{"id":7696,"date":"2009-12-01T07:00:51","date_gmt":"2009-12-01T11:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=7696"},"modified":"2011-05-31T12:43:06","modified_gmt":"2011-05-31T16:43:06","slug":"allied-health-sciences-professor-jane-kerstetter-named-teaching-fellow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2009\/12\/allied-health-sciences-professor-jane-kerstetter-named-teaching-fellow\/","title":{"rendered":"Allied Health Sciences Professor Named Teaching Fellow"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"<p>Jane<\/a>
Jane Kerstetter, associate professor of allied health sciences, teaches in Hawley Armory. Photo by Frank Dahlmeyer<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Jane Kerstetter<\/a> does everything in her power to motivate students during her intensive three-hour long lectures, including bringing a supply of hot coffee and cups to class.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to realize that these students have six straight hours of lectures Monday and Friday, and eight hours of clinical a day Tuesday through Thursday,\u201d says Kerstetter, an associate professor of allied health sciences. \u201cThey\u2019re exhausted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kerstetter\u2019s connection to her students and dedication to her craft has earned her a distinction as one of two University Teaching Fellows in the 2009-2010 academic year. The other honoree, Wendy Glenn, is an associate professor and English education coordinator in the Neag School of Education.<\/p>\n

Kerstetter\u2019s classes, despite the often intense workload, are popular among undergraduates, who appreciate her commitment and energy. Following a recent Friday afternoon session, students described their professor as \u201cinteresting\u201d and \u201cengaging.\u201d<\/p>\n

Addressing her classes of future dietitians and health care workers, Kerstetter leads the discussions with marked enthusiasm. She allows her students small breaks at the top of the hour during her longer lectures and then utilizes the time to discuss questions and concerns on the material or current events such as the University\u2019s recent loss of its star football cornerback Jasper Howard.<\/p>\n

Laughter seems to play an important role throughout Kerstetter\u2019s lectures as she captures her students\u2019 attention through the use of humorous analogies. In one particular lecture, she compared the thyroid gland\u2019s involvement in specific processes to a gas pedal, emphasizing its usefulness.<\/p>\n

Kerstetter encourages students to \u201cwatch her,\u201d and not their notebooks, during lectures as she highlights important concepts. Personable and approachable, she makes herself available to students by e-mail for further study sessions or simply to discuss their future careers. Covering complex topics \u2013 such as finding the basal metabolic rate in patients of different ages, weights, and activity levels \u2013 she speaks slowly and purposefully, giving her students class notes ahead of time and emphasizing what she plans to use in her tests.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to give these kids credit,\u201d Kerstetter says, as the University only accepts a limited amount of students into the dietitian program. After all their hard work, and even in this economy, she adds, \u201cthese students will graduate as registered dietitians with great job opportunities\u201d in their fields.<\/p>\n

When asked how she felt about becoming a University Teaching Fellow, Kerstetter responded, \u201cTeaching is hard work. It\u2019s easier to get recognition and funding for research, but it\u2019s hard to get recognition as a teacher.\u201d<\/p>\n

Preston Britner, an associate professor of human development & family studies, led the Institute for Teaching & Learning\u2019s<\/a> Advisory Board and Awards Selection Committee that supported Kerstetter\u2019s nomination.<\/p>\n

\u201cProfessor Kerstetter regards teaching as an art,\u201d Britner says. \u201cShe believes that students should have a connection with faculty \u2026\u00a0 Student letters of support describe her teaching style as one that gives students a \u2018true thirst for knowledge.\u2019 Another student writes that she \u2018transformed complex and intimidating lecture material, making it easier to understand \u2013 but without sacrificing the quality of the science.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Kerstetter says she encourages constructive criticism from her students so that she can improve her teaching methods and give them an even better learning experience. \u201cClearly, she has achieved this goal,\u201d says Keith Barker, director of the Institute for Teaching and Learning.<\/p>\n

University Teaching Fellows become engaged in a number of teaching and learning activities as part of their recognition. They are asked to participate in workshops developed by the Institute for Teaching & Learning, to allow teaching assistants to visit their classrooms, and to serve as mentors to other faculty in their discipline or cognate areas.<\/p>\n

Kerstetter, who began teaching at UConn in 1988, holds a joint appointment with the Department of Nutritional Sciences, which, like allied health, is also in the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources<\/a>. She is a member of The American Society for Bone and Mineral Research and has been an associate of the American Institute of Nutrition and the American Society for Clinical Nutrition since 1990.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Teaching Fellow Jane Kerstetter motivates and engages her students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[44],"class_list":["post-7696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-10 18:29:49","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7696"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37605,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7696\/revisions\/37605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7696"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=7696"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=7696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}