Sandy Utt Excellence in Teaching Award

The Dr. Sandy Utt Excellence in Teaching Award 2024: Call for Entries

If you are passionate about your working with students, consider applying for The Dr. Sandy Utt Excellence in Teaching Award 2024. This competition celebrates not only your knowledge but also your teaching skills, your passion for the field, your engagement with students and colleagues and your innovative skills in the classroom.

Dr. Sandy Utt retired in 2019 after 34 years of teaching advertising. She donated a portion of her retirement funds to support the Visual Communication Division’s annual teaching competition.

Categories

  • tenured
  • non-tenured, including graduate students

Award

Winners in both categories will be recognized during the Innovation in Teaching panel at the 2024 AEJMC annual conference in Philadelphia.

Application requirements

  • Membership in the VisCom Division of AEJMC in the year you’re applying.
  • A cover letter (two pp max) that highlights accomplishments contained in the package.

Please indicate at the top if you’re submitting to the tenured or non-tenured category.

  • Your CV emphasizing visual communication accomplishments.
  • A one-page letter from a colleague or a student supporting the application.
  • One syllabus highlighting excellence or innovative practices in visual communication.

The winner’s syllabus will be posted on the division website.

Examples of student work from an assignment in the syllabus.

Extended Deadline

April 15, 2024

Compile materials and submit at https://form.jotform.com/240097490349159

Questions?

Ask VisCom Division’s teaching chair Denise McGill at mcgilld@mailbox.sc.edu.

Notification

A committee consisting of the VisCom Division’s teaching chair, head, and vice-head will
review and rank the applications and contact the applicants approximately one month after the
application date.

Last year's recipients

Tenured or Associate Professor Category
Dr. Bob Britten Dr. Bob Britten
Teaching associate professor in the Reed College of Media, West Virginia University. 
Non-tenured Category
Six Patterson A. Kix Patterson
Doctoral student in the College of Journalism and Mass Communications, University of Florida

About the award: In an interview last year, Dr. Sandy Utt, for whom our division’s Excellence in Teaching Award is named, defined a good teacher this way: “There has to be a point at which you are challenging, to the point of [students saying] ‘Oh my God, what more can she possibly ask us?’ and challenging to the point of being understanding and kind.” Utt retired in 2019 after 34 years of teaching advertising. She donated a portion of her retirement funds to support the Visual Communication Division’s annual teaching competition.

If Utt’s sentiments resonate with you, please consider applying for this year’s competition that celebrates not only your knowledge but also your teaching skills, your passion for the field, your engagement with students and colleagues, and your innovative skills in the classroom.

The competition has two categories: tenured and non-tenured instructors. I’d like to especially invite graduate teaching assistants to participate!