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Professor Philippa Martin has been awarded the UC Teaching Medal, the University’s highest award for teaching, in 2024.
Prof. Martin has taught in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering for twenty years; Associate Professor Paul Gaynor calls her “the most passionate, engaged, talented, and effective person I have ever met in the field of higher education.” Her passion for teaching and learning can be seen not only from her many awards (most recently, a 2023 Te Whatu Kairangi Aotearoa Tertiary Teaching Award for “Progressing seamless ākonga transitions between contexts”) or the extremely high regard in which her students hold her (as shown in her high student evaluation scores), but also in her own engagement as a student of other disciplines. Attaining qualifications in Education, Counselling, Te Reo Māori, and Strategic Leadership, she has then applied this knowledge to her own teaching practice and leadership within her faculty.
In the years following the 2011 earthquakes, she led the way in boosting attendance and engagement in tutorials with formative assessments, innovative online resources such as tutorial videos, and developing a community of learners that helps students to feel they belong. Aware that Engineering does not exist in a vacuum, she has worked to authentically weave te ao Māori into the Engineering curriculum, and proactively challenged her students to apply their knowledge as a force for good, whether for people, the economy, or the environment.
However, it is in improving student wellbeing within her faculty that Philippa unquestionably shines. In her tireless work on equity and diversity initiatives, she has strived to improve the culture of Engineering among both staff and students. As the inaugural Dean of Engineering (First Year), she shifted conversations with struggling students away from deficits and problems to focus on their strengths and solutions using techniques from solution-focused brief therapy and motivational interviewing. She used her studies in Strategic Leadership to create and bring to life a strategy for first-year Engineering and lead her faculty during the response to Covid-19. Finally, she led the design and implementation of the ‘ENG ME!’ peer mentoring programme, which has improved social connection metrics for first-year engineering students (this programme also received a 2023 Outstanding Teaching and Learning Transformation Award and a 2023 Engineering New Zealand ENVI Award, and was adopted by Law to create ‘LAW ME’).
As a former student, Emma Lloyd, writes:
Philippa’s ability to connect with students on a technical level is impressive and she is highly regarded among students in the department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering. However, it is her work outside of the classroom that sets her apart as an educator. Her passion for creating a safe, equitable space for students by empowering them in their learning and development is truly one of a kind.
