In light of the evolving situation around the COVID-19 crisis, the University has a number of updates related to award nomination deadlines and previously scheduled events.

Excellence in General Education Award: Nominations due April 10

The Office of Innovation in General Education is honored to sponsor the 2019-2020 Excellence in General Education Award, which recognizes two members of the URI teaching community who are committed to providing students with an intellectually stimulating, challenging and dynamic general education experience. Deserving individuals consistently demonstrate excellence in the delivery and design of a general education course.

Students, faculty and staff are invited to nominate a teacher who exemplifies excellence in general education and has positively influenced students’ learning experiences. Nominations should reflect firsthand knowledge of the candidate’s teaching style, use of activities and assignments, and/or engagement with students.

The two recipients of this award will be recognized at the last meeting of the Faculty Senate this semester and will receive a financial award of $1,000.

Any member of the University who has taught in the General Education Program during the 2019-2020 academic year (Summer ’19, Fall ’19, J Term ’20 and Spring ’20) is eligible for nomination. Past nominees qualify and you are encouraged to re-nominate someone for consideration this year.

The nomination deadline is April 10. For more information on eligibility and nomination criteria, please review the nomination form. Questions may be emailed to gen-ed@etal.uri.edu.

Postponing Rumowicz Lecture Series and awards ceremony to fall 2020

The Annual Rumowicz Lecture Series and the Awards Ceremony for the Edmund S. and Nathalie Rumowicz Undergraduate Maritime Essay Contest is postponed until fall 2020. We are grateful and thrilled that we will still be able to coordinate Honorée Fanonne Jeffers’ Rumowicz Lecture with the culmination of the Caged Bird Sings Poetry Festival, details of which are included below.

As a result, the deadline for submission to the Edmund S. and Nathalie Rumowicz Undergraduate Maritime Essay Contest is extended until May 15, 2020. One happy consequence is that this change will enable students (or faculty on a student’s behalf) to submit essays that they are preparing as final papers or projects.

Please join us in November for the Caged Bird Sings Poetry Festival

Because these are uncertain times, and because we want to make sure that we fully celebrate your poetry, we have decided to postpone the Caged Bird Sings Poetry Festival to November.

We make this decision at this time because we believe that what keeps poetry alive is a community that engages through listening, speaking, and sharing. We do not want to put this community at risk.

We have not yet determined how current submissions will be affected and whether we will revise the current call. But we will make sure the contest is fair to all when it is re-activated in November. We are also excited to share that our guest poet, Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, will be with us in November.