CMU Celebrates Value of Graduate, Professional Students
Award winners to be recognized for teaching, service and three-minute thesis presentation
“Innovation with Impact” is the signature event of Carnegie Mellon’s annual Graduate and Professional Student Appreciation Week, which salutes the contributions and accomplishments of its graduate students in research, teaching and service to the university.
The event concludes with a ceremony honoring this year’s Graduate Student Teaching and Graduate Student Service Award winners, along with the champion of the Three-Minute Thesis Competition.
Casey Roark, a Ph.D. candidate in cognitive psychology, is the recipient of the Graduate Student Teaching Award.
Roark has been a teaching assistant for several courses in psychology, but her most important teaching contribution according to Professor Vicki Helgeson was as a co-instructor for Cognitive Research Methods with Professor Lori Holt last fall.
Holt said Roark carried the bulk of the load, as she took the lead in writing course assignments, establishing how grades would be determined, organizing the timeline of assignments and grading, and making sure the class ran smoothly.
“Casey exhibited a deep thoughtfulness in course design that considered the timing and logistics and recognized where students would be in their learning,” Holt said. “She was careful to articulate learning objectives and to create rubrics that would guide students in completing assignments. The end result is an innovative and detailed syllabus that I intend to follow in future semesters.”