WCE’s Watson Student Leader organization held their second annual Aspiring Educator Summit on Nov. 21. The theme of the event was “Equity in Education.” The full-day virtual conference featured a keynote by Daphne Penn, visiting fellow in education at Harvard University and presentations by 25 educators from 13 states, including six 2020 state-level Teachers of the Year. The WSLs planned the event in partnership with WCE’s SAIL Office. more...
WCE faculty members Bill Sterrett and Michele Parker presented with Ed.D. graduates and current doctoral students at an International Scientific Forum in October. Tyumen State University hosted the forum with the support of the Russian Foundation for Fundamental Research. Jen Fernandez-Villa coordinated UNCW’s participation in the virtual event. more...
Meredith Jones has received the 2020 Early Career Research Award from the National Association of Early Childhood Teacher Educators. Jones is an assistant professor in the Department of Early Childhood, Elementary, Middle, Literacy and Special Education, and coordinator of WCE’s M.Ed. program in leadership, policy and advocacy in early childhood. The award was announced in November. more...
Sabrina Hill-Black has received the 2020 WILMA Women to Watch Award in Education. Hill-Black is principal of D.C. Virgo Preparatory Academy. The award was announced in October. more...
Amy Garrett Dikkers is co-editor of the book “Social Presence in Online Learning: Multiple Perspectives on Practice and Research.” The book was selected for the 2020 Distance Education Book Award by the Association for Educational Communications and Technology’s Division of Distance Learning. The award was presented at the AECT International Convention in November. more...
Healthful Living and Fitness Education faculty Jordan Weber and Amelia (Kit) Huelskamp have been named Educators of the Year by the N.C. Society for Health and Physical Educators (NC SHAPE). The news was announced by UNCW’s College of Health and Human Services in October. more...
Charles “Hal” Wilson ’97, associate professor of coaching education at Georgia Southern University, has received the 2020 Waters College of Health Professions Senior Teaching Award. Wilson was a high school teacher and coach for 12 years before moving to higher education. He recently reflected on his career and the foundation for success that was set at UNCW. more...
UNCW’s new eSports program is the first of its kind in North Carolina and among the first in the nation.
Ray Pastore, coordinator of UNCW’s eSports program, was featured in We Are UNCW in October. The eSports program was also featured in a recent UNCW video and home page news story. more...
The Watson College is pleased to share a We Are UNCW profile featuring Morgan Walker O’Connell ’13, ’15M. She joined the MarineQuest team in 2019 after spending four years as an educator at Dolphin Research Center, a marine mammal facility in the Florida Keys. more...
Kimberly Robinson ’15, ’18M has been named Union County Public Schools 2020-2021 Beginning Teacher of the Year. She earned a Master of Arts in Teaching from the Watson College in 2018 and currently teaches English at Monroe High School. more...
Schala Harper has been selected to represent New Hanover County Schools for the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching (NCCAT) Beginning Teacher of the Year Award. Harper is an EC teacher at Trask Middle School and a member of the inaugural cohort of WCE’s Residency Licensure program. more...
The Watson College of Education is pleased to announce that two $5,000 Hattie M. Strong scholarships have been awarded to WCE interns for the fall 2020 semester. Please join us in congratulating Jessica Strachan and Laney Summerlin. more...
Joy Childs was selected as a UNCW nominee for the NC Governor’s Award of Excellence, the highest honor bestowed on a state employee. Symphony Oxendine was selected as a member of the ACPA Foundation’s Diamond Honoree Class of 2021. Janna Robertson and the Ed Lab Team were featured in OCEAL Faculty Spotlights. The Watson College is pleased to share these stories and other news. more...
Teen youth and families are invited to join MarineQuest for a virtual celebration of Youth Climate Action Day! The event will feature youth and scientists as speakers, MarineQuest staff, artists and writers – all of whom are taking action to combat climate change. The event is free but registration is required. more...
