Call for Applications	Review Process and Rollover Policy
Materials To Be Submitted in a Dossier	How to Apply
Award Criteria and Suggestions for Supporting Evidence	Contact
Previous Excellence in Teaching Award Recipients	Fund for Excellence

2026 Award Recipients

Each spring, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology (Division 2 of the American Psychological Association) recognizes outstanding contributions in teaching, mentorship, scholarship, service, and teacher training with Excellence in Teaching Awards in six categories. Award winners will be honored during STP’s Annual Conference on Teaching. 

STP's Excellence in Teaching Award selection committees (comprised of previous award winners) congratulate the outstanding teachers of psychology who are recipients of this year’s awards:

The 2026 recipient of the Adjunct Faculty Excellence in Teaching Award is Dr. Beverly Wertheimer, an Adjunct Professor of Psychology in the Graduate School of Education and Psychology at Pepperdine University in Malibu, CA. After spending over a decade as a broadcast journalist, Beverly shifted towards a career in mental health counseling with a pastoral focus, earning a Master of Social Work from the University of Southern California, a Doctor of Ministry from the Andersonville Theological Seminary, and a Doctor of Psychology in Ministry Counseling from the Graduate Theological Foundation. At Pepperdine, she shares her clinical expertise with students in courses focused on psychological foundations, learning and behavior, lifespan development, and clinical interventions, and students and faculty alike consistently note how lucky they are to have Beverly as an instructor and a colleague. In her teaching philosophy, she writes that teaching is “a deeply human act rooted in the belief that growth is always possible.” Years after taking her courses, former students (now practicing clinicians) attest to the personal and professional growth that Beverly helped facilitate. One student wrote that Beverly’s framing of antecedent-behavior-consequence sequences improved her own health so much that she continues to use this concept in her daily work with families whose children are navigating neurodevelopmental disorders. 

The 2026 recipient of the Jane S. Halonen Excellence in Teaching Award for early-career faculty is Dr. Daniel Storage, a Teaching Associate Professor and Teaching Area Head in the Department of Psychology at the University of Denver. As a leader in his department, he redesigned the flagship Foundations of Psychological Science course to feature recitation sections where students can practice team-based learning in community with each other. Daniel also developed the University of Denver’s first micro-credentials program, in which students work with a faculty member to conduct an experiential project that helps them apply their skills to non-academic careers. His efforts have been so successful that there are now several similar programs across the university modeled after his. Daniel also conducts research that informs his own teaching practices and, very likely, many of ours. During his graduate training, he was the lead author of a highly cited study that found, across 14 million Rate My Professor reviews, that fields in which students consistently described their instructors as “brilliant” or “genius” were also significantly less