Eight professors receive prestigious teaching award

The Lindback Awards are presented annually in recognition of excellence. The University awarded its prestigious Lindback Awards yesterday to eight faculty members who have displayed excellence in education. Sponsored by the Lindback Foundation to honor distinguished teaching, the awards are given annually to eight Penn professors -- four from within the health-related schools and four from the other University schools -- after a lengthy and rigorous selection process. This year's recipients in the non-health schools were Finance Professor Robert Inman, Computer and Information Science Professor Max Mintz, Legal Studies Professor Philip Nichols and English Professor Peter Stallybrass. In the health schools -- comprising the Medical, Nursing, Veterinary and Dental Schools -- the awards were given to Medical School Deputy Dean Arthur Asbury, a professor emeritus of neurology; Psychiatry Professor Cabrina Campbell; Cindy Christian, a Pediatrics professor at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia; and Nursing Professor Ann O'Sullivan. The awards -- which carry a $3,000 prize -- are among the most prestigious teaching awards the University offers, according to Terry Conn, an assistant vice provost for University life who oversees the Lindback Award selection process. "I think it demonstrates that Penn values good teaching," she said. "And we do have a number of good teachers at the University." For many Penn professors, the Lindback Awards are the pinnacle of teacher commendation because, unlike other teaching awards, winners are recommended by both students and faculty. "Not only do the students judge you, but your teaching peers judge you," O'Sullivan said. "That combination makes this the most important award I've ever received in my life." Also recognized yesterday were Geology Professor Gomaa Omar and Nursing Professor Mary Ann Lafferty-Della Valle, who received the Provost's Awards for non-standing faculty members. The Lindback Awards, begun in 1961, are given by universities across the mid-Atlantic region. Each school has its own selection committees and criteria. At Penn, there are two separate committees to review candidates in the health and non-health related schools. The non-health committee is made up of six faculty members -- all former Lindback winners -- and four students. The individual departments nominate professors for the awards and request letters of recommendation from students and faculty. The selection committees then create candidate dossiers -- which include recommendations and course evaluations -- and eventually select the eight with the strongest dossiers, after reviewing the candidates for months. Nichols, who has been at Penn since 1992, said he tries to put himself in his students' shoes. "I try to be the teacher that I want to teach me," Nichols said. "I try to think of, when I'm sitting instead of standing, who did I want to be teaching me?"