UNCW will hold its first-ever virtual commencement on Saturday, December 12. Separate events will be held for May and December 2020 graduates. The commencement events will feature traditional ceremony elements including speeches and individual graduate recognition. more...
The Watson College will host virtual preview day events in January and February for high school and transfer students interested in becoming a teacher. Parents are welcome too! Registration is open. more...
Wilson Okello, Donna DeGennaro and Jamie Pond, participants in the newly formed Racial Justice Learning Community at UNCW, organized a Critical and Decolonizing Praxis Teach-in in October. The two-day event featured speakers from UNCW and nationally recognized critical and decolonizing scholars. more...
Six students enrolled in WCE’s middle grades Master of Arts in Teaching program were selected to present the results of math tasks they implemented with students at the third annual Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators’ Pre-service Teacher Poster Session. The online forum was held in November. more...
The Alpha Alpha Pi chapter of Kappa Delta Pi welcomed 35 new members in September. In October, they collected nearly 800 face masks for children in our community during a drive-through mask donation event held at the Watson College. KDP also held a food drive in support of areas schools and students in November. more...
WCE seniors Jessica Gehrin, Heather Jones, Cherish King and Kaitlyn Marshall presented on issues of importance to future teachers and held a live Q&A with North Carolina State Senate candidates Michael Lee and Harper Peterson at an educational “Get Out the Vote” event for students on Oct 12. The event was organized by WCE’s new SNCAE student group, faculty members Kathy Fox and Laura Szech, and the Watson College Diversity Committee. more...
The Watson College welcomed 65 teachers to a virtual Beginning Teachers Professional Development Day on November 4. The theme of the event was “Daring to Dig Deeper.” Leanne Rose, NCCAT Beginning Teacher of the Year, was the featured speaker. more...
Lori Best ’94, ’00M and Chase Morgan ’14, ’18M gave a joint presentation on standards-based grading at the North Carolina New Teacher Support Program Institute in October. Best is an NC NTSP lead instructional coach and Morgan is a second-grade teacher at D.C. Virgo. The NC NTSP provides support to beginning teachers in more than 40 districts in North Carolina. more...
MarineQuest School Programs Coordinator Harris Muhlstein introduced teachers to the Foldscope microscope during a presentation at WCE’s Beginning Teacher Conference in October. Because it works well, costs less than a dollar and can fit in your pocket, the Foldscope is an effective tool for teaching remotely, face to face or in a hybrid classroom. more...
In 2018, Youth Programs introduced I-40 E.A.S.T., a STEM Student Enrichment Program (SSEP) funded by the Burroughs-Wellcome Foundation. The project serves rural middle and high school students in Duplin and Sampson counties. Career exploration field trips were cancelled last spring due to the pandemic, but the project was relaunched in October as a virtual program. more...
The Watson College held a virtual Future Conference on October 28. The event, held each semester, gives high school students an opportunity to learn about the teaching profession and programs offered by the Watson College. more...
On Oct. 27, emeriti faculty members Hathia Hayes and Eleanor Wright joined Dean Dempsey, Brad and Becky Walker, the Ed Lab Team, WCE students and their tutees for a live demonstration and discussion of ways the Ed Lab has transitioned to preparing future teachers in a virtual environment. Brian Brinkley and Dawn Carter arranged the Zoom event. more...
WCE’s Diversity Committee formed a book group in June to explore issues of race and equity as one critical action in anti-racist work underway at the Watson College. This fall, UNCW Provost Jamie Winebrake and WCE Dean Van Dempsey joined the group to discuss Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book “Between the World and Me,” the third book selected. more...
The Watson College held a special Watson Wednesdays celebration to honor Jasmine Gaston on November 11. Gaston, UNCW’s K-12 engineering associate will begin her new role as a NASA engineer on December 7. more...
Morgan Walker, MarineQuest’s research and volunteer coordinator, is now Mrs. Thomas O’Connell! She was married September 5 in Hendersonville, North Carolina. more...
