January-February 2000

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Marilyn Repsher: An Award-Winning Problem Solver

A Professor of the Year Award goes to a Jacksonville University professor who creatively meets challenges facing her students and her institution.

By Hans Johnson

For many students, it would have meant a dream deferred. One year ago, Han Duong, an undergraduate math major at Florida’s Jacksonville University, had just been accepted to a prestigious semester-long instructional program in Budapest. But he was already on scholarship at the small, private school and lacked the money to make the trip. Looking back, says Duong, "It seemed as though, after jumping one hurdle, I had an even taller one to surpass."

Then Marilyn Repsher, a professor of mathematics at JU, entered the equation. "Professor Repsher presented my case to the vice president," says Duong, "and within twenty-four hours I received enough money to cover tuition and room and board for the overseas program." Duong’s is just one of several testimonials from students and colleagues who cite Repsher’s rare blend of passion and ingenuity as a troubleshooter in areas ranging from student achievement to campus governance.

In October such praise helped Repsher win recognition from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, which jointly named her one of four 1999–2000 Professors of the Year.

"My goal as a teacher," explains Repsher, "is to transmit to undergraduates the excitement, the beauty" of mathematics. Yet her dedication to students transcends narrow, disciplinary boundaries. She commends administrators and colleagues at JU for fostering an approach to education that nurtures a broad range of skills. "The faculty are creative, innovative teachers, committed to integrating technology into the curriculum and to developing students’ writing and speaking skills," she notes. "I have never been pressured to do traditional research. We view the scholarship of teaching as research, and I have written a number of articles on mathematics pedagogy."

Repsher’s devotion to teaching has not diminished her participation in university governance. "I served for a time as vice president of the faculty, and I served on committees to rewrite the faculty bylaws and the faculty handbook," she says. In the early 1990s, Repsher, who is chair of her department, also headed the university’s self-study, which led to JU’s adoption of a Learning Resource Network. Composed of a math center, a reading center, and a writing center, the network takes advantage of e-mail and other technologies to help students improve skills and persevere in school.

Of course, problem solving is quite literally a stock in trade for mathematicians. Yet, according to those who have observed her at work during her thirty-year career at JU, Repsher’s skills extend far beyond the classroom. "If you want to have something done and see it done well, she is definitely a person to talk to," says Joan Carver, dean of the university’s College of Arts and Sciences, which encompasses the math department and about two-thirds of the university’s total enrollment of 2,200.

Carver has worked closely with Repsher in several committee settings and notes Repsher’s knack for staying "very well organized" through drawn-out and complicated procedures. Carver singles out Repsher’s service on the self-study: "She identified the tasks involved in reaching a larger goal and broke them down" for individuals to tackle. Owing in large part to Repsher’s diplomacy and deftness at delegation, Carver says, committee members "submitted reports on time," ultimately achieving "a more cohesive and stronger core curriculum."

Carver has also observed Repsher in the classroom, where her capacity to elicit the most from her students is on display daily. "What you notice right away is how involved and absorbed they are," Carver says. "They don’t mill around, but rather come right in and sit down, seeming eager to get to work." Often paired at terminals, students experience both collaboration and immersion in technology while poring over math problems. Thanks to grants that Repsher helped secure for the department, all classrooms contain updated computers along with new software that allows students to see on their terminals work conducted on other terminals.

Repsher also oversaw the installation of high-speed Internet connections and put them to good use in her courses. According to math department colleague Marcelle Bessman, Repsher has created a "global classroom in which students and scholars from around the world meet live over the Internet to discuss and learn mathematics." Colleague Harley Flanders also gives Repsher a rave review. "Professor Repsher," Flanders says, "has built, almost single-handedly, the JU department of mathematics over the past thirty years."

Math departments have not always been the most hospitable places for women; Carver credits Repsher with breaking down gender barriers in the field. "She is certainly a model," says the dean. "And she is always trying to get women over the stereotype that math is not for them." She cites the work of one of Repsher’s former students, Laura Hilton Gunn, who is now seeking an advanced degree at Duke University. Before Gunn’s graduation in 1999, Repsher encouraged her to pursue summer programs that would supplement her coursework at JU and improve her contacts in the field. Gunn did just that. She now credits Repsher with playing "an integral role in my decision to continue with graduate studies in mathematical sciences" and to become a professor herself. Gunn says she has mined liberally from Repsher’s example: "I diligently took mental notes of the effective teaching methods Professor Repsher used to convey mathematical ideas to students at the right pace for them."

All in all, adds Carver, "Marilyn has dedicated a tremendous amount of time to the university." Yet no matter her workload, says Bessman, Repsher’s "door is always open to students who need assistance or just need to talk." That inclination to listen—and intervene, as in the case of Han Duong’s trip to Hungary—has made Repsher a trusted ally, who makes solutions seem as easy as one, two, three.

The U.S. Professor of the Year Program, begun in 1981, is a cooperative venture between the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for the Advancement and Support of Higher Education (CASE). The program recognizes noteworthy undergraduate educators, especially those cited by students as having had a profound influence on their lives and aspirations. Awards, which carry a $5,000 honorarium, recognize professors in four institutional categories: research and doctoral universities, master’s universities and colleges, community colleges, and baccalaureate colleges. Repsher won the 1999–2000 award for master’s universities and colleges. Other recipients were Vernon Burton (History), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Ellen Olmstead (English), Bristol (Mass.) Community College; and Stephen Fisher (Political Science), Emory and Henry College. For information on the 2000–01 competition, contact CASE at 1307 New York Ave., NW, Suite 1000, Washington, DC 20005. (202) 328-5900. E-mail: <brown@case.org>.

Hans Johnson is Academe’s news writer and assistant editor.