Graduate student Sarah Battersby was awarded the UCSB Academic Senate Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award for 2004-2005. The Academic Senate Graduate Council and the Committee on Distinguished Teaching Awards are charged with recognizing and enhancing teaching on this campus. Only four Teaching Assistants in diverse disciplines are recognized for their excellence in teaching each year.
Geography faculty note that “Sarah specializes in helping students to think…She elicits reasoned thinking about problems rather than merely answering questions or dishing out rehashes of lectures…She prefers that students engage in dynamic participatory learning rather than acting as static receptors.”Sarah’s course evaluations have been equally laudatory, with students making comments such as “I can definitely say Sarah is the best TA I’ve had,”“Sarah has helped me greatly in understanding not only how to complete the labs but how to relate the lab material to lecture material,”and “she’s on the way to becoming one of those great teachers that touch students’lives—I know she touched my life.”
Sarah is currently working on her dissertation in spatial cognition. Her committee members are Reg Golledge (Co-Chair), Dan Montello (Co-Chair), Mike Goodchild, and Mary Hegarty (Psychology).
