Public policy prof wins national teaching award

Eric Jacobson (center) receives the 2004 Leslie A. Whittington Excellence in Teaching Award from Sue Faerman, University of Albany, SUNY, selection committee chairperson, and NASPAA President B.J. Reed, University of Nebraska at Omaha.

3:09 p.m., Nov. 3, 2004--Eric Jacobson, assistant professor of urban affairs and public policy, was presented the Leslie A. Whittington Excellence in Teaching Award from the National Association of Public Affairs and Administration (NAPSAA) Oct. 21 at the group’s annual conference in Indianapolis.

“This is really a credit to the wonderful students in the School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy,” Jacobson said. “Being successful as a teacher depends upon having students who are interested in the subject and have strong skills and motivation. Watching bright people begin to do important work in a field I think is so important, then going on to become leaders in the field--it’s enormously satisfying.”

NAPSAA is the accrediting organization of graduate programs in public affairs, public policy, public administration and nonprofit management. It exists to ensure excellence in education and training for public service and to promote the ideal of public service. The group’s Whittington award is presented for demonstrated excellence in teaching and sustained contributions to education for public service.

Leslie Whittington was an economist and professor at Georgetown University who was leaving with her husband and two small daughters for several months as a visiting fellow at Australian National University in Canberra on Sept. 11, 2001, on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon. The impact of taxation policy on family life was a central interest for Prof. Whittington, who had worked on a book on women, work and family with Saul Hoffman, chairperson of the Department of Economics in the Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics at UD.

“Eric’s course evaluations are uniformly excellent,” Jeffrey Raffel, School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy director, who nominated Jacobson for the Whittington Award, said. “That’s particularly impressive considering that many of his courses are required, quantitative ones. He is one of our more demanding faculty and toughest grader, yet students flock to, and greatly enjoy, his courses.”

Raffel also said that Jacobson excels at supervising graduate students who participate in public service research projects on such topics as health care and human services funding.

“Eric’s interest in preparing his students for a career in public service does not stop at the borders of the University,” Amy Droskoski Hall, CHEP ’96, one of several graduates mentored by Jacobson and later selected as U. S. Presidential Management Fellow, said. “He is always searching for new opportunities for his students. It’s his constant effort to be an involved partner with students--in learning and expanding horizons--that attracts top students to work with him.” Hall now works on health care issues for the Energy and Commerce Committee of the U. S. House of Representatives.

Jacobson received an excellence-in-teaching award from UD in 2001.

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