An associate professor in McMaster’s Department of Political Science has been named one of the most outstanding university teachers in the province.

Marshall Beier will be one of six professors in Ontario to receive a 2013-14 Teaching Award from the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations (OCUFA) during an Oct. 25 ceremony in Toronto.

“Professor Beier treats his students as colleagues and collaborators, and excels at integrating his students into the research enterprise. His teaching is more than excellent- it is transformative,” said OCUFA president Kate Lawson.

Over the past ten years, Beier has received a McMaster Student Union Faculty Teaching Award in 2003, an Ontario Leadership in Faculty Teaching Award in 2007, a Petro-Canada Young Innovator Award in 2009 and a Canadian Political Science Associations biennial Teaching Excellence Prize in 2010.

Most recently, in 2012, Beier was awarded a 3M National Teaching Fellowship, which recognizes excellence in teaching at the undergraduate level and a commitment to the improvement of university teaching.

“Something that’s become increasingly important to me in recent years is thinking about new ways to engage students as bona fide bearers of knowledge and as knowledge producers in their own right, not merely as passive recipients of whatever might be imparted by way of the familiar ‘Sage on the stage’ model of teaching,” said Beier, adding that he is now modelling some undergraduate courses on a research seminar approach, which is more common in graduate level courses.

For the 2014-15 year, Beier is teaching the fourth-year courses Conceptual Issues: Global Politics and Advanced Issues in Global Security. He is also teaching the graduate courses Theories of International Politics and Advanced Concepts of International Relations Theory.

He is also continuing to contribute towards the successful McMaster Children and Youth University. This program offers free Saturday morning lectures to students between the ages of seven and 14-years-old in order to spark their curiosity and introduce them to a university environment.

“It’s always very exciting and very gratifying to be involved in new initiatives like this that present us with opportunities to think about how we might develop new ways of thinking about our roles as teachers,” said Beier.

“That said, it is often in the everyday ways of interacting with students that our support may be most keenly felt.”