A horticulture professor at Iowa State University has been selected as Iowa Professor of the Year. Gail Nonnecke was presented the award, along with winners from 40 other states, at a luncheon on Thursday in Washington, D.C.
Corly Brooke, director of Iowa State’s Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching, nominated Nonnecke for the award. Brooke calls Nonnecke one of the most engaged ISU faculty members in terms of working on diverse learning initiatives for students.
Nonnecke has been at ISU for 24 years and serves as a mentor to new faculty members. "She’s a very popular senior teaching partner," Brooke says, "she has such a collaborative nature." During the last two summers, Nonnecke has led a team of students to rural Uganda to develop a school for teaching agriculture.
The state professor of the year awar ds are presented by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education.