Champaign County.
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Cheelan Bo-Linn, a senior specialist in education for the Center for Teaching Excellence in the Office of the Provost, has dedicated herself to advancing teaching and learning on the Urbana campus.
"Bo-Linn has been a major contributor to the success of the Center for Teaching Excellence," wrote Walter Hurley, a professor of animal sciences, in his nomination letter. "Her various roles at the center have placed her in a unique position to impact the campus's broad teaching community for more than a dozen years."
Hurley cited her enthusiastic promotion of excellence in teaching, her tireless efforts to engage faculty members in their individual and collective efforts to enhance their teaching and her consistent promotion of teaching as a source of scholarship.
One of her primary duties at the center is to engage instructional faculty members in efforts to enhance the effectiveness of their teaching. She has done this through workshops, and direct consultation with individual faculty members, as well as the annual Faculty Retreat, of which she is the primary organizer.
"Bo-Linn is an outstanding teacher in her own right," Hurley said. "She uses those skills and her knowledge of pedagogy in her workshops."
In addition, her impact on faculty members extends to their efforts to secure grants for research. She is often asked to consult when a component of a grant is to include education and outreach.
Bo-Linn also is engaged in her profession at the national and international level. She has made presentations at 35 U.S. conferences or meetings as the plenary speaker. Internationally, she has coordinated eight workshops in Taiwan and parts of India.
Bo-Linn also has participated in Scholarship of Teaching and Learning events, the Teaching Advancement Board and the Provost's Initiative for Teaching Advancement.
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William P. Kruidenier is the coordinator of external relations in the department of natural resources and environmental sciences in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences, the director of the U. of I. Arboretum, and the associate director of the National Great Rivers Research and Education Center in St. Charles, Ill. Kruidenier has worked with and engaged internal and external partners to design, develop and implement many pilot programs that have benefited students and faculty members.
He has led many fundraising programs, including the Fund for Excellence program, the Jonathan Baldwin Turner scholarship program and an initiative to purchase additional land for the St. Charles research center.
He was asked to assist with the fledgling Great Rivers project during its formative years and, in 2002, he became the associate director. He has been instrumental in the development and success of the center, playing a crucial role in laying the groundwork for the strategic planning and implementation of its five-year goals and objectives.
He served as the associate director of the Arboretum for a number of years and became the director in 2012. Under his leadership, many features have been added and existing gardens have been updated. He developed a five-year plan to enhance and maintain the gardens with limited funding and has been successful in increasing revenue.
He often assists other units in program planning, development, management and evaluation, and recently became a member of the Allerton Park Advisory Board. He also has been serving as an executive consultant with the Aslan Group and Environmental Consultants since 2000, and is the executive director for the International Society of Aboriculture in Champaign. He continues to be involved in the cross-campus Faculty Fellows program and the Land-Grant/Community College Initiative.
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Patricia Malik is the director of Beckwith Residential Support Services and the assistant director for nonacademic services for the Division of Disability Resources and Educational Services. "Since joining DRES in 2005 as the director of Beckwith Residential Support Services, Malik has been an extraordinarily effective administrator and a tireless and passionate advocate for college students with the most severe physical disabilities," said Brad Hedrick, the director of the division. "She has improved the breadth and quality of Beckwith programs while enhancing the program's national and international reputation."
To eliminate transitional barriers faced by students and their families, she established a successful mentoring program that pairs incoming students with disabilities with juniors and seniors; juniors and seniors with alumni; and parents of returning students with parents of new students.
She also worked with the department of kinesiology and community health to structure the content of the transitional disability management program to motivate participation in the educational programming designed to promote greater independence. To address the inefficiency of the program's classroom-based general training for prospective personal assistants, she led the development of an online approach that substantially reduced the time required to perform the necessary training for 100 personal assistants.
She played a central role throughout the planning and construction of Nugent Hall. Hedrick credits her vision, leadership and commitment to excellence for the U. of I. being selected to receive the Paralyzed Veterans of America's 2012 Barrier Free America Award (the first time in the award's history that it was given to an organization other than an architecture firm).
Malik holds a 0 percent appointment as an associate professor in recreation, sport and tourism and is a collaborating investigator on a project to develop a robotic aide for students with impaired communication ability. She is coordinating the division's deployment and evaluation of a personal wireless elevator control system that allows students to independently operate elevator controls.
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Jane A. Scherer is an extension specialist in urban programming/Web development for U. of I. Extension and the director of its State Office of Web Development. Her 40-year career has spanned several technological ages - from town hall meetings to online educational programming for international audiences.
Before the Internet made information easily available to everyone, Scherer organized the Consumer Call-In for the Chicago area, which received more than 80,000 calls annually. Consumers could call and receive an answer within 24 hours to questions as wide-ranging as how to donate body parts to how to cook lamb. She also developed the program Helping You Help Youth used by 4-H staff members in 35 states.
As the Web became more accessible, she became the champion for Internet-related education within U. of I. Extension. She now manages more than 375 websites that total an average of 4 million to 8 million page views each month, reaching 143 countries. She uses technology and social media so that content is available on cellphones and iPads, through Twitter, Facebook, Scoop.it and YouTube.
"Largely because of Jane, U. of I. Extension is known as a creative, reliable and evidence-based source of information available to anyone, anytime, instantly," wrote Karen Chapman-Novakofski, a professor of food science and human nutrition and an Extension specialist, in her nomination letter. "In addition to her Web-based information, she recognized that to reach a large gardening population, U. of I. information needed to be available in the marketplace. As a result, she developed garden kiosks to put U. of I. horticulture education at gardeners' fingertips in garden centers and libraries."
In addition to information for consumers, Scherer orchestrated the development of user-friendly tools for Extension employees assisting them in fiscal management and internal communications.
She also has an ability to recognize potential and has mentored colleagues and student employees on their paths to success.
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Linda Tortorelli, the program coordinator for the Autism Program (TAP), is the person that parents, child care workers, teachers and medical professionals turn to for help when a child who has been diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder.
The program, affiliated with the department of human and community development and the special education department, is part of a statewide network funded by the Illinois Department of Human Services. Tortorelli is responsible for managing the daily operations of the TAP Resource Center, serving as the first point of contact for families, providing consultation to families and professionals, and implementing educational programs for children, parents and professionals.
Since the resource center opened in Doris Kelley Christopher Hall in 2007, it has served more than 2,900 clients, distributed more than 17,000 learning aids and produced more than 800 sets of customized educational materials for parents and educators.
In addition to public service, she has contributed to the university's teaching mission. Since 2007, she has given guest lectures or made presentations in 50 classes from eight departments, reaching more than 2,000 students. The TAP internship program has given more than 70 undergraduate and graduate students hands-on experience working with people with autism and their families. She provides informal mentoring as well as direct instruction, and she serves as a model for how to help children, parents and professionals with sensitivity and professionalism.
She also serves as the liaison for collaborative efforts with other U. of I. units. For example, she has worked with the School of Music to provide family wind orchestra concerts at Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, with staff members at the Speech Pathology and Audiology Clinic to assist in training students, and with staff members at University Primary School to provide supports for children with autism. Most recently, she created a partnership with the Psychological Services Center so that clinical training for graduate students would also result in much needed assessment and diagnostic services for families who face long waiting lists from local medical centers.
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