Inspiring students: Dedication trumps high-tech

Concordia's Venkatanarayana Ramachandran helps students succeed

Venkatanarayana Ramachandran decided in the fall of 1979 to step down as the graduate program director in what was then Concordia’s Department of Electrical Engineering, but students rallied for his return. They wrote to the department chair, citing Ramachandran’s humble and unselfish dedication to their welfare as “above and beyond the call of duty.”

Venkatanarayana Ramachandran

Their appeal worked, and Ramachandran spent another four years in the position before deciding once and for all that administration wasn’t where he wanted to put his energies. Instead, the professor in the Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science has devoted his career to instructing his students with the same dedication that he demonstrated in his former administrative role.

His numerous teaching and research accolades include most recently the 2009-10 President’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, Full-Time Faculty. The award’s accompanying citation notes his “unsurpassed reputation among his students for innovation in teaching methods, clarity in explanation, perseverance with classroom instruction, and availability above and beyond conventional lecture hours.” The citation further recognizes him as “a true educator, in that his success is measured in the success of the thousands of students he has taught.”

Ramachandran’s approximately 20 other awards include the Outstanding Contribution Award from Concordia’s Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science, the Merit Award from the Concordia Council on Student Life, and the 1997 Alumni Award for Excellence in Teaching. The American Society for Engineering Education has recognized him with its Centennial Award. He is also the recipient of a medal from IEEE (Canada) for the Outstanding Educator Award and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers made him a Fellow Member in 1989.

Somewhere along the way, Ramachandran has also found time to write four books, course notes and laboratory manuals on his areas of expertise that can help other professors to teach students about circuits and systems, and modelling techniques.

Ramachandran began his academic career in India on January 17, 1958, two days after his MSc training period ended. His distinguished supervising professor, K. Sreenivasan, “the first person to teach electronics in a university department in an independent India,” pulled out all the stops to get Ramachandran an academic appointment. “We didn’t get along that well; any other administrator would have just thrown me out. But he recognized only one thing: merit. That was a great quality for me to learn, and I never returned from India without visiting him.”

Ramachandran arrived at Sir George Williams University in 1969 after a brief time at the Nova Scotia Technical College (now part of Dalhousie University).

His focus has always been on helping students. “Each year, the student body is different and I have to adapt myself to that,” he says.

Ramachandran reverted to old-fashioned chalk on a board about five years ago when he realized that the information was being conveyed too quickly in PowerPoint and slide presentations for students to follow. He extols his low-tech method for providing students with ample time to copy information.

He regularly pauses to scan the faces in his classroom for signs of comprehension, and to encourage students to ask questions. “There’s no such thing as a stupid question,” he emphasizes, hoping that will persuade shy people in particular to ask for clarification when they don’t quite grasp a concept.

Another way he combats student reticence is through an open-door policy with “lots of time for consultation, including Saturdays,” hoping this individual time for consultation motivates students to present their concerns. “If I don’t know what they don’t know, it’s very hard to figure out what to do,” he emphasizes.

Related links:
•    Concordia Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science:
•    Concordia Council on Student Life
•    American Society for Engineering Education
•    Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers


Originally published on Concordia NOW.

Darryl Martin: Perseverance is the key

Even while he was shoeing horses, he was always fascinated with "how things work"

Darryl Martin has been working with the Mohawk Bridge Consortium on the Mercier Bridge rehabilition. | Concordia University

Darryl Martin and his wife had four children when she obtained a degree in early childhood education from Concordia. At the time, Martin worked with draft horses, with a sideline as a farrier — a horseshoer. He had never graduated from high school, but he decided it was his turn to go to university.

Martin, now a grandfather, will receive his bachelor’s in civil engineering this June.

“I was always interested in how things work,” he says. Engineering seemed like a natural fit. A friend and counsellor at a school on the Kahnawake reserve suggested Martin start off by developing good study skills. “It was one of the best pieces of advice I was ever given.” So he started by taking courses he felt most passionate about.

The key to his success, Martin says with humour and modesty, is “perseverance, or in my case, bull-headedness.” He kept working full-time as a farrier, taking sociology, psychology and anthropology, and then the math and calculus prerequisites for engineering studies. “I knew I didn’t have a fresh mind so it might be harder for me than for someone else,” he says. He compensated by taking reduced course loads, summer courses, and putting in a lot of late nights. At the beginning, he says, it was “really rocky finding my feet.” He credits Concordia’s centres for Native Education and Mature Students (the latter now part of the School of Extended Learning’s Student Transition Centre) for helping him find his path.

