FSU 教师 Member 杰森Speights Honored With USM Regents Award for Mentoring

2018年4月12日下午12:50

Dr. 杰森Speights, director of 澳门十大赌城官方网站’s Multimedia Learning Center (MLC) and Planetarium and assistant professor of physics, 获校董会颁发卓越导师奖, the highest honor that the University of Maryland Board of Regents bestows to recognize exemplary faculty achievement. 他将在4月20日的董事会会议上获得荣誉.

“我所有最大的成功都可以追溯到我生命中伟大的导师, 所以回馈这些经历是一件很愉快的事情,斯贝茨说.

Speights’ honor marks the ninth time since 2007 that the regents honored an FSU faculty member. The award takes into account the impact a faculty member had on students during the previous three years.

“Dr. Speights takes pride in his hands-on interactions with students that result in the application of student learning to real-life projects,FSU主席Ronald Nowaczyk说. “其中一些显然是以研究为重点的. Others have focused on developing students as mentors or training students to use and instruct others in the use of our campus observatory.”

斯贝茨“表现出了特殊的指导倾向”, which has allowed numerous students to do amazing things they would not have been able to do on their own,”医生说。. Eric Moore, chair of FSU’s Department of Physics and Engineering and an associate professor.

Speights joined FSU in 2012 and helped with the transition of the FSU Planetarium from its longtime home at Tawes Hall to the newly constructed MLC and Planetarium inside the Catherine R. Gira Center for Communications and Information Technology, which opened in 2014. It would not be uncommon to see Speights spend late nights under the stars helping students look for stars and test equipment. He also provides the students he mentors with a room furnished with such necessities as a computer, 白板和咖啡机, 在他办公室旁边, allowing them to work together on projects and have easy access to him for questions and advice.

In 2015, 作为MLC的副主任, Speights guided students to help assemble and program components and new software f或者是 rooftop observatory to capture deep space images. These hands-on opportunities allowed students to develop skills for research as well as prepare public planetarium shows. In 2016, Speights became director of the MLC and Planetarium at FSU following the retirement of Dr. 罗伯特·多伊尔. 斯贝茨也是物理与工程俱乐部的顾问.

达斯汀·乌勒里表示，他在MLC与斯贝茨共事的时间非常宝贵, 帮助他为读研铺平道路.

“He helped teach me how to bring astronomy and astrophysics to a non-academic crowd through the planetarium shows each week,乌勒里说. “Not only was he instrumental in driving my love of sharing physics with the world, but he also gave me the opportunity to set up and characterize the Frostburg State observatory.”

Speights’ approach to mentoring is to empower students by providing guidance to answers, 让他们得出自己的结论. 这给乌勒里留下了持久的印象.

“The biggest help to me was teaching me to find the answers through critical thinking rather than being handed the results,他说. “这为我的生活奠定了很多基础. 没有博士. 斯贝茨和他的导师, I would not understand that simple fact that life does not always provide a direct answer.”

Speights has mentored nearly 40 students in the last three years in a variety of roles and disciplines, with several students recognized for national achievements and acceptance to graduate and doctoral programs.  

Jacob Lichtenberg graduated with dual degrees in physics and materials engineering. Lichtenberg spent time as Speights’ teaching assistant and research assistant, presenting – as first author – a poster on the rotational speed of a disk-shaped galaxy NGC 3184’s spiral arms at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

他的导师风格创造了一个无拘无束的学习环境, in the sense that he encouraged students to thoroughly evaluate all solutions to a problem,利希滕贝格说, 现在是轨道ATK公司的副机械工程师. “再加上他的知识，对我的影响是不可估量的.”

Other research completed by Speights’ mentees included the “Radial Flow Speed of Neutral Hydrogen in the Oval Distortion of NGC 4736” and the “Dynamical Relationship Between Bar and Spiral Patterns of NGC 1365.” The NGC 4736 study was presented at the 229th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society and looked at a galaxy commonly known as Messier 94 to understand where the fuel for star formation comes from. The NGC 1365 study was published in 2016 in The Astrophysical Journal by Speights and 2015 graduate Paul Rooke. That study showed that the bar is rotating more quickly than the spiral arms, which challenges the common assumption that these types of patterns in galaxies co-rotate.

另外, Speights’ students have continued successful academic journeys with acceptance to physics doctoral programs at Clemson University and Rensselear Polytechnic Institute and Master of Science physics programs at Towson University.

就像斯贝茨在学术上挑战学生一样, 这是他的欢迎, 温暖的方式传授明智的人生建议，澳门赌城官方网站的价值.

“我可以用很长一段时间来谈论奥巴马博士的影响. 杰森·斯贝茨讲述我的生活, 但当我看到他对我生活的持久影响时, I could not be more proud to have met him and had an experience so rich with the mentoring he provided,2015届校友亚当·博斯利说, 他也于2016年在FSU获得了教育学硕士学位.

位于阿勒格尼县的山区, 澳门十大赌城官方网站 is one of the 12 institutions of the University System of Maryland. FSU是一个综合性的, residential regional university and serves as an educational and cultural center for Western Maryland. 更多信息，请访问 澳门十大赌城官方网站网站 或者是 FSU Facebook页面. 在Twitter上关注FSU @frostburgstate.