Outstanding teacher: Nicole Rodriguez, Ph.D.

Nicole Rodriguez, Ph.D., of the Munroe-Meyer Institute, will receive the Outstanding Teacher Award at the annual faculty meeting, which this year will be held virtually through Zoom on April 14 at 3 p.m.

• Name: Nicole Rodriguez, Ph.D.

• Titles: Director of Applied Behavior Analysis Doctoral Program; director of MMI’s Early Intervention Program; associate professor, Munroe-Meyer Institute
• Joined UNMC: Post-doc, August 2010; faculty, August 2011
• Hometown: Miami, Florida

What are the greatest rewards of teaching?

The opportunity to train others to be scientist-practitioners, critical thinkers and scholars is at the top of my list. When I look at how I can increase my impact in this world, I find that teaching is one of the most effective and rewarding ways to do so. I can have a positive impact on the kids we work with within our Early Intervention Program in the integrated Center for Autism Spectrum Disorders through my direct involvement with those cases. I can increase that impact further by sharing what we learn through our applied research, which is often driven by our clinical work, with the scientific community. However, the opportunity to train doctoral students to take on these roles themselves is such a meaningful way to maximize this impact and elevate our science and field.

On a more personal level, when I leave class for the evening, I often find myself excited to share how class went with my husband. Our doctoral students are a bright group of students with a thirst for knowledge and a love for the field. The fact that I can walk away from class with new perspectives or ideas as a function of our in-depth group discussions is truly rewarding. It is like a fun nerd-out session with junior colleagues. I also love the contingency for me to remain on top of my game, so-to-speak. What is the saying? If you want to become an expert on a topic, try to teach it to someone else.

Describe a moment in your career when you realized you had picked the right occupation.

A friend of mine used to keep a McDonald’s job application in his car. He ran his own business and would joke that if things ever got too stressful that he always had a back-up plan. As I reflected on what my back-up plan would be (which often involved some island in the Caribbean), I kept coming back to my same job. I would still want to do clinical work. I would still want to teach and mentor students, continue to ask meaningful questions through research, continue to serve our field in various way such as through editorial work. Before you know it, I end up with my same exact job. This is how I know that I have picked the right occupation.

What are the biggest challenges you face as a teacher?
I feel an enormous responsibility to give students my best and really challenge themselves as well as myself in the process. I try to be thoughtful in how I design assignments that allow students to practice the skills that they will be expected to have once they graduate with their Ph.D. I try to provide numerous opportunities for students to put their behavior out there to be shaped, but this also results in a decent amount of grading on my part. One of the most consistent forms of feedback I have gotten from course evaluations is how much students appreciate the amount of detail and work I put into grading written assignments. It is a labor of love.

Another challenge is to get those more quiet or reserved students to put their behavior out there during class discussion. I try to do this with a combination of assigning points for in-class discussion and following up with students directly to see, first, if I can understand why they are hesitant to speak up and, second, how I can help them address those barriers. Sometimes it just takes a change in perspective (what better way to learn than to allow yourself to make mistakes during a time that you are not expected to know it all). Sometimes it takes some planning (considering how they might come to class with some ideas already well thought out so they can practice speaking up when they are most confident in what they have to say).

How do you know when you’ve been successful as a teacher?

A big part of teaching is regularly assessing for learning. Ideally, those assessment would be tied to the types of skills students would be engaging in post-graduation (e.g., conducting research, critically analyzing studies, effectively communicating and disseminating ideas, teaching). Beyond these more formal assessments, I look for how quickly and effectively they can tackle a novel idea using the principles of our field. Can they teach the topic to someone else? Do they know where to go when they don’t know an answer to a question? Do they understand that the delivery of the content matters as much as how well they know it? In addition to the knowledge base required, I believe that having these characteristics are likely to set someone up for success as they enter their next professional role, whether that be academia or as a director of clinic.