Gillespie Distinguished Scholar Award

The Gillespie Distinguished Scholar Award is designed to recruit and retain high-quality faculty in the school. This award is designed to:

1. honor and reward faculty who have made outstanding contributions in the area of scholarly teaching, scholarship, and research;
2. identify a core of outstanding scholars who will serve as models to engage, mentor, and inspire other faculty and graduate students to become distinguished scholars in their disciplines; and
3. foster expanded research within the School of Applied Sciences.

The faculty member(s) selected by the Evaluation Committee and approved by the Dean will serve as Distinguished Scholar(s) for a term of two years. Those selected must have a break of one year before becoming eligible to be nominated for a second term.

Award and Recognition

During the two year appointment, the selected member(s) will receive a total award of $9,000. This will come from a $4,500 annual award from the Gillespie Endowment and an additional $4,500 matching award funded using the Dean’s office resources. The award will be paid beginning in September of each year. The faculty member receiving the award will have the designation of “Distinguished Scholar” added to their faculty title. They will be able to carry this title as long as they are employed at the University of Mississippi.

Eligibility

In order to be eligible for a Gillespie Distinguished Scholar Award, faculty members must:

1. have been a full-time, permanent faculty in the UM School of Applied Sciences for at least two years;
2. be tenured or tenure-track at any rank; and
3. have consistently demonstrated that they have made significant contributions as a scholar in teaching, independent or collaborative research/scholarship productivity and/or exceptional research mentorship.

Department Chairs who are tenured and continue to be actively involved in research are eligible.

Deans, Associate Deans and Assistant Deans, are not eligible to receive this award.

Nominations

Step 1:

Nominations must come from a full-time, permanent member of the faculty, a Department Chair, Dean, Associate Dean, Assistant Dean or current students. Nominations must be submitted via an online submission form, briefly stating the nominee’s qualifications for the award.

Nominators should convey what is unique and striking about the nominee as a scholar; special qualities he/she brings to the academic enterprise; and what notable successes he/she has had in research/scholarly activities.

Click here to nominate a faculty member for the Gillespie Distinguished Scholar Award.

Nominations must be submitted online by 1 p.m. on Wednesday, November 15, 2017.

Step 2:

Upon nomination, the nominee will be notified and given the opportunity to accept or reject the nomination. If the nomination is accepted, the nominee will become a candidate. Subsequently, the candidate’s Department Chair will be notified and asked to provide the Evaluation Committee with an evaluation of the candidate’s teaching, research and professional service record via an online submission form provided to them, along with application materials listed below.

Application Materials should be uploaded by the Department Chair or Associate Dean (in the case that the nominee is a Department Chair) via the online submission form provided: 

1. Current curriculum vita
2. Last two years of faculty activity reports
3. Letter of recommendation from the Department Chair or Director in their discipline

Selection

The Dean will chair a selection committee consisting of two tenured faculty, two administrators and one external member who is a documented scholar. After extensive review of the applications submitted, the Evaluation Committee will recommend a recipient who must be approved by the Dean. At the discretion of the Dean, the award may not make if a suitable candidate is not identified. The award is not automatically renewable and will end when full-time employment ceases.

Funding

Funding will be provided by the earnings of the Distinguished Teacher Scholarship Endowment(s). Contributions may be made by anyone to grow the endowment(s). The number of Distinguished Teacher Scholar Selected in any year is determined by the earnings available for disbursement from the Distinguished Teaching Scholars Endowment(s).