Brandie Bohney Receives Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Award

The Rhetoric & Writing program is thrilled to announce that second-year student Brandie Bohney has been named the recipient of the Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Associate Award. The campus-wide award is given out each spring by the Graduate College to recognize, reward, and encourage excellence in undergraduate instruction.

Brandie, in addition to her years of experience teaching at the secondary level before pursuing a PhD at BGSU, has taught GSW 1110 (Introduction to Academic Writing) and GSW 1120 (Academic Writing) as well as ENG 3810 (Grammar and Writing). She was warmly recommended for this award both by past students as well as faculty from within the Rhetoric & Writing program.

Dr. Neil Baird described Brandie's innovative revisions to the ENG 3810 curriculum, and her incorporation of transfer theory. He wrote, "I think the pre-service teachers she works with [in ENG 3810] will be better able to deal with the pressures many early-career writing teachers face." Dr. Sue Carter Wood noted that "it was an easy decision" to assign ENG 3810 to Brandie, "given her years of secondary teaching experience, her clarity in communication, her knowledge of best practices in teaching writing in secondary and post-secondary, her professionalism in meeting work responsibilities while engaging students and pushing them to genuine inquiry, her understanding of teacher development," and more.

Brandie's prior students described her as "engaging, personable, and prepared," noting that her passion and investment in the topics she taught made the class valuable. One student said that they "have never met a more humble, approachable instructor." A student whose first language is not English wrote that Brandie's "affection, teaching, and care" allowed them to stop worrying and spend valuable time discussing English with other students, gaining additional confidence and interest in the language.

The Rhetoric & Writing program and the Department of English congratulate Brandie on this well-deserved recognition.