An energetic political scientist takes students on "philosophy walks" around the city and finds real-world references to the political theories of Aristotle, Plato and John Stuart Mills.

A dedicated education professor organizes peer-counseling programs that connect his students to children in inner-city schools.

A history professor invites students showing up during office hours in for impromptu group seminars where they learn from each other as well as from him.

These UCLA faculty share three things - they are luminaries in the classroom, they are beloved by their students and they are winners, together with 10 other Senate and non-

Colacurcio

MacDonald

Terraciano

Trent

Walker

Senate faculty and teaching assistants, of the 2000-01 Distinguished Teaching Awards given annually by the Academic Senate Committee on Teaching, in conjunction with the Office of Instructional Development.

Every year, lengthy nomination letters and glowing testimonials from department chairs, vice chairs, colleagues, students, alumni and others fill campus-directory-thick dossiers on each candidate.

This year, the Senate faculty winners are Michael Colacurcio of English; Glen MacDonald of geography; Kevin Terraciano of history; James Trent of education; and Brian Walker of political science.

Winners among teaching assistants are: Thomas Dubois of history; Caryl Lee-Benner of Spanish and Portuguese; Nancy Llewellyn of the classics; Ronald Den Otter of political science; and Andrew Sargent of English.

Among the non-Senate faculty winners are George Leddy of international development studies; Sandra Mano, UCLA writing programs; and Jeanne Perry, molecular, cell and developmental biology.

Several of the winners, like Walker, reflect pride, but also humility at receiving UCLA's highest award for teaching.

"I find teaching a constant anxiety because I never really know whether I'm getting thingsacross to them," he admitted candidly. "In my darkest moments of self-doubt, I can now say, 'Well, I did get a prize for this!' "

Walker guides undergraduates to an understanding of the concepts of great thinkers in an "Introduction to Political Theory." "I try to encourage students to take an ethical viewpoint without preaching ethics to them," said Walker, known for running up and down aisles, holding out a wireless microphone to elicit dialogue.

Springing from one chair to another, he debates philosophical points with himself, to students' delight. They join in on his potlucks and philosophy walks around town as they engage in informal philosophical discourse.

Called "one of the best teachers of his generation" by a former Ph.D. student, MacDonald admits his first attempt at teaching a university class was not a rousing success - he tried to do too much, too fast.

After seeking advice from more seasoned instructors, he reappraised his teaching approaches and devised four primary goals: to inform students about the subject area; to excite and engage them; to develop their critical analytic skills; and to develop their communication skills.

Today, the teacher of environmental studies and biogeography draws raves for taking a practical, rather than ideological, approach to his material. "If I hadn't won the award, I still learned a lot about what my students think of me," MacDonald said. "But winning's great!"

Early in his 30-year UCLA teaching career, said Trent, "I came to realize that a brilliant lecture could dazzle, but that deeply processed teaching and learning called for a dynamic, interactive process between me and each of my students."

As a passionate teacher and compassionate mentor to both undergraduate and graduate students, Trent was instrumental in establishing the very popular Education Studies minor and the Educational Leadership Program. He has developed numerous peer counseling programs, including one serving inner-city students.

"Above all, the student matters," his teaching credo goes. "Students are not learning machines; they are students, and they are also individuals with worth and dignity," Trent noted.

Terraciano entered UCLA as an undergraduate, thinking he wanted to be a lawyer. It only took a year for him to realize that he wanted to be a history professor instead.

"I went where my heart led me," Terraciano recalled, "the history of Latin America, especially Southern Mexico and its indigenous people. It's a type of history that's still very much alive today - there is our proximity to Mexico, which makes it especially relevant - and I just fell in love with the subject, country and people."

Terraciano, who lives in De Neve Plaza as a faculty in residence, said he tries to stress to his students that understanding the past is key to understanding today's society.

"If we do not make the study of history relevant to the understanding of the present, it doesn't really serve a purpose; it becomes simply an academic matter," said Terraciano.

Colacurcio quotes Emerson in describing his approach to teaching: "Truly speaking, it is not instruction, but provocation, that I can receive from another soul."

Colacurcio's success as a teacher, his colleagues wrote in nominating him for the award, resides in his ability to breathe life into the literature of the Puritans.

The English professor is well-known for his "performances" of literary analysis, memorable experiences to students who admire and even imitate his "searching gaze," "the wide-eyed flare of his face" and his habit of cupping the air as if to trap the beating wings of an idea, his students commented.

Provocative teaching and drama aside, Colacurcio added, "The book must do the work. And its effects are well beyond professorial control."

The awards will be presented at the Andrea L. Rich Night to Honor Teaching, an invitation-only dinner May 22 at Royce Hall's West Lobby.

The Senate faculty winners will also be honored May 19 at the UCLA Alumni Association Awards ceremony in the Grand Horizon Room of Covel Commons.