Ragins Awarded for Outstanding Teaching
Professor Belle Rose Ragins of the Management faculty has been honored with the 2005 UWM Alumni Association Award for Teaching Excellence.
Ragins is an internationally known expert in diversity issues. “Professor Ragins is highly respected by her students for her extensive knowledge, as well as for creating a stimulating and challenging classroom environment and encouraging students in their studies,” said School of Business Dean V. Kanti Prasad. In 2004, she was also awarded the School of Business Advisory Council Outstanding Teaching Award.
Letters of support from her students described how Ragins inspires and challenges students to make a difference in their workplaces and in their personal lives. One student described her impact on him as making him a better student, a better man, and a better father. “That’s what Dr. Ragins’ classes are about,” he said. “I knew her class was preparation for the world outside her classroom.”
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs Janice S. Miller notes that in addition to the unique impact Dr. Ragins has on her students, her record of scholarly achievement is equally outstanding. “The Alumni Association is not only recognizing an outstanding teacher,” she said. “It is simultaneously honoring a nationally prominent researcher who has put UWM on the map in terms of the scholarship of diversity and mentoring.”
Ragins’ scholarship has been acknowledged with four elected fellowships this past year in the Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, the American Psychological Society, the American Psychological Association, and the Society for the Psychology of Women. She also received the 2004 Academy of Management Mentoring Legacy Award. These honors are just the most recent in a distinguished academic career.
Associate Dean Miller also notes Ragins’ impact on the Milwaukee community. “Her tireless efforts to disseminate knowledge about workplace diversity led to the establishment of the Institute for Diversity Education and Leadership (formerly the UWM Milwaukee Center for Workplace Diversity),” said Miller, “a leading organization in Milwaukee on the topic of diversity.”
This is the second consecutive year that a School of Business faculty member has received the UWM Alumni Association Award for Teaching Excellence. In 2004,
Associate Professor Christine Bauman of the accounting and tax faculty received the award.
