Klein College of Media and Communication professors Nancy Morris and Jan Gera won Faculty Teaching, Research and Creative Awards handed out by Temple University. Morris won the university’s most prestigious honor, the Great Teaching Award, and Gera won the Part-Time Faculty Excellence in Teaching and Instruction Award.
Morris, who teaches in the Department of Media Studies and production, has served as a faculty member at Temple University since 1999. Before that, she taught at the University of Stirling in Scotland. In 2002 Morris was the Unesco Communications Chair at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain, and in 2012 she received a Fulbright Scholar Award for teaching and research in Chile.
She said the transition from teaching abroad to teaching in the United States was never difficult.
“Since I spent my whole life in the U.S. except for that, it was fairly straightforward,” she said.
Although Morris never intended to become a professor when she was younger, she said she fell in love with higher education while earning her doctorate in communications at the University of Pennsylvania. She also earned her master’s degree there after earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Latin American studies at the University of New Mexico
Years later, she raved about her interactions in her time at Temple.
“So many great students and great colleagues,” she said. “I think all of us feel like it’s our actual students that make the experience important. The students are so great, energetic and thoughtful.”
Morris was awarded the Lindback Distinguished Teaching Award in 2015. The Great Teaching Award provides a $15,000 stipend to the recipient along with a sculpture and framed certificate. Her name will also be engraved on the Great Teachers Wall in Founder’s Garden.
Gera has served as an adjunct professor in the Department of Advertising and Public Relations since 2012 and teaches Intro to Marketing and Media Planning at Klein College. She has her own business, Gera Media Consulting, where she acts as a media and marketing consultant.
She’s always had a passion for teaching. While Gera Media Consulting allowed her to work from home and raise her kids, when they grew up, she said she knew she wanted to teach. To do that, she brushed up on modern media skills.
“It pushed me out of my comfort zone in a good way,” she said. “Now I can bring it to the class and talk about what we’re working on in a digital space.”
Gera will receive a stipend and a plaque for the Part-Time Faculty Excellence in Teaching and Instruction Award.
Originally published at Klein.Temple.edu