Rita Cossa, Latham Hunter and Geraldine Voros have made the cut. This trio of McMaster lecturers is part of an elite group of 71 professors vying for the title of “Ontario's Best Lecturer”.

Organized by TV Ontario, the Best Lecturer Competition gives students and alumni the opportunity to shine a spotlight on the professors who inspire them and rise above the rest.

Cossa teaches in the strategic market leadership and health services management area of the DeGroote School of Business. She teaches both the introduction to business and the introduction to marketing courses to the commerce and engineering management students. This four-time nominee for the McMaster Student Union teaching award is liked by her students who know her to be fair and approachable. Featured twice in Maclean's Guide to Canadian Universities twice as the most popular marketing professor, Cossa believes that university is a great experience for students; she strongly encourages students to get to know their professors and establish connections with them. Cossa is also the for the best-selling introduction to business textbook in
Canada in the college and university market entitled “Understanding Canadian Business”.

Hunter recently earned her PhD in cultural studies and critical theory at McMaster, where she studied representations of gender in recent American films that focus on the “plight” of the 1990s white male office worker. She has taught at McMaster University, Wilfred Laurier University, and Mohawk College. Her writing has been published in The Journal of American Culture, Mosaic, Film-Philosophy, Film and History, Politics and Culture, Canadian Literature and The Globe and Mail.

Voros has been a lecturer at McMaster for more than 25 years. She created and has been teaching four courses for the Faculty of Social Sciences on a rotating basis since 1981. The courses: Women and Work, Women and the Family, Canadian Children and Canadian Adolescents have some of the highest enrolments at the University – between 300 and 500 students per course, more than 80% of whom are women. In 2005, the Hamilton Status of Women Committee recognized Voros as “Woman of the Year” in her role as mentor/education, stating she “is committed to assisting others to be successful in their accomplishments and inspires and encourages women to take part in shaping the future of their own lives and communities.”

Voros has previously received the Martin W. Johns Award from the McMaster Association of Part-Time Students and the McMaster Student Union Teaching Award for recognizing and encouraging excellence in teaching. Maclean's magazine also ranked Voros as the most popular professor in the Department of Social Sciences from 1999  2001.

The response to the call for nominations for TVO's Best Lecturer Competition 2007 was overwhelming, with professors endorsed for their enthusiasm, knowledge, and eloquence. From 258 nominations, 155 met the criteria for the competition and were asked to participate by submitting a video of one of their lectures. Of these, 71 professors have accepted the challenge to vie for the title of Ontario's Best Lecturer.

TVO's Best Lecturer Competition committee will select 30 semifinalists whose names will be announced this fall. A panel of independent judges will reduce the 30 to a short list of 10. The judges – Globe and Mail columnist Margaret Wente, novelist Camilla Gibb, and Maclean's managing editor Tony Keller – will be looking for lecturers who engage their listeners with passion, flair, and clarity, conveying their message with genuine conviction. In a gripping 5-week pursuit of academia's latest sought-after award, the top 10 finalists will deliver their winning lectures on TVO's Big Ideas in February and March 2007. It will then be up to the viewers to determine who will be named Ontario's Best Lecturer 2007.

TD Meloche Monnex will donate a $10,000 TD Meloche Monnex scholarship to the winning professor's school.

Throughout the competition, viewers can actively follow the journey of their favourite professors, watch clips online, and refer to articles posted in the media room at TVO's Best Lecturer Competition website: www.tvo.org/bi.

Click here for the full TVO announcement.