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Utah State University is home to yet another Carnegie professor.
The Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) named Laurie McNeill, an associate professor in the department of civil and environmental engineering, as Utah's top college educator on Thursday. She teaches courses in water treatment and waste management.
The Professor of the Year program, sponsored by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, is the only national honor that recognizes college faculty members' prowess in the classroom and engagement with students. The annual prize goes to the nation's four best teachers at the community college, baccalaureate, masters and doctoral/research levels. It also picks top college educators for each state. McNeill is the 10th USU professor to be chosen among Utah schools since 1989, including last year's winner, physicist David Peak.
"Dr. McNeill has a deep dedication to teaching and to service learning, and she brings meaning into every contact she has with students," Stan Albrecht, president of the Logan-based land-grant university that serves the whole state, said in a statement. "She is an exceptional educator and deserves this highest honor, and we are proud, once again, to count a USU professor among the very best university teachers in the nation."
The award, named in honor of the 19th-century industrialist-turned-philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, is based on certain criteria: impact on and involvement with undergraduate students, scholarly approach to teaching and learning, contributions to undergraduate education in the institution, community, and profession, and support from colleagues and current and former undergraduate students.
McNeill, the faculty adviser for the USU chapter of Engineers Without Borders, is famous on campus for putting her lectures in real-world contexts and encouraging students to pursue engineering projects in the community and abroad.
"Facts they'll forget, but if I can teach them to approach a problem and evaluate it more broadly, they will learn what it takes to confront a lot of issues they will face," said McNeill, who holds her doctorate from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. "That is my ultimate goal — to get them to learn how to learn." —
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