March 19, 2012
Professor Wallace Fowler has been selected as the recipient of the 2012 Student Engineering Council (SEC) Faculty Appreciation Week award for the Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics (ASE/EM) Department.
The awards are given to one faculty member in each engineering department during Faculty Appreciation Week, an event hosted by the SEC. During the fall semester, the council accepts student nominations for outstanding faculty. The top three faculty members for each department are then selected and placed on a ballot. The nominee with the highest number of votes from each department is selected to receive the award.
Fowler humbly received the award and accepted it on behalf of the ASE/EM faculty.
“I am greatly honored to receive this award,” Fowler said. “Student nominated awards are the most important. A lot of folks could get this award – I just represent the entire faculty.”
Dr. Fowler believes that his number one priority as a professor is to teach.
“My most important job at the university is teaching,” Fowler said. “If I just wanted to do research, I would work at a research lab. But I’m turning out at army. When I visit the Jet Propulsion Laboratory I see a lot of my former students. I have a gift of making learning fun – and if you have a gift, you better use it. It’s my students that are important. Class is about them.”
Student nominations attested to the strength of Fowler’s teaching as well as the passion he exemplifies in the classroom.
"I took his course last semester, and he connects tremendously well with all students,” an aerospace engineering student said. “The passion with which he teaches shows very clearly. His concern for his students' progress is also commendable.”
Fowler received his award at the Faculty Appreciation Week ceremony on March 8, 2012.
