Faculty Awards 2024

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During this year’s Academic Convocation, we welcomed first-year students into the Geneva academic community and recognized outstanding scholarship, teaching, and service among our faculty. The celebration included several speakers from our faculty and leadership, including Calvin Troup, PhD, President, Melinda Stephens, Provost, PhD, Professor of Chemistry, Jamie Swank, JD, MA, VP & Dean of Student Engagement, and Keith Martel, PhD, Professor of Higher Education, Sociology, and Humanities.

The Excellence in Scholarship Award

The Excellence in Scholarship Award recognizes faculty for breadth and depth of knowledge in their discipline, contribution to the advancement of their field beyond Geneva’s campus, and stimulation and direction of scholarly activity among students.

jonathan-watt Dr. Jonathan Watt, Professor of Linguistics, is the recipient of the 2024 Excellence in Scholarship award, as he is one of the most prolific scholars on the faculty. Some of the activities that he completed, only including highlights of last year, include:

Designed, coordinated, managed and hosted a Missions Conference at Geneva in October 2023.
Served as the organizer of the first Orality and Literacy Conference held at Geneva in April 2024 and also presented on the topic of “Water Ong, Milman Parry, McMaster Divinity and Lynard Skynyrd on Markers of Orality in the New Testament Literature”.
Co-editor of the Baker Encyclopedia of Biblical Greek and Linguistics and author of multiple entries himself.
His Commentary on Colossians and Philemon was published in May 2024 as a part of the Brill Exegetical Commentary Series
Authored “Semitic language code-switching in Acts 21-22” which will be published in a volume titled Sociolinguistics and the New Testament this year.
Authored a chapter title “Language and Religious Literacy” for the International Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics to be published by Elsevier this year.

Believe it or not, this is not an exhaustive list but gives a sense of the level of activity that this faculty member has managed to maintain even while he taught more than a full-time load and serving as a department chair.

During his 24 years on the faculty, this is the third time Watt has been awarded the Excellence in Scholarship Award, having previously won the award in 2005 and 2019. Watt has a BS from Syracuse University, an MDiv from Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and a PhD from the University of Pittsburgh.

The Outstanding Service Award

kerry-mcmahon The Outstanding Service Award recognizes identifiable service activities for the campus or broader community, and the positive impact of the service events either internally or externally. This year’s Outstanding Service Award went to Kerry McMahon, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Chemistry.

Some of McMahon’s outstanding service includes:

Outside of campus, he shares his gift of music as a guitarist for his church worship team.
For over a decade, McMahon served his department faithfully by organizing weekly and monthly lab safety inspections and managing the department stockroom.
He has overseen the annual soil analysis initiative which is a service to our local community.
He has served as faculty marshal for over ten years.
He also served as the faculty advisor for the Chemistry club, guiding students in their projects and assisting in the Big Kablooey demo event
As another example of his spirit of service, although he retired from Geneva in May 2024, he is continuing to teach for the department, providing significant support.

This professor is an alum of Geneva College graduating with a degree in Chemistry in 1979 and then completing a PhD from the University of Connecticut. He served faithfully as a full-time member of the faculty for 20 years.

The Excellence in Part-Time Teaching Award

The Excellence in Part-time Teaching Award is awarded based on the faculty member’s classroom teaching ability, educational leadership, creativity in teaching and methodology, course and program development, and enhancement of the educational climate and opportunities at Geneva.

This year’s winner of the Excellence in Part-Time Teaching Award was awarded to Professor Alisa Huston. Huston has been teaching for Geneva since 2021 in Humanities and English and has been instrumental in the successful implementation of our developmental reading and writing curriculum.

In addition to her curriculum and classroom work, Huston’s students share how she has impacted them:

“Having [this professor] was an amazing [experience]. There is nothing better than having a professor who is so invested in getting to know you as a person first then a student, helping you understand the course that you are taking.
[This professor] is very dedicated to her students and is willing to do everything in her power to help them succeed. Her teaching style allows individuals of all learning types learn the best that they can.”
[This professor] gave great feedback …and was very understanding of our circumstances. She knew what we would have trouble with and made sure to spend extra time on these areas.
“The way that she led discussions in class made them very easy to follow, and she was good at listening to each of our opinions. This was encouraging and helped us feel heard and understood in the classroom.”
“She made an effort to know us outside of our classwork and personally that made writing with honesty and vulnerability easy.”

The Excellence in Teaching Award

The Excellence in Teaching Award is also awarded based on a faculty member’s classroom teaching ability, educational leadership, creativity in teaching and methodology, course and program development, and enhancement of the educational climate and opportunities at Geneva.

Scott Shidemantle, PhD, Professor of Biblical Studies, is the recipient of this year’s Excellence in Teaching Award. Shidemantle has been a member of the Geneva Faculty since 1997. He has a BA from Slippery Rock University, an MDiv from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, a ThM from Princeton Theological Seminary and a PhD from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.

Students and faculty have nominated Shidemantle for this award countless times over the years. Some of the student comments include:

I thought [this professor] did an amazing job making this course understandable and interesting.
Might be one of my favorite classes/professors I've had in college. I took this professor at the recommendation of both my brothers that had him in class years ago, and he exceeded my expectations.
[This professor] is an excellent professor and he is VERY knowledgeable of the topic. I thought he had great insights into the content, and I know I would not have learned nearly as much having taken the course with anyone else. I know that I am going to remember what I learned in this class for a long time.
Great teacher, joy to be in [this professor’s] class
I super enjoyed being in your class!

The faculty at Geneva College make all the difference. The faculty at Geneva truly are unique. Alumni frequently remark that the most profound parts of their education were because of a personal relationship with a faculty member. Often, a student’s deepest learning occurs when faculty members take time outside of the class or what is required of them, to meet a student where they are. Each of these faculty members, along with many others, dedicates a deep commitment to Geneva’s mission of education, academic and scholarly excellence, advancement of their fields, and an unwavering care for their students. We are thankful for the hard work and talent of our faculty.

Sep 3, 2024

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Faculty Awards 2024

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