March 24, 2003, Northern Today Extra

Gabris, Chappell named 2003 Presidential Teaching Professors

At first blush, they seem to have little in common. One teaches local government management, the other music. But both veteran NIU faculty members have a gift for dispensing knowledge and inspiration, and they consistently strike a chord with students.

Meet political scientist Gerald Gabris and music professor Robert Chappell, the 2003 Presidential Teaching Professors.

"In terms of teaching - the most important activity that occurs on our campus - Jerry Gabris and Robert Chappell set the bar," says NIU Provost Ivan Legg. "They care passionately about the subject matter and demonstrate extraordinary commitment to their students. They love to teach, and it shows."

Begun in 1990, the Presidential Teaching Professorship is NIU's top honor for outstanding teaching. Award recipients 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.

Gabris and Chappell will be recognized at the NIU Convocation for Academic Excellence. The event will be held at 5 p.m. Sunday, April 13, in the Duke Ellington Ballroom of Holmes Student Center.

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

Shaping community leaders

More than likely, Gerald Gabris has improved your quality of life.

That's because over the past 17 years at NIU, Gabris has helped mold hundreds of people who have gone on to become innovative leaders in our communities. He is a mainstay of the university's acclaimed Master's of Public Administration (MPA) program, which produces about one-third of Illinois' city managers. If that's not impressive enough, U.S. News &World Report ranks the graduate program as the third best in the country for city management and urban policy.

So what does it take at the classroom level to maintain that level of excellence?

"You have to blend theory with practice," Gabris says. "Our students will be practicing administrators, so they need to know what goes on in the real world. We're training not professional managers but professional problem solvers - people who must master a wide range of skills necessary to deal with complicated, sensitive issues."

Gabris teaches primarily graduate courses on government organization, administration, leadership and personnel management, and he has directed 10 student Ph.D. dissertations. His students are required to participate in class and often will find themselves in team-building or role-playing exercises.

In a lesson on collective bargaining, for instance, Gabris creates one team of management and another of labor so students get a feel for what it's like to be wrangling at the bargaining table. He also brings in a parade of speakers, from top city managers to police and fire chiefs.

"Dr. Gabris puts everything in a current and applied context," says alum Gloria Simo (MPA, '91; Ph.D. '97), now a professor in the Public Services Graduate Program at DePaul University. "He understands the way organizations work and helps you to understand them so that you can be more effective as an organizational member. Beyond that, he takes a personal interest in each student. He inspired and encouraged me to be a professor."

Gabris travels the country as an invited speaker and is a familiar face in city halls across the Chicago region, where has served as a consultant to more than 50 communities. He is well-known and well-published in his field, with research specialties in public-sector leadership development and personnel management. He has two new books in the works.

"It sounds cliché, but good teaching and good research really are intertwined," Gabris says. "I also think it's important to keep active professionally and read a lot of books outside my discipline. I'm always looking for new ideas. You have to learn more, extend yourself and try new teaching techniques. I take student feedback very seriously as well, and often incorporate their suggestions."

Once among Gabris' students, Douglas Ihrke (Ph.D., '96) today directs the MPA program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Ihrke describes Gabris as well-prepared in the classroom and passionate about the subject matter.

"The fact that he is a respected consultant to many communities only adds credibility to what he's teaching his students, about half of whom are working adults," Ihrke says. "I remember him sharing with us fascinating behind-the-scenes stories that illuminate what can and does happen in a political world.

"Jerry brings a great deal to NIU," Ihrke adds. "He has been a real contributor to an awful lot of people's lives."

'Responsible' for learning

Robert Chappell cannot imagine life without teaching, but uses a different word to describe his job.

"I am a co-learner with my students," says Chappell, who realizes great musicians are molded not by the weekly hour-long lessons but by the long hours of independent practice in between. "I am responsible for learning at every lesson, and they are responsible for teaching."

Still, he holds dear his role as teacher.

"I see the kids grow, from the surface knowledge of music to a deeper level of understanding and then knowing how to communicate that to a listener," he says. "They're now capable of teaching themselves. They've graduated to the point of really being musically aware enough to continue to be their own teacher."

Self-learning is familiar to Chappell, who came to NIU in 1984.

The head of percussion studies at NIU discovered music at age 8, when his family bought a piano and he tried to mimic his father's playing by studying his fingers. Classically trained on the keys after that, Chappell accompanied his junior high school orchestra on the piano and, occasionally, on simple percussion.