Martin works for the Mohawk Bridge Consortium, which was awarded the first contract in the rehabilitation of the Mercier Bridge. The project involves the federal and provincial governments, along with the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake.

Learning, he maintains, isn’t just about schooling; it goes on everywhere, all the time. “If you can memorize the names of the contestants on American Idol or learn somebody’s phone number, you can learn this other stuff. People always say, ‘Oh, I could never go back to school.’ That’s the kind of statement that just shuts everything down.”

Related links:
•   Concordia's Department of Building, Civil and Environmental Engineering
•   Concordia's Centre for Native Education
•   Concordia's Centre for Mature Students

Originally published by The Concordia Journal.

Keeping Students Engaged is Key

i>clickerFollow @Beverly_Akerman

Engineering lecturer and first-year program coordinator Nancy Acemian

If students find Nancy Acemian sometimes feels like a big sister, it is probably because she’s been a volunteer with Big Brothers Big Sisters of West Island for almost three years now.

She finds mentoring preteen girls very gratifying. “I’m a role model they can come to about issues in their lives.” She uses her love of painting and crafts — knitting, crocheting, jewellery making — to help connect with the girls.

Nancy Acemian was honoured with the President’s Teaching Award in 2010 for Innovative Excellence in Teaching. | Photo by Concordia University

This desire to connect drives her achievements in the classroom, too.

Acemian received the President's Teaching Award 2010 for Innovative Excellence in Teaching for her classroom performance and leadership in developing innovative teaching in the Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science (ENCS). The year before, she was recognized by the Faculty with the Teaching Excellence Award.

A native of Montreal, Acemian earned her bachelor’s from McGill with a major in Mathematics and a minor in Computer Science. She then obtained her master’s in Computer Science from Concordia and is working on a PhD in Educational Technology, also at Concordia. She taught at Marianopolis College for 11 years before arriving at Concordia in 2000. Plus she teaches in her third language, giving her unique insight and a deep appreciation of the diversity that’s the heart of Concordia.

“At Concordia, we give everyone a chance, with kids straight out of cegep alongside young adults back at school after several years at work,” she says.” The multicultural diversity of the student body is also way up on her list of Concordia pluses.

Acemian is the first-year program coordinator at ENCS, and shares her knowledge and expertise through the Centre for Teaching and Learning Services; however, her passion is teaching introductory level courses in computer science, which can be difficult. “Classes are large and the students are very diverse. Some have never programmed before.”

Keeping students engaged — ensuring they’re active participants in classroom discussions — is paramount. Acemian believes in a very interactive class: “Teaching is a two-way street.” She needs to know right away if students have problems with the material.

That’s why she uses the i>clicker classroom response system. Like the “ask the audience lifeline” from Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, the i>clicker lets Acemian pose multiple-choice questions and get instant feedback. Because it’s anonymous, “everyone participates, even the shy ones.” And she can zero in on unclear concepts in real time.

She also uses i>clicker to get students interacting. “Sometimes, the answer will split 50/50 in the class. I’ll tell them ‘find someone who doesn’t have the same answer as you and talk about it, try to convince each other.’”

Acemian also relies on the tablet. “Students can have the teaching slides ahead of time and we can figure out the problems in class. And because I’m always facing them, I can see when the light goes on,” she laughs.

Sometimes attention spans are short, especially when it comes to teaching on a Monday morning at 8:45 a.m. “You can’t be passive. You have to challenge the students, to keep them involved. Programming isn’t a spectator sport.” Breezing in, doing a lot of talking, and then walking out again is what doesn’t work. “The challenge is to keep from boring them.”

Respect is also very important. Acemian cultivates an open-door policy, encouraging her students to consult her, and not just about course content. “Life can be tough. There are career decisions and sometimes problems in their private lives. There’s the juggle of kids new to Montreal, living on their own for the first time.”

And Acemian likes being there for her students. Just like a big sister.

Related links:
• Centre for Teaching and Learning Services
• Slide show of the 2011 Mascot Design Contest Acemian organized as first-year program coordinator at ENCS

(Originally published in Concordia NOW.)