1995 Recipients
William Anthony
Charles Deering McCormick University Distinguished Lecturer
A graduate of Colby College (BA 1971) and The Johns Hopkins University (PhD 1982), Anthony has been a member of the Northwestern faculty since 1986. He is currently Senior Lecturer in the Department of German in the College of Arts and Sciences. He was nominated for "possessing the rare gift of integrating diverse groups while arousing each student's desire to learn. He employs a remarkable variety of teaching techniques in his elementary and intermediate German courses, making students feel that they are addressed personally and that each one is respected as a learner, no matter how brilliant his or her performance was." With a colleague in the department, Anthony has developed a number of multi-media programs to accompany German language courses; several are widely used at other institutions. In 1994 he was appointed Director of Undergraduate Studies in the department. Anthony has been active in the residential college program and serves as a faculty associate of Williard Residential College.
Alvin Bayliss
Charles Deering McCormick Professor of Teaching Excellence
A graduate of City College of New York (BS, 1967) and New York University (PhD, 1975), Bayliss joined the faculty of Northwestern University in 1986, where he now holds a joint appointment as Professor in the department of Engineering Sciences and Applied Mathematics and the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science. Bayliss was nominated for having "established a stunning record as a creator of courses and as an instructor. He is intensely dedicated to student learning and has a touch with novice students that makes them want to learn computer programming." A leader in curriculum revision in the McCormick School, he is described as someone who "understands why students need to know what is in their courses and is widely respected for his insights by his faculty peers." A widely published researcher in numerical analysis and scientific computation, he serves as Associate Editor of the journal Applied Numerical Mathematics.
Dan P. McAdams
Charles Deering McCormick Professor of Teaching Excellence
A graduate of Valparaiso University (BS 1976) and of Harvard University (PhD 1979), McAdams joined the Northwestern faculty in 1989 and currently holds a joint appointment as Professor in the School of Education and Social Policy and as Professor of Psychology in the College of Arts and Sciences. Described as "an absolutely precious gemstone in the tiara of Northwestern's teaching excellence," McAdams' nomination was based on "his extraordinary CTEC evaluations and commentaries; student recommendations which underscore the multiple dimensions of his teaching strengths; and diverse accolades from the leading journals in the field for his college textbook The Person: An Introduction to Personality Psychology." Aspiring in his courses to be "provocative rather than definitive," McAdams seeks "to inspire students to examine their own lives and the lives of others . . . from a multitude of perspectives, each of which challenges cliches and conventions." A widely published author in the field of personality psychology, McAdams serves on the editorial boards of several leading journals in the field.
Kenneth Seeskin
Charles Deering McCormick Professor of Teaching Excellence
A graduate of Northwestern University (BA 1968) and Yale University (PhD 1972), Seeskin joined the Northwestern faculty in 1972, where he is now Professor of Philosophy and has served as chair of the department since 1981. He was nominated as "a highly successful classroom teacher in all course formats, with a special gift for one of the most challenging teaching assignments -- the large lecture course dealing with the primary texts of classical philosophers -- addressed to a very diverse student clientele." As department chair, director of the Jewish Studies Program, and a leader in the formation of the Center for the Writing Arts, he is described as "an effective advocate of the kind of education that grounds students in disciplined habits of thought." Seeskin is the author of several books on numerous articles on Greek and Jewish philosophy and serves as editor of the SUNY Press Series in Jewish Philosophy.