The Department of English is proud to announce that PhD in English student Jordan Woodward is the recipient of the 2021 Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) Outstanding Writing Instruction Award. This annual award recognizes a Graduate Teaching Associate who teaches writing in an innovative fashion: helping students overcome learning challenges, connecting writing to significant disciplinary concepts and improving teaching based on assessment and feedback. As this year’s winner, Woodward will receive a $200 award and a certificate of achievement. In addition to her monetary prize, Woodward will participate in an episode of the WAC podcast—Write.Think.Teach.—to discuss how she uses multimodal assignments to promote her students’ overall engagement with the local community, and more specifically, to be able to address the real needs of diverse audiences.  

Associate Professor of English Christa B. Teston is Woodward’s advisor and an important influence in her career. Speaking about Professor Teston’s impact, Woodward said, “Dr. Teston has been an excellent mentor and collaborator in designing and implementing community-engaged curriculum, to whom I am incredibly grateful.” Previous recipients of this award in the English department include Colleen Kennedy (2015) and Jacqueline Kauza (2019).