The Chattanooga State Faculty Fellows program recognizes and supports innovative faculty who develop and implement academic projects that support scholarship and promote student success. Chattanooga State Faculty Fellowships are named for former faculty members and/or administrators who demonstrated outstanding scholarship and dedication to teaching and learning.

The Faculty Fellows Committee reviewed the proposals submitted for the 2020-2021 academic year and named three faculty members as recipients. 

The Dr. Howard Yarbrough Nursing and Allied Health Fellow awarded to Marie Loisy, an associate professor of nursing, for the proposal to develop a cross disciplinary theatre healthcare course. “This experiential learning course will introduce students to role play, act as simulated performers in nursing and interdisciplinary healthcare simulation scenarios, and give feedback related to the communication skills of the healthcare learners,” shared Ms. Loisy. This course is designed for students interested in professional acting or health careers.  

The Beatrice Rutledge Lyons Social and Behavioral Sciences Fellow awarded to Dr. Skylar Davidson, an associate professor of sociology who collaborated with Dr. Anita Polk-Conley, mathematics professor and interim director of CARE, on a proposal to research best practices in student evaluations to help develop questions for Chattanooga State's end-of-semester student evaluations that assess critical and objective aspects of teaching.

"Traditionally, student evaluations of teaching in most colleges are used to assess faculty members' performance for the purposes of promotion and tenure. However, researchers have debated the effectiveness of these evaluations due to documented biases such as class size, class subject, and instructor demographics,” stated Dr. Davidson. This Faculty Fellows project seeks to improve upon Chattanooga State's student evaluations of teaching through building an evaluation instrument that minimizes unhelpful biases and provides timely and relevant information that can help faculty improve the quality of their teaching in this time of rapid change.

The program awards each Faculty Fellow $2,000 to support their work and $1,000 in travel funds to a professional conference or event where they can present their work or become inspired for their next innovation in teaching and learning.