Anita Blanchard, associate professor of psychology and organization science, is among the five finalists for one of UNC Charlotte’s highest honors – the Bank of America Award for Teaching Excellence.
She and the other finalists – Matthew Davies, professor of mechanical engineering and engineering science; Jae Emerling, associate professor of art and art history; Janos Gergely, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering; and Daniel Jones, associate professor of chemistry – are being featured in Inside UNC Charlotte prior to the naming of the 2016 recipient at a formal ceremony on Friday, Sept. 9.
Blanchard’s students frequently use one word to describe her approach to teaching: passionate. Her teaching philosophy is focused on active learning, teaching with technology, co-creating knowledge and developing enthusiasm for learning.
In the classroom, Blanchard uses a pedagogical practice she calls “quick groups” in which she breaks students up into small groups and gives each group a problem to solve in a short period of time. She believes her students learn better when they work together and also are engaged in a deeper level of processing. The students who solve the problems move closer in their mental maps (i.e., structures of understanding) than the students who do not. These students can then better explain the reasoning errors of their peers because they themselves had just been making them. In this way, students work together to successfully complete an activity.
Another component of Blanchard’s teaching philosophy is that she and her students create and interpret knowledge together. To achieve this, she stresses that each student’s perspective and interpretation is worth sharing and discussing, and she has noticed greater communication from an increased number of students.
Business major Nafisah Abdulkarim said, “Dr. Blanchard has an energy in her teaching style that influences students. There aren't boundaries between teacher and student that typically would restrain a genuine connection. What student wouldn't look forward to coming to class and doing well when a friend is the one teaching? She's magical.”
Blanchard’s approach to teaching is reflected in students’ research projects, too. For example, she offers extra credit to students if they participate in one of her research studies. In this way, students contribute to science, participate in the process and get to peek behind the curtain of the scientific process. Students collect data and discuss the study, its background, hypotheses, methods, analyses steps and the results.
Students also participate in Blanchard’s Virtual Identity, Community and Entitativity (V.I.C.E.) research lab. Every Friday, the V.I.C.E. squad, a small group of undergraduate and graduate students, meets to discuss research processes, to make presentations and to review each other’s papers. Since the inception of the V.I.C.E. lab, more than 24 undergraduates have participated, usually across multiple semesters and even multiple years. Likewise, the lab has produced almost 20 conference presentations and 10-plus publications as a result of student participation.
Blanchard truly understands how to engage students by trying to discover that which is interesting and important for them to know both in the classroom and for their lives beyond the University. According to Fary Cachelin, chair and professor of psychology, Blanchard “is one of our most effective, enthusiastic, innovative and current instructors.”
Blanchard joined UNC Charlotte in 2001. She completed a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in organizational psychology from Claremont Graduate School. Her undergraduate degree in mathematical sciences was from UNC Chapel Hill.