Throughout the month of January, Elizabethtown College students, staff members, alumni and faculty members are being encouraged to nominate a faculty member to receive the Kreider Prize for Teaching Excellence, an annual award that recognizes educators who inspire their students. This is the first time the prize will be awarded since its inauguration last spring semester.

The Kreider Prize was created by Etown alumnus Thomas Connor, class of 1972, to honor the now-retired J. Kenneth Kreider and Carroll L. Kreider who served Etown in the departments of history and business respectively for more than 30 years. The Kreiders inspired their students inside the classrooms and out, acting as mentors and role models to many students at Etown. “One of my principal desires in helping the College to create the Kreider Prize for Teaching Excellence has surely been to honor both Ken and Carroll Kreider for the decades of exemplary service they have given as teachers in the fullest sense,” Connor said about the award.

“By no mere coincidence, the two subject areas I studied with Ken… became the focal points of my doctoral studies in history and, for the past thirty years, my own undergraduate teaching,” he continued.

“I was interested in these subjects before I took formal courses in them, and had loved history ever since elementary school,” Connor continued.

But, there was something about the way Ken presented these two centuries… that stimulated a depth of interest and excitement that has never abated,” Connor said when describing his personal experience with Ken Kreider.

Connor is one of many alumni that find ways to give back to the College in a way to honor those who taught them. “Many of our alumni actively give back to the school because they value the education received from the College’s highly talented and dedicated faculty. Alumni often share their favorite stories about a particular faculty member who helped them and even changed their lives,” Vice President for Institutional Advancement and Community Relations David Beildeman said.

After graduating from Etown, Connor went on to receive his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina. Connor now teaches history himself at Hillsdale College and has been there for almost three decades. As of 2012, Connor holds the William P. Harris Chair in Military History at Hillsdale and is working on a book about the history of the American Battle Monuments Commission. In the same year, he was honored with the distinction of making the Princeton Review’s list of 300 best teachers.

“I wish for this prize also to be a belated, but heartfelt and permanent expression of how indebted I will always be to Elizabethtown College, and to all of the teachers and mentors I had there, for equipping me to pursue successfully and joyfully my chosen career and, hopefully, to ‘teach as I was taught’ by so many wonderful people there four decades ago,” Connor added.

For a faculty member themselves to be eligible to receive the prize, they must work full-time at the College, meaning no adjuncts may be nominated, and they must have taught at Etown for at least three years. Students are encouraged to spread the word and get others to nominate their chosen faculty member as the chosen member must have nominations from at least three of the following groups: alumni, current students, faculty members or administrators or other staff members. The nomination progress will be documented on the College’s Facebook page, and live updates will be available via the Twitter account.

The nomination forms can be found online on JayWeb, and the deadline for submitting nominations is Jan. 30. The nomination process is fairly simple and involves writing a short 250-500 word statement describing why the nominated faculty member inspires the person nominating them and why that faculty member would deserve the Kreider Prize. “Elizabethtown College is fortunate to have the support and dedication of alumni, parents and community contributors… Looking forward, it is our hope to inspire other alumni to establish additional endowments that will support the recognition of Elizabethtown College faculty excellence in areas such as research and service,” Beidleman said.

The final recipient of the prize will be determined by the Professional Development Committee alongside two students, and the winner will be announced in mid-March.