McComas Receives Mentor Award from National Organization for Science Teacher Educators

Photo Submitted

William McComas, third from right, celebrates with friends, colleagues and former students who supported him as the 2018 ASTE Outstanding Mentor.

William McComas, University of Arkansas Parks Family Professor of Science Education, has been awarded the 2018 Outstanding Science Teacher Educator Mentor of the Year award from the Association for Science Teacher Education.

The award was given at this month's meeting of the association in Baltimore. This is the second ASTE award for McComas. In 1998, he was named the ASTE Outstanding Science Teacher Educator.

The association is the world's largest organization promoting leadership and support for professionals involved in the education and development of teachers of science at all levels. It advances practice and policy through scholarship, collaboration and innovation in science teacher education.

The mentor award honors and encourages ASTE members who support and encourage pre-service and in-service science teachers and new science teacher-educators entering the profession. It also seeks to recognize the valuable contributions of mentors to the profession of science teacher education. Recognition comes with a plaque and tribute in the awards issue of the Journal of Science Teacher Education. 

The application was submitted by Peggy Ward, clinical assistant professor in the UAteach program and one of McComas' recent graduates. In addition, nearly a dozen former students and others he mentored, most of whom now teach at various universities, wrote in support of the nomination. They all stressed McComas' involvement in making sure they received the types of experiences they needed to be the strongest science educators, researchers and professors possible. They described McComas as intentional in the way he integrates his colleagues and graduate students into a community of practice where they can share common experiences, ask questions and develop professionally.

The letter-writers also spoke of the lengths McComas goes personally to engage his students, providing funds so they can attend professional conferences and introducing them to other colleagues in an ever-expanding international network of science educators. He also arranges numerous opportunities for informal conversations with him and each other over lunches and gatherings with him and his family.

"He is known to invite graduate students and visiting scholars to the University of Arkansas," according to one letter. "Not only does he support their academic and professional development, but he also actively seeks places for them to live, solicits household items for them from his network of colleagues and friends, and scouts out appropriate schools for their children. Three spoke speak of their personal experiences with Bill advocating on their behalf professionally and personally as they transitioned into the American culture of academia."

McComas also frequently collaborates with students, graduates and other colleagues on research projects and expresses the importance of contributing to the knowledge base of science teacher education, another letter said.

"In everyday interactions, Dr. McComas provides his students a realistic view of the professoriate," wrote Ryan Walker, a U of A graduate who teaches at Mississippi State University. "He holds nothing back, allowing us to experience the role of an academic, prior to us stepping out on our own. I find myself reflecting on these experiences often and because of these experiences I was able to hit the ground running. Now in my fifth year as an assistant professor, I have made excellent strides toward tenure, and I can link this success directly back to the preparation I received from my friend and mentor, Bill McComas."

McComas is co-author of a new book, The Scopes Monkey Trial, and is editor of The Language of Science Education and The Nature of Science in Science Education: Rationales and Strategies soon to be published by Springer in a new edition.

McComas was a Fulbright Fellow at Dublin City University, was recently elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and currently serves as the editor of the American Biology Teacher. He is proud of all the students whose dissertations he has chaired but particularly of those 15 students who are now professors of science education.