Features
Lessons Learned
‘Faculty brat’ credits parents for her commitment to teaching
BY ANDREW VOWLES
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| Prof. Janet Wood is the winner of the 2009 College of Biological Science Teaching Award. Photo by Teresa Pitman |
Prof. Janet Wood, Molecular and Cellular Biology (MCB), still remembers the first undergraduate class she taught at Guelph as a new faculty member. It was fall 1977. Arriving on the hour for her first lecture, she began writing on the blackboard and speaking to a sparsely populated classroom.
“I didn’t realize most of the students weren’t there yet,” says Wood.
A short time later, she learned her own first lesson at U of G: classes began 10 minutes after the hour.
Since then, there have been more than a few lectures and lessons for this longtime teacher and researcher. That 32-year-long record was recognized in the fall when she received the 2009 College of Biological Science Teaching Award.
Known as a dedicated teacher who demands commitment and effort from her students, Wood has taught courses in MCB, in the former departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Microbiology, and in the Guelph-Waterloo Centre for Graduate Work in Chemistry and Biochemistry. In 1995, she won a teaching award from the U of G Faculty Association.
Nomination letters from students and faculty especially cited a literature research lab she developed for a third-year course called “Microbial Adaptation and Develop- ment.”
For this module, developed along with science librarian Sharon Taylor, students must analyze and critique a primary research article, including studying the social context of the science and writing reports. Wood came up with the assignment a decade ago after realizing that students lacked practice in evaluating research literature.
Understanding how research works is vital for would-be scientists, but the exercise develops tools that students can use in many other courses, science or not, she says.
“These skills are important for all citizens, not just for practising scientists,” says Wood, who studies how cells sense and control their own water content.
Writing in support of her award nomination, MCB professor George van der Merwe said: “Not only is she committed to teaching the required principles of her courses, but she is also adamant that students develop into good scientists in the process. This high bar in teaching extracts the best from her students and also motivates her colleagues to higher goals.”
In his letter of support, department chair Prof. Chris Whitfield described Wood as “a dedicated teacher who is organized, rigorous and highly effective in the classroom.” He noted that she receives some of the best student evaluations in MCB.
It was only about a decade ago that Wood learned to relax in the classroom. Before that, the self-described shy professor had been a tough self-critic. Several of her earliest courses had seen her teaching challenging material that wasn’t necessarily her forte. She recites a line from one student evaluation from that first year on campus: “She’ll be a really good teacher when she knows the stuff.”
A revelation came about 10 years ago, around the same time she was developing that new research literature project. Sure, she has to be organized and on top of her material, but the focus in the classroom lies not on her but on her students.
“What they’re doing is more important than what I’m doing.”
She figures her commitment to teaching was planted early by her parents, particularly her father. Alex Wood taught animal science and nutrition at the University of British Columbia and was founding chair of the Department of Bacteriology and Biochemistry at the University of Victoria.
“My father believed — and I also believe — that the primary role of a public university is education. My father would say no research is justified in a university that is not relevant to students.”
Acknowledging that he might regard much of her own research as too “pure,” she says her studies of E. coli bacteria may find application in understanding kidney function, salinity tolerance in plants or ethanol production in yeast.
Janet Wood and her sister, Sandra — a former adjunct professor at UVic and a retired community planner — grew up on the UBC campus.
“I’m a faculty brat,” she says, recalling her early childhood spent living in an army barracks hut. Several huts on campus had been pressed into service as inexpensive housing for students and faculty returning from Second World War service.
She started working in her father’s lab at age 16, tending white-tailed deer used in nutrition studies.
Wood’s mother, Eileen, studied home economics at Cornell University, where she met Alex, then a post-graduate student.
Janet Wood studied at UBC and UVic before completing her PhD at the University of Edinburgh in 1972. She worked at the National Research Council in Ottawa before joining the faculty of U of G.
In 2001, she won a YMCA- YWCA of Guelph Women of Distinction Award in Science, Technology and the Environment for her work in education and her involvement in employment equity, disability and literacy initiatives.