Jun 7, 2022
LEXINGTON, Ky. (June 7, 2022) – The University of Kentucky Alumni Association started the Great Teacher Award program in 1961 to honor excellent teaching at the university. There have been 307 teachers honored since that first year. Nominations may only be submitted by current students.
To receive the award, a candidate must:
- Hold the rank of full-time lecturer or above and have been a member of the faculty for the past three years at UK.
- Have superior knowledge of the subject matter.
- Have original and innovative classroom presentations.
- Demonstrate concern for students, both inside and outside the classroom setting.
- Not have been a recipient of the award for the past 10 years.
A committee of the UK Alumni Association Board of Directors and a representative from the student organization Omicron Delta Kappa select the recipients based on objective rating and ranking of the eligible nominations submitted.
This episode of Behind the Blue spotlights one of the 2022 Great Teacher Award winners. Zachary Bray, from the Rosenberg College of Law, is a James and Mary Lassiter Professor of Law at the Rosenberg College of Law. A Lexington native and graduate of the University of Notre Dame and the Yale Law School, Bray worked at the University of Houston Law Center before coming to UK as a visiting assistant professor in 2015. He was promoted to full professor in 2020. At the University of Houston, he was recognized with a university-wide Provost’s Teaching Excellence Award. Bray’s research focuses on monument law, private land trusts, low-income housing, the Endangered Species Act, groundwater conflicts and religious land use. Bray has taught as a visitor at the Washington University School of Law and The College of William & Mary Law School. He has taught undergraduate students considering law school in the Kentucky Legal Education Opportunity Summer Institute and the University of Houston Law Center Pre-Law Pipeline Program.
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