2023 Outstanding Faculty
Posted: February 15th, 2024
Jenni Cragun has been named the 2023 University of Wisconsin MBA Consortium Outstanding Faculty. Instructors are recognized for teaching in the previous academic year. Student nominations throughout the year primarily contribute to selecting the winner of the award.
Jenni taught for the UW MBA Consortium for the first time in Fall 2022. Since then, she has taught sections of MBA 701 - Leading & Communicating in Dynamic & Diverse Organizations and MBA 773 - Communicating for Success: Writing for Results.
Students appreciated that Jenni was very responsive, approachable, and engaged, providing detailed feedback on assignments and discussions. "Jenni approached the class in a very personalized way, that allowed for her students to learn from each other, as well as obtain her highly specialized feedback," one student commented. "I appreciated the way she structured the learning environment. It was clear that she has carefully thought out the best ways to enrich learning."
Jenni graduated from the UW MBA Consortium in May 2022, earning the UW MBA Consortium's 2022 Outstanding Graduate award that year. She is the first person in program history to earn both outstanding graduate and outstanding faculty honors.
"I feel lucky to be part of a program that cares deeply about their educators' and students' impact on the world," Cragun said. "I treasure the interesting students I've had the privilege to teach and can confidently say that I've gained as much from them as they from me."
Dr. Fred Kolb, professor emeritus of economics from UW-Eau Claire, and Dr. Paula Lentz, department chair and professor of business communication from UW-Eau Claire, were also recognized as finalists for the outstanding faculty award. Dr. Kolb began teaching for the UW MBA Consortium in 2001 while still employed full-time at UW-Eau Claire and has continued developing and teaching various courses for the program including MBA 709 - Essentials of Economic and Statistical Analysis and MBA 754 - Fundamental Methods of Forecasting. Dr. Lentz began teaching for the program in 2010, teaching both MBA 701 - Leading & Communicating in Dynamic & Diverse Organizations and MBA 773 - Communicating for Success: Writing for Results. She has served as the UW MBA Consortium's academic director since 2020. Kolb previously earned outstanding faculty honors in 2015 and 2012, while Lentz received the honor in 2020.
We congratulate and thank these faculty for their efforts in making their courses, and therefore the UW MBA Consortium program, one of the best online MBA programs in the nation.
View previous outstanding faculty |
