Faculty Senate recognizes two for excellence

Faculty Senate2016
Faculty Senate2016

The Faculty Senate recognized outstanding contributions to the Health Science Center’s teaching mission at its Sept. 14 meeting.

Rajeshwar Rao Tekmal, Ph.D., professor of obstetrics and gynecology and holder of the Carl J. Pauerstein Professorship in Reproductive Research, received the 2016 Faculty Leadership Award.

Aggie Manwell-Jackson, R.D.H., Ph.D., director of Virtual & Innovative Teaching and Learning (formerly Online and Blended Learning), received the Faculty Administration Leadership Award.

Dr. Tekmal first joined the ob-gyn faculty at the Health Science Center in 1989. After six years, he moved to Emory University in Atlanta where he led the Breast Cancer Research Program at Emorys Winship Cancer Research Institute. In 2003, the UT Health Sciences ob-gyn department recruited Dr. Tekmal to return to San Antonio to start a Division of Reproductive Research. As director, he oversees the department’s basic and translational research.

Dr. Tekmal is internationally known for his studies of how hormones influence the formation of cancer, specifically for his in vivo local estrogen models and their use in understanding the role of estrogen in breast and gynecological cancers.

In the past decade Dr. Manwell-Jackson has been charged with the creation, development, implementation and evaluation of more than 3,500 institutional online and blended learning courses and associated faculty development workshops and programs at the Health Science Center. She also led efforts toward faculty development that will optimize learning outcomes via integration of new learning technologies and teaching approaches in the new Academic Learning & Teaching Center. That included transforming the online and blended learning group into the Virtual & Innovative Teaching and Learning (VITaL) Faculty Development Center in a technology rich 2,000-sq-ft. space in the ALTC devoted to faculty activities and development.



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