“In all she does, Dr. Shumow is dedicated to the improvement of learning and development conditions for all children. This is a teacher’s teacher.”
- Wilma Miranda, chair, Department of Leadership, Educational Psychology and Foundations
For Lee Shumow, “professor” is more than just a job description or a title. It is her identity.
“It’s essential to what I do, to who I am and what I am trying to do in the world,” Shumow says. “Teaching for me is not a vocation, it’s an avocation. I feel very lucky to have a career I love.”
That deep and abiding enthusiasm for her job is but one of the traits that puts Shumow in an elite class of teachers who not only effectively convey information, but also connect with and inspire their students on a personal level, colleagues say. She is particularly zealous in her mission to create teachers with a keen insight into the importance of the adolescent years.
“She has a tremendous passion for the discipline, for her students and for her students as future teachers,” says Jean Pierce, assistant chair of the Department of Leadership, Educational Psychology and Foundations. “She is firmly committed to creating the best secondary education professionals possible and she leads by setting a very powerful example.”
That leadership by example is no accident. Shumow is always keenly aware of the fact that she is teaching future (or current) teachers. Whether introducing undergraduates to the basics of adolescent development, or guiding doctoral candidates through the intricacies of high-level research, she tries to model best practices.
For instance, Shumow is a firm believer that she can spot an outstanding teacher by his or her ability to speak about the strengths and weaknesses of individual students.
Not surprisingly, Shumow’s own conversations are sprinkled with biographical tidbits about students, such as who comes from a family of 12 siblings or who has a deep interest in poetry. Such information surfaces naturally, she says, in the course of the free-wheeling conversations that take place in class, from reading the journal entries that students must submit weekly, from guiding students through research or from writing letters of recommendation to help them earn internships and jobs.
She also is very current on the whereabouts of former students who routinely e-mail her with reports of their progress and requests for advice. So frequent are such requests that she formerly hosted a support group one Saturday each month where former-students-turned-teachers talked through the challenges they are facing.
All of that personal attention makes a lasting impression on students.
“She epitomizes the essence of humanity in teaching,” writes Pamela Parker, a veteran educator for whom Shumow served as dissertation chair while she earned her doctoral degree. “She encourages, challenges, stimulates and inspires her students to accomplish great things. I am grateful to have experienced her extraordinary commitment to our profession.”
Letters from colleagues and former students supporting Shumow’s selection for the Presidential Teaching Professor were filled with similar prose, but Wilma Miranda, chair of LEPF, sums it up most succinctly.
“In all she does, Dr. Shumow is dedicated to the improvement of learning and development conditions for all children,” Miranda writes. “This is a teacher’s teacher.”
In addition to her new status as a Presidential Teaching Professor, Shumow has received numerous other honors including the Exceptional Contributions to Teaching Award from the College of Education in 2004 and the NIU Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching award in 2005.
- Joe King, NIU Public Affairs
- Photo by Scott Walstrom, NIU Media Services