Ginicola, an assistant professor in the Counseling and School Psychology Department at Southern Connecticut State University, is strongly regarded for her successful efforts to engage a broad range of students across the disciplines, for her commitment to teaching that extends beyond the confines of the classroom, for her dedication to student mentoring and the facilitation of their social and personal development, for her work in advancing diversity and multiculturalism at the university, and for her scholarly approach to teaching and learning.
GALINA BAKHTIAROVA - Dr. Bakhtiarova, an associate professor in the Department of World Languages and Literature at Western Connecticut State University, is widely recognized for her contributions to the creating a vision for the study of languages, literature and cultures, as exemplified by a rigorous and competitive Spanish language program that advances a proficiency oriented communicative approach and includes a global immersion component, and for her championing of effective collegial work as a department chairperson.
The Norton Mezvinsky Trustees Research Award at the university level will be presented to:
MATTHEW G. SPECTER - Dr. Specter, an assistant professor in the History Department at Central Connecticut State University, is widely regarded in the university community and beyond for his scholarly work on the development of political thought, ideology and institutions in 20th century Germany and of its global projections on human rights, humanitarianism and international law, particularly in developing the intellectual history of German sociologist and philosopher Jügen Habermas, whose work has shed light on that country's political development.
QIMIN LIU - Mr. Liu, an associate professor in the Department of Visual Arts at Eastern Connecticut State University, is acclaimed for his scholarly creative work as a prolific artist with a prestigious exhibition record, for his ability to bridge in style and social consciousness the American and Chinese painters world, for his efforts to establish connections with galleries and museums in China, for promoting American contemporary realism, and for use of art to highlight the struggles of the homeless.
ELLIOTT P. HORCH - Dr. Horch, an associate professor in the Physics Department at Southern Connecticut State University, is highly regarded for his scholarly work in optics research and the development of interferometric instrumentation, allowing the capturing of high resolution images on the Hubble Space Telescope and work with other large telescopes; for his observations and contributions to the understanding of stellar and galactic astrophysics, star formation, and extra-solar planet research; and for his developing techniques for de-blurring images in land telescopes.
DAMLA ISIK - Dr. Isik, an assistant professor in the Department of Social Sciences at Western Connecticut State University, is esteemed for her scholarly work on gender and globalization in particular as it relates to poverty alleviation in Turkey with particular focus on local, institutional and transnational negotiations using a religious and social context, and on the ways in which charitable work there influences unemployment and underemployment in the younger working age populations.
The annual teaching awards began in 2007, the research awards in 2006. In 2010, the Trustees Research Award was named in honor of Dr. Norton Mezvinsky, who retired in 2009 after four decades at Central Connecticut State University.
The Trustees Teaching Award is granted to faculty who have “distinguished themselves as outstanding teachers for at least five years and have a minimum of a two-year track record of promoting instructional improvements for their programs or departments.” The Trustees Research Award is granted to faculty who are conducting “research work of exceptional promise.” Nominees are expected to demonstrate substantive contributions or achievements and scholarly activities in their academic fields of study during the last five years.
Each university accepted nominations and selected the university-level nominees earlier this year. Nominees were then considered for the system-wide awards by a panel consisting of Connecticut State University Professors, a designation earned by no more than three senior faculty members at each university. Their recommendations were forwarded to the Board’s Academic Affairs Committee, and then to the full Board. The Connecticut State University System includes more than 36,000 students attending Central, Eastern, Southern and Western Connecticut State Universities.
