STEM Shoutout: Dr. Tamar Ginossar
UNM C&J professor named a UNM Presidential Teaching Fellow
Associate Department Chair and Associate Professor of Communication and Journalism Dr. Tamar Ginossar has been recognized as a UNM Presidential Teaching Fellow effective 2019 – 2021.
According UNM’s Center for Teaching Excellence website, the fellowship,“promotes excellence in teaching by establishing a core group of faculty who are given the highest recognition for their effective teaching. Additionally, fellows carry a special responsibility for ensuring teaching excellence by sharing their expertise with the University community.”
One fellow is selected each year, according to the site, and fellows keep their title while employed at UNM.
Ginossar, whose research focuses on addressing disparities in health outcomes, said she’s looking forward to working with the university and the community to collaborate on more teaching and mentoring projects through this award. Another goal is to “increase interdisciplinary collaboration and networking, including mentoring undergraduate and graduate students on reaching out to local communities,” Ginossar said.
While addressing inequalities in health outcomes, Ginossar says she is using community and clinic-engaged methods to advance health in diverse settings. Currently, Ginossar is the principal investigator on a project entitled “Saludamos: Successful Accrual: co-Learning and Understanding of Decisions, Attitudes, Meaning Making, Obstacles and Support for Research,” which was awarded $10,000 by UNM Cancer Center Shared Resources.
“As communication technologies and other innovations advance, it is important to make sure that they are used to reduce inequality, rather than increase it,” Ginossar said.
To increase undergraduate engagement with communication courses and to address cutting edge topics, Ginossar recently designed and taught the first course on cannabis and communication, implemented spring 2019. Throughout the course, students learned about the significance of marijuana and the role it plays in the media and other communication settings, such as patient-provider interactions and mHealth (health-related mobile phone applications). Of the entire country, UNM is one of only 12 schools with a cannabis course and the first to focus on the field of communication.