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SUNY Potsdam prof awarded 2011 Thomas L. and Jane D. Russell Distance Education Faculty Excellence Award

Posted 7/18/11

POTSDAM -- SUNY Potsdam instructor Dr. Linda Moerschell has been named the recipient of the College's 2011 Thomas L. and Jane D. Russell Distance Education Faculty Excellence Award. Moerschell …

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SUNY Potsdam prof awarded 2011 Thomas L. and Jane D. Russell Distance Education Faculty Excellence Award

Posted

POTSDAM -- SUNY Potsdam instructor Dr. Linda Moerschell has been named the recipient of the College's 2011 Thomas L. and Jane D. Russell Distance Education Faculty Excellence Award.

Moerschell received the $1,000 award for her course titled "Team Building," which she taught on-line in the fall semester of 2010. She is an instructor in SUNY Potsdam's Department of English and Communication, and the College's Department of Computer Science, Organizational Leadership and Technology.

Thomas L. and Jane D. Russell, who live in Raleigh, N.C., endowed the award to encourage excellence in SUNY Potsdam's distance education program. The Russells established the honor to recognize faculty who are conducting their courses in an exemplary manner, by providing faculty with a financial incentive to improve their distance education courses and rewarding those who make their courses available to as many students as possible by removing all unnecessary barriers.

Dr. Moerschell's course is a graduate-level elective for students in the Organizational Leadership specialization. Major subject areas included virtual teams, mastermind groups, self-organizing systems, psychodynamics, team discipline and behaviors and troubleshooting. The students' learning process was enhanced by rigorous and informed discussions that addressed theory and application of ideas related to team building. Dr. Moerschell created complex discussion rubrics for instructor reference prior to the course launch and populated the course discussions and assignments with up-to-date literature. The course will be offered again in Fall 2011.

Criteria for the award are based on course access; excellence in curricula design and presentation; student evaluations, and academic evaluation of teaching effectiveness, scholarship and completion rate. A Distance Education Award Committee determines the winner each year.

A 1957 alumnus of SUNY Potsdam's Crane School of Music, Mr. Russell is director emeritus of the Office of Instructional Telecommunications at North Carolina State University in Raleigh. His career covered more than 40 years, including the first five teaching elementary and secondary school music before changing to instructional technology and eventually focusing on research and distance education at NCSU.

Mrs. Russell taught at the elementary through university levels and then enjoyed her career as a university law librarian. From the University of Florida, she moved up to a position at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, and on to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In 2009, Mrs. Russell was awarded Honorary Alumni status by the SUNY Potsdam Alumni Association.