Robert K. Butz Award for Excellence in Teaching

Annual • $1,500 + plaque • Assistant Professors (Math) • Official Page →

2026 Deadlines

Milestone Date
Nominations due (names only) Friday, February 20, 2026
Complete packages due Friday, March 20, 2026

Background

This annual award was established by Dr. Phillip W. Bean, who received his collegiate training in mathematics at Auburn University. Dr. Robert K. Butz was a faculty member of the Department of Mathematics at Auburn University; he passed away in 2012.

Eligibility

  1. Assistant professor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics
  2. Mathematics faculty only (statistics faculty are not eligible)
  3. At least one year at Auburn University (new faculty are not eligible)
  4. Must have taught undergraduate-level math courses
  5. Must remain at the level of assistant professor for the duration of the award

Selection Criteria

The recipient must be an innovative and challenging teacher who is:

A recipient is eligible for consideration in future years provided they satisfy all requirements.

Selection Committee

The Departmental Faculty Awards Committee makes the selection.

Past Recipients

Year Recipient
2025–2026 Michael Brown
2021–2022 Gregory Puleo
2020–2021 Thi Thao Phuong Hoang
2019–2020 Hans-Werner van Wyk
2018–2019 Hans-Werner van Wyk
2017–2018 Hans-Werner van Wyk
2016–2017 Ziqin Feng
2015–2016 Junshan Lin
2014–2015 Xiaoyu (Sophie) Li
2013–2014 Jessica McDonald
2012–2013 Erkan Nane
2011–2012 Xiaoying (Maggie) Han
2010–2011 Dmitry Glotov

Nomination Package Contents

A complete Butz Award nomination package should include:

# Item Description
1 Nomination Letter From a faculty member, addressing the nominee’s teaching excellence
2 Nominee’s CV Current curriculum vitae
3 Teaching Evaluations Student evaluations from the past 3–5 years, organized by semester and course
4 Peer Teaching Evaluation At least one classroom observation report from a colleague
5 Supporting Letters 2–3 letters from students and/or faculty attesting to teaching quality

Download Template Package

Download Butz Award Template

The template directory contains:

butz-award/
  Nomination_Package_Butz.tex       # Main LaTeX file
  nomination-package.sty             # Shared style file
  README.md                          # Instructions & checklist
  Nomination_Letter.pdf              # PLACEHOLDER - replace with real letter
  CV.pdf                             # PLACEHOLDER - replace with real CV
  Teaching_Evals_2024.pdf            # PLACEHOLDER - replace with real evals
  Teaching_Evals_2023.pdf            # PLACEHOLDER
  Teaching_Evals_2022.pdf            # PLACEHOLDER
  Peer_Evaluation.pdf                # PLACEHOLDER - replace with peer eval
  Support_Letter_Student_1.pdf       # PLACEHOLDER - replace with real letter
  Support_Letter_Student_2.pdf       # PLACEHOLDER - replace with real letter

How to Use

  1. Download the template directory.
  2. Replace each placeholder PDF with the actual document.
  3. Edit Nomination_Package_Butz.tex:
    • Update \def\Nominee{Dr. NOMINEE NAME} with the actual name.
    • Update \def\Award{YYYY the Robert K. Butz Award...} with the year.
    • Adjust \section and \subsection titles as needed.
    • Add or remove \vfile{} / \hfile{} commands to match your files.
  4. Compile with pdflatex Nomination_Package_Butz.tex (run twice for TOC).
  5. Submit the resulting PDF to the committee chair.

See also: Email Templates for sample emails requesting nomination and support letters.