He remained in the percussion section through high school, but laid his mallets aside to study engineering in college. Midway through his freshman year, he missed music enough to transfer to Ohio State University in pursuit of a degree in percussion performance.

Chappell later toured and recorded with the Paul Winter Consort, which fueled his interest in world music as he gained experience on the East Indian tabla, the Ugandan xylophone and West African drums.

Meanwhile, the desire to teach grew.

"I wanted to find a way I could continue to be creative, still perform and teach," he says. "That's vital to remain a really good teacher. If you continue to be an active musician, it regenerates you. It recharges the batteries. It gives you a freshness, an excitement, a passion."

Former student Liam Teague, who collaborated with Chappell on a recent CD, praises his zeal.

"When I first came to the States, I didn't really understand what jazz was all about. As a matter of fact, I hated it, just because I didn't understand it," Teague says. "I took his jazz improv course, and that opened up a new world to me, not just because of his teaching skills, but he was very enthusiastic. He's one of the big reasons my playing has improved over the years."

Chappell's busy life includes performing with Teague and with the Caribbean jazz group Panoramic. He also leads the percussion/steel band camp every summer at the Birch Creek Music Center in Door County, Wis., where he is the program director. He is a prolific composer, whose steel band composition "Wood-N-Steel" earned top honors in two rounds of World Steelband Festival 2000.

"His talents as a teacher are the most diverse of any faculty member in the School of Music," says Paul Bauer, director of the school.

"I have never known a collegiate faculty member who moves with such ease from classical to jazz to world music idioms or from the most serious to the most comical in nature, and always at a world-class performance/teaching level. His students produce to their fullest potential for him because he is very demanding, yet truly treats them as co-learners."

NIU Communication Department presents 'Reality Bytes' documentary film festival

The NIU Department of Communication and College of Liberal Arts and Sciences will host the Reality Bytes Documentary Film Festival from Tuesday through Friday. Admission is free and open to the public for all events.

Festival entries are student-produced short documentaries. Entries will be screened from 7:55 to 10 p.m. Tuesday and from 8:50 to 10 p.m. Wednesday in Diversions Lounge at the Holmes Student Center.

Documentary festival winners will be selected from three genres: historical, biographical and social issue. The winning films will be screened at 5 p.m. Friday in Diversions Lounge. The Best of Festival winner will be announced at the awards presentation Friday evening in the University Suite of Holmes Student Center. Refreshments will be served, and the NIU Jazz Ensemble will perform from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m.

In addition to festival entries, several documentaries produced by Department of Communication students will be featured throughout the week at Diversions Lounge. "Ghost Stories: Out of the Corner of Your Eye," a 12-minute film by Paul Butler, Chris Johnston, Lindsey Katz and P.J. Stiltz, will be shown at 7 p.m. Tuesday. That will be followed by a 7:15 p.m. showing of "Comfort & Joy," a 20-minute film by Tory Norquist and Laura Blake.

Paul Butler's film, "Save Them! The Life of Paul Rader, Christian Radio Pioneer," will screen at 7 p.m. Wednesday in Diversions. "Wade in the Water," a documentary by former graduate student James Macon, will begin at 8 p.m. Macon's documentary gives an in-depth account of the Underground Railroad that once ran through DeKalb County.

CAB will co-sponsor a presentation from NIU media alumni - Bill Weinman, Wil Hernandez and Robert Katz - at 7 p.m. Thursday in Diversions Lounge. The three alums are actively involved in the Los Angeles production scene.

Weinman was a film editor on "Beyond the Glory," "Nash Bridges," and "VH1 Behind the Music," and editor/producer on two feature-length music documentaries, "The String Cheese Incident" and "Pura Vida & Evolution." Hernandez is a free-lance editor who is currently working on "Beyond the Glory" for Fox Sport Net. Katz just completed production on the new Gary Ross film "Seabiscuit," featuring Tobey Maguire. Previously Katz worked as an associate producer on the 2002 film, "One Hour Photo" featuring Robin Williams, and he is producer of the soon-to-be-released film, "The Wedding Contract."

On Friday, film scholar Judith Mayne of Ohio State Univeristy will speak from 3 to 4:45 p.m. in Gable Hall's Cavan Auditorium. Mayne is an expert in the field of film and women's studies. Her lecture, "Marlene Dietrich and Hollywood's Representation of the Aging Female Star," will present her recent studies into how film and popular culture merge into our cultural reading of gender roles.

Visit the festival Web site at www.niu.edu/comm/realitybytes for more information.

3-24-2003