Allen Landers, physics professor in the College of Science and Mathematics, was the 2014 recipient of the Auburn University Award for Excellence in Faculty Outreach.
James Hanson, professor and chair of the physics department, nominated Landers for the award.
“We look at what professors are supposed to do, and he does it all and does it extremely well,” Hanson said. “He’s characterized by his concern for students.”
Landers said there are many ways to think about his outreach, but, overall, he wanted to relay the importance of sharing findings to the students he works with.
“Ultimately, I’m a scientist,” Landers said. “But I think to be a complete scientist, you can’t just go into a lab and do experiments, and you can’t just sit and calculate things and write theories. You have to think about science as a whole, and that includes the most important part of science in my opinion, which is reporting what you find to the rest of the world.”
According to Hanson, Landers started the Summer Science Institute, which brings high school students to Auburn for a week and teaches them about the research projects going on at the University.
“(The Summer Science Institute) has turned out to be extremely useful for faculty throughout the college to talk to high school students about their research projects,” Hanson said.
Landers was inspired to start the project because said he felt it was important to reach out to students beyond the University. He said there is no point in doing research alone because, then, there is no connection to society.
“The students on the university level, that’s only one part of the population, and, if you want to think broadly and in terms of the public, the next segment of the population upon which you can have an impact would be kids. For me, the first place to look is just a step below of what we have here, and that’s high school students,” Landers said.
Mary Lou Ewald, Director of Outreach in the College of Science and Mathematics, said his love of outreach is what makes him stand out from other professors.
“Our faculty in COSAM as a whole is very supportive of outreach,” Landers said. “They get involved in a lot of the different programs that we do. Dr. Landers stands out because he is invested to the point that he will help write the grants and travel off site to actually train the teachers.”
According to Ewald, Landers has been very interested in outreach since he first began working for Auburn.
“Right off the bat, when he came here, he was really interested in doing outreach-type programs that I work with,” Ewald said. “We do a number of K-12 science programs throughout the year.”
Landers said the outreach is not about the awards. He said he just finds it to be a very important aspect of his career.
“I just felt like this as something that I wanted to do or needed to do, because I love students, and so any chance you get to work with students or excite them is fun at all ages,” Landers said.
Ewald said Landers has truly become an asset to the College of Science and Mathematics and inspires his peers with his work.
“I think he became a role model for other faculty when he put more time and energy into outreach,” Ewald said. “I think it brought other faculty into the mix and made them want to participate.
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