Faculty Awards Nomination 2022-2023

Thank you for joining us at the recent faculty/staff awards luncheon. It is truly one of our favorite DU events. We are already turning our eye to the next faculty/staff awards luncheon.

With that in mind, we invite you to nominate members of the University of Denver faculty for five special awards. Please read the award descriptions carefully and submit nominations in PDF format via email to the Faculty Senate, c/o Faculty Senate President Renée Botta: Renee.Botta@du.edu.

We particularly encourage nominations from deans, directors, and department chairs. Those individuals have access to annual review and reappointment, tenure, and promotion materials and thus are in a unique position to identify outstanding performance by faculty members. Please note that the Senate Awards Subcommittee has specifically defined the materials required to support nominations.

We urge you to give careful thought to these awards and to submit nominations so that we may honor those who have made particularly distinguished contributions to the University.

All 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 nominations remain active, and updates are requested.

Most of you are familiar with these awards and the fact that each distinction includes an award of $2,000.

• Please include a nomination letter (of no more than two pages), a curriculum vita, and no more than five written statements of support from colleagues, students, alumni and others as appropriate (e.g., a nomination for Distinguished Teacher is appropriately supported by letters from students, alumni, and outside colleagues positioned to judge teaching excellence; nominations for Lecturer and Distinguished Scholar are appropriately supported by letters from outside scholars). Because distinguished teaching is not limited to the classroom, please consider including mentoring and outreach activities as well. The nomination letter should summarize the nominee’s scholarship, teaching, and/or service accomplishments, highlighting those of exceptional merit. Summaries of students’ numerical course evaluations will be appreciated for consideration of teaching awards.
• A Senate Subcommittee will consider and make recommendations based only on its review of the material outlined above.
• Please indicate the award for which the nomination is being made, but do not hesitate to indicate more than one award for which the nominee should be considered.
• The Awards Subcommittee of the Faculty Senate Personnel Committee makes recommendations to the Provost, the Chancellor, and the Board of Trustees, who make the final selections. The committee recommendations are taken very seriously.
• Again, please read the award descriptions carefully and submit nominations in PDF form via email to the Faculty Senate, c/o Faculty Senate President Renée Botta: Renee.Botta@du.edu.

Deadline for nominations is February 10, 2023.

For a full listing of past award recipients, please visit: University of Denver Announces 2022 Faculty Awards | University of Denver (du.edu)

Award Descriptions:

Distinguished Scholar Award

This award recognizes unusually significant and meritorious achievement in professional scholarship, as evidenced by publications and their enhancing effect on classroom teaching.

Distinguished Teaching Award

This award recognizes excellence in teaching. The nomination should emphasize the degree to which a person’s teaching has constructively influenced his/her students. The nominee must have completed three or more years of teaching at the University of Denver.

Faculty Service Award

This award is given to a faculty member in recognition of outstanding service to the University, the community, or the profession.

University Lecturer

This award recognizes superlative creative and scholarly work. The lecturer is chosen without regard for time spent at the University or popularity as an individual or as a teacher. The award is announced at the Fall Convocation and presented at the University Lecture in the spring.

Ruth Murray Underhill Teaching Award

This award recognizes excellence in teaching by an adjunct faculty member, here defined as a teacher

whose primary employer is not the University of Denver. It is named after Ruth Murray Underhill, who served as an instructor at DU 1948-1952 and as an adjunct faculty member into the 1970s.

Nominees should have taught at least one course per year for the University for each of the three years prior to nomination. Courses must have been taught in a degree-granting program but need not have been taught in a single department or unit.