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Contact: Joe King, NIU Office of Public Affairs
(815) 753-4299

May 4, 2004

NIU names Blair, Giles and Ridnour

2004 Presidential Teaching Professors

 

DeKalb, Ill. — If Northern Illinois University had a “hall of fame” for teaching, Mathematics Professor William Blair, English Professor James Giles and Marketing Professor Rick Ridnour would be in it.

 

The three faculty veterans have been named as NIU’s 2004 Presidential Teaching Professors. The annual recognition is the university’s highest honor for outstanding teaching.

 

“The aim of any institution of higher education is to teach future generations. At NIU, we pride ourselves in providing students with professors who are both experts in their respective fields and highly skilled in the art of teaching,” NIU Provost Ivan Legg says.

 

“Bill Blair, Jim Giles and Rick Ridnour fit that mold perfectly,” he adds. “They are top scholars and extraordinarily effective teachers whose passion and commitment to their students often extends even beyond the classroom.”

 

Presidential Teaching Professors receive a salary boost and grant money to further develop their classroom talents over their four-year appointments. After four years, they are awarded the title of Distinguished Teaching Professors. (See http://www.niu.edu/president/ptplist.shtml for a list of past winners.)

 

Here is a closer look at this year’s winners.

 

The right equation

 

Mathematics Professor William Blair has zeroed in on the perfect equation: Make complex topics approachable, show how mathematics relates to the real world, inspire students’ confidence in their own skills.

 

As a result, thousands of NIU students over the years have come to appreciate the beauty of math and power of numbers.

 

“He approaches the study of mathematics as an intellectual adventure,” says former student Hisaya Tsutsui, now a mathematics professor at Millersville University in Pennsylvania. “As a result, he doesn’t give away solutions, but patiently—and brilliantly—guides students through that process of discovery.”

 

Blair, of DeKalb, earned his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland and came to NIU in 1971. He has taught 34 different undergraduate and graduate courses, with calculus and abstract algebra being among his mainstays. For the past 14 years, he has served as chair of the department, which serves about 6,000 students each semester. While that responsibility alone is a full-time endeavor, he chooses to continue teaching. Despite his busy schedule, his door is always open to students.

 

“In conversations outside of class, I try to learn my students’ majors and interests,” Blair says. “Showing how a particular topic in mathematics relates to their major subjects helps them to see how they might apply it in the future.”

 

Students consistently give Blair among the highest marks in the department on evaluations. They describe him as personable, organized and highly skilled at bringing out the best in students. Back in 1999, Lanea Keller thought she had made a mistake by enrolling in honors calculus. Thinking it would be too challenging, she intended to transfer out. But after one week with Blair, she was hooked.

 

“He has an incredible knack for explanation and illustration that made the very complex comprehensible,” says Keller, now a medical student at Rush University. “He made it so we believed in ourselves. I realized math was fun for me for the first time in my life.”

 

Blair convinced Douglas Mupasiri to pursue mathematics, rather than chemistry, as a career. “He was the one who changed my mind,” says Mupasiri, now a mathematics professor at the University of Northern Iowa. “Professor Blair is a real master craftsman, extremely knowledgeable about his subject, and always, always prepared. Above all, he struck me as a man who truly loved teaching.”

 

Blair won the Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award in 1990. During his tenure as chair, he has helped raise the department’s stature, but his influence extends well beyond the university. He and Distinguished Teaching Professor John Beachy co-authored the textbook, “Abstract Algebra,” which is used at NIU and universities across the country.

 

“I often have Bill’s students in my classes,” Beachy says. “They are always well-prepared, since he does everything possible to help them meet his high standards. It is a very tough act to follow.”

 

Blair views teaching mathematics as a privilege and as “just plain fun.”

 

“Most students approach mathematics with a healthy respect for its utility,” he says. “But many non-majors also have varying degrees of fear. One of my goals is to share the beauty of mathematics as well as its power. And one of my greatest joys is watching a student’s mathematical awakening.”

 

‘The Giles experience’

 

Whether their last class with English Professor James Giles was three or 30 years ago, students never forget “the Giles experience,” as it’s known.

 

Just ask Shannin Schroeder, a professor at Southern Arkansas University. Or Zerrie Campbell, president of Malcolm X College. Or Don Henley, yes, that Don Henley, of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

 

In his 20th century literature courses, Giles charms, challenges, enlightens and encourages students.

 

“Meet Jim Giles and you might not know what to expect of him as a teacher,” says Schroeder, who recalls her first class nearly 10 years ago. “He appears disorganized; his hair becomes disheveled as he ruffles it in thought, and his materials form a haphazard stack under his arm as he makes his way to class. Take his course, however, and you understand that there is marvelous method to what you originally took as ‘madness.’ ”

 

Malcolm X’s Campbell took three Giles classes in the early 1970s. It was during that time that Giles launched NIU’s first course in African-American literature.

 

“The fact that he took a risk to examine issues of race, culture and diversity through the exploration of African-American literature is a testimony to his courage in expanding his own vistas in his pursuit of lifelong teaching and learning,” Campbell says. “ More than 30 years after having been a student in his class, I can recall vividly the encouragement I received to engage in the exchange of free ideas through the respect for intellectual diversity.”

 

As for Henley, the Eagles front man took a course from Giles in the 1960s, when he was teaching at North Texas State University. It left such an impression that, in 1998, Henley invited Giles and his wife Wanda to be guests at the dedication of the Henry David Thoreau Institute at Walden Pond. Henley introduced his college professor to the audience, which included Bill and Hillary Clinton.

 

A native of the Lone Star State, Giles earned his Ph.D. at the University of Texas. He came to NIU in 1970 and over the years developed courses in African-American, ethnic-American and multicultural literature. In 2002, he won NIU’s Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award. He also has directed 11 dissertations, more than any current English faculty member.

 

With publication of eight books and more than 40 short stories and essays, Giles is considered a leading scholar in American literary naturalism, the urban novel and multi-ethnic literature. Over the years, he has played various leadership roles within the English department. He co-authored a winning Fulbright grant proposal that brought 36 foreign scholars to campus the past two summers to learn about America through its literature. He also has served on the NIU Faculty Senate and as elected executive secretary of the University Council.

 

“Perhaps no one else in the English Department has combined so well the ideal balance of productive research, excellence in classroom teaching and commitment to student welfare and development,” says Robert Self, interim English chair. “It’s no wonder that every semester his courses generate long waiting lists for admission.”

Despite his many accolades, Giles insists he is still learning lessons in the art of teaching.

 

“I don’t, and will never, know enough,” he says.

 

Passionate professional       

 

Typically, letters nominating an individual for the honor of Presidential Teaching Professor are signed by a close friend and colleague of the nominee. In the case of Rick Ridnour, however, the letter was signed by all 18 of his colleagues in the Department of Marketing in the College of Business.

 

“He raises the bar for all of us. He makes all of us want to be like him,” says Chair of Marketing Denise Schoenbachler, explaining the unanimous show of support for Ridnour who joined the department 14 years ago as an instructor teaching evening classes part time and rose through the ranks to full professor.

 

Add to that, a perpetually positive attitude, a sincere willingness to help any student or colleague who asks and a genuine passion for education, and Ridnour seemed a natural choice for the Presidential Teaching Professorship, Schoenbachler says.

 

That assessment seems to be shared by nearly every student to ever pass through the Ridnour’s Principles of Sales class. One of the cornerstones of the nationally recognized Professional Sales Program, which Ridnour helped foster from its earliest days, the class is challenging, comprehensive and capped off by a nerve-wracking live sales presentation before the class. Despite the demands he places on them, students are effusive in their praise of Ridnour’s teaching. In fact, for 14 straight years, he has earned the highest student evaluation scores of any teacher in the department.

 

“Were you to ask our alumni which faculty member had the most profound impact on them during their stay here, I would confidently venture to say that Dr. Ridnour’s name would be mentioned most often and by a wide margin,” said Geoff Gordon, one of Ridnour’s colleagues for the last 14 years.

 

Many of those students keep in touch with Ridnour long after graduation, and say they apply lessons learned in his classes even if they chose not to pursue a career in sales.

 

“He is a power packed semester of success. Going to his classes was like going to a high priced motivational seminar for three hours a week,” says Gayle DeHaan-Garland who is now an advisor Coach and financial advisor for American Express Financial Advisors.

 

While Ridnour, of Sycamore, counts the PTP among his most prominent awards, it is hardly the first. He received the Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award in 2001 and the Ideal Industries Excellence in Business Education award in 1992.

 

An active participant in campus life, he has served as a presenter at the Master Teacher Forum, is a frequent speaker at summer orientation programs, serves as a Huskie Host at university open houses and is regularly called upon by the Athletics Department to meet with recruits and their families.

 

Ridnour says he is happy to participate in all of those things, out of a love for his craft, and for the university.

 

“NIU is really a good fit for me,” says Ridnour, who pursued his love of teaching (which he had studied since his undergraduate days) after careers in banking and training. “I really feel fortunate to be in the Department of marketing, to be in the College of Business here at NIU where I have had the good fortune to work with such wonderful colleagues and students for these last several years.”

 

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