David Ruzic wins Rose Award for Teaching Excellence

4/3/2019 Susan Mumm

Written by Susan Mumm

David Ruzic wins Rose Award for Teaching Excellence
David Ruzic, teaching from the Boneyard Creek.
David Ruzic, teaching from the Boneyard Creek.
Students have appreciated Prof. David Ruzic’s innovative and non-traditional teaching style. This year, it has gained him the Rose Award for Teaching Excellence from the College of Engineering.

A faculty member in Nuclear, Plasma, and Radiological Engineering, Ruzic has built a well-earned reputation for engaging students, being included in the List of Teachers Ranked Excellent by Their Students almost every semester since he started at the University of Illinois almost 35 years ago. Said NPRE Department Head Rizwan Uddin in nominating Ruzic for the honor, “Engineering and non-engineering students, alike, are transformed in their understanding of energy after encountering the Ruzic experience.

“The energy of (Ruzic’s) personality bursts forth as he teaches about energy, often by blowing things up,” Uddin wrote. “His class demonstrations have included burning coal in class so students can smell the sulfur being released. He has set up a still on the Quad to show how corn becomes gasohol. And he can be found standing in muck boots knee-high in the Boneyard Creek with a whiteboard to lecture about hydropower. The hands-on and practical demonstrations Professor Ruzic injects in his teaching is meant not only to entertain his students, but also to help them think for themselves about energy.”

Sometimes, teaching requires walking on water!
Sometimes, teaching requires walking on water!
Ruzic’s teaching methodology has been applied well in NPRE 101, Introduction to Energy Sources, and NPRE 201, Advanced Energy Systems – courses that tend to draw over 100 students, including non-engineering majors.

He has gone the extra mile in sharing his love for teaching by creating the Energy, Environment and Everyday Life video series, now available as a free Massive Open Online Course the university offers in conjunction with Coursera. Ruzic dedicated more than 1,000 hours during the three years needed to research, prepare, record and review the 130 video segments of the course. He developed 490 assessment questions and eight in-depth assignments so learners could probe deeper into the topics that include lessons on energy, chemistry, fuel cells, electricity and electric grids, coal, oil, natural gas, solar energy, wind energy, hydropower, nuclear energy, nuclear accidents (Chernobyl and Fukushima), nuclear waste, economics and fusion.

Ruzic has made the content available to his own students as well as to his colleagues. He also prepared for high school teachers potential lesson plans that fit within the Lab Science Standards the State of Illinois requires. He then distributed the online material to over 400 high school teachers in the state.

 

 

 

 

 


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This story was published April 3, 2019.