Sheffer, Gould win top COM faculty awards
Gary Sheffer (left) and Doug Gould.
Gary Sheffer and Doug Gould received this year’s top faculty awards from the College of Communication, honoring their work in instruction and advising, respectively.
Sheffer, the Sandra A. Frazier Professor of Public Relations, is the recipient of this year’s Becker Family Teacher-of-the-Year Award, considered the highest honor presented by COM to its professors. The award was established in memory of David Brudnoy, a legend in Boston broadcasting and a professor at COM.
“Professor Sheffer routinely records very high evaluation scores from students, even though his required graduate-level financial and strategic management course and his grad corporate public affairs course are anything but an easy A for students,” said Dean Mariette DiChristina (COM ’86). “Students tell us that he explains things well and makes learning fun. He receives lots of praise for his ability to simplify complex concepts. As one student put it, ‘Gary’s the best teacher I’ve ever met.’”
Recent Teacher-of-the-Year Award recipients include Bill Braudis, assistant professor of film and television, and Mina Tsay-Vogel, associate professor of communication.
Gould, professor of the practice in advertising, is the recipient of this year’s Lyndon Baines Johnson Student Advising Award, nominated by COM students for excellence in student advising.
“Providing mentoring is an important role for the professors at COM, and this year’s award, as it’s done every year, goes to a faculty member nominated by students,” DiChristina said. “Students choose faculty who shaped their way of thinking, challenged them to think outside the box, and were there to turn to if an idea needed a little more work.”
This award is made possible through a fund established at the College of Communication by Luci Baines Johnson, a friend and Trustee Emeriti of Boston University, in honor of Johnson’s father, President Lyndon Baines Johnson.
Recent Advising Award recipients include Garland Waller, assistant professor of television and the director of the television graduate program, Tobe Berkowitz, associate professor of advertising.
