Jennifer Wolf to receive Dinkelspiel Prize for Undergraduate Education at Commencement
Lecturer Jennifer Lynn Wolf, director of the education minor program at the School of Education, will be honored for her contributions to undergraduate education with this year's Lloyd W. Dinkelspiel Award for Undergraduate Education at Stanford University Commencement on June 13.
Wolf is being honored for creating and directing the new Undergraduate Minor in Education, a program that enables students to develop an understanding of the core issues facing educators and policymakers and receive rigorous preparation for graduate studies in education. She also is cited for her leadership in developing an Honors College program for juniors in Human Biology and for mentoring students conducting honors research. The award letter also notes that Wolf is "such an engaging lecturer that a student who 'historically found myself counting minutes in lecture classes' lost all track of time."
A lecturer at the School of Education since 2008, Wolf previously taught high school English and drama in underserved California public high schools for fifteen years. She examines the role of literature and the arts in learning, with a particular interest in adolescents who are reluctant to let their out-of-school gifts and talents surface in school settings. She teaches research methodology courses for the School of Education and the Human Biology department.
Named after the president of the Board of Trustees who served from 1953 to 1958, the Lloyd W. Dinkelspiel Award recognizes distinctive and exceptional contributions to undergraduate education or the quality of student life at Stanford. The contribution may be made for such activities as curriculum design, program development, advising excellence, residential education, committee leadership, or extracurricular education. Typically, awards are given every year to two graduating seniors, a faculty or staff member with ten or more years of service, and a faculty or staff member with less than ten years of service.
