Ronald Lewis rewarded for teaching excellence in quantitative genetics and genomics

April 25, 2016

Lincoln, Neb. — Ronald Lewis’ peers commended his teaching for Great Plains Interactive Distance Education Alliance (Great Plains IDEA) with a Faculty Excellence Award. Lewis is professor of animal science at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.

Lewis helped develop 16 one-hour courses that offer online master’s students training in quantitative genetics and genomics. The courses were developed and evaluated through U.S. Department of Agriculture Higher Education Challenge grants.

Lewis set about to assure that a new group of professionals were trained to integrate genomic information with quantitative genetics. Online delivery through AGIDEA, affiliate of Great Plains IDEA, made the information available nationwide.

Lewis coordinated five universities to participate in course sharing. Students were quick to enroll when the five partners offered quantitative genetics and genomics courses online in fall 2015.

Lewis received the teaching excellence award at the Great Plains IDEA annual meeting April 18, 2016, in Kansas City, Mo.  It comes with a $2,000 cash award. 

Through the Great Plains IDEA, 18 accredited member institutions and two accredited affiliate institutions share responsibilities to offer 20 online degrees and certificates. UNL takes part in eight human sciences programs and six agricultural programs through the consortium. To take part in the inter-institutional degrees, a student chooses one partner university as a home institution for enrollment, transcript, and graduation.