Distinguished Graduate Mentoring Award
The Distinguished Graduate Mentoring Award honors GVSU tenured/tenure-track faculty members who have direct and significant impact and involvement with graduate students, outstanding commitment and effectiveness as a mentor of graduate students, been innovative in mentoring, and have demonstrated unusual effort to provide consistent mentoring of graduate students during the course of their careers at GVSU.
Tricia Thomas, Ph.D.
Professor of Nursing
Tricia Thomas is an innovative scholar and educator whose dedication to mentoring continues to inspire and elevate the next generation of nurse leaders. Her guidance emphasizes critical thinking, problem-solving, self-reflection, and the development of professional confidence. Thomas has championed her students’ scholarly growth by including former mentees as contributors in four textbooks. Her contributions have been instrumental in promoting the clinical nurse leader role, guiding curriculum development, and supporting successful national board certification efforts. The impact of her mentorship is evident in the accomplishments of her mentees, who have made meaningful contributions across the nursing profession.
AWARD INFORMATION
The Faculty Research and Innovation’s Distinguished Graduate Mentoring Award was established to recognize and encourage outstanding mentoring of graduate students by GVSU tenured/tenure-track faculty members. Recipients will have direct and significant impact and involvement with graduate students, outstanding commitment and effectiveness as a mentor of graduate students, been innovative in mentoring, and have demonstrated unusual effort to provide consistent mentoring of graduate students during the course of their careers at GVSU. In addition to the honor of being designated a Distinguished Faculty Mentor, recipients are awarded $500. Nominations for the Award are solicited from deans, department chairs, faculty colleagues, alumni, and current research students.
The criteria used in nominations and evaluations of nominees are: extraordinary commitment and effectiveness as a mentor of graduate students including activities such as serving as major professor, minor professor, Graduate Council Representative, committee member, and so forth; demonstrated record of graduate student success in graduate school and in their professional career (e.g. scholarships/fellowships, awards, placement, career achievements, scholarly works); and demonstrated commitment to creating an environment supportive of graduate student success.
ELIGIBILITY
All tenured and tenure-track faculty members who have been employed at GVSU a minimum of 3 years.
NOMINATE
Each college may nominate a faculty member for one of the four University-wide awards. Recipients will be recognized as distinguished scholars. The Faculty Award Committee for each college will select one faculty member (except CLAS, which selects up to seven, and Seidman College of Business, which selects up to two) to be considered for the award. Faculty Award Committee members are selected by the Dean. Faculty Award Committee membership will be a minimum of three faculty. Nominations for the award may come from the college Dean, Department Chair, and faculty colleagues. Self-nominations are not accepted.
NOMINATION PACKET MATERIALS
Packets with missing items will not be reviewed. Nomination packets must include:
- Completed Nomination Packet Cover Page
- A statement from the nominee, one or two pages in length, of the nominee's professional accomplishments deemed most significant.
- Two letters of support from faculty colleagues who have knowledge of the nominee’s ability as a scholar, and who are not committee members. The letters should address the criteria for the award.
- A current Curriculum Vitae.
** Please note: ONLY the above stated documents, combined into a single PDF, will be accepted as a complete nomination packet. No additional documents will be accepted. No additional documents will be accepted. Please see Accessing Adobe Products for GVSU Faculty & Staff for information on the software for creating and compiling PDF documents.
DEADLINE
Yearly on November 1st. The nominee’s unit is responsible for obtaining pertinent data and providing the required information. Please check with your Dean for any deadline requiring you to submit to the Dean's office for review and signatures prior to being sent to FRIC by November 1st.
REVIEW PROCESS
The Faculty Research and Development Committee, with representation from the Undergraduate Research Council, will review all candidates, and FRIC will forward the names of recipients to the Provost by December 15th. FRIC will inform the recipients of the award and will inform nominees who are not selected. Recipient(s) will receive $500. An individual faculty member may not receive the award more than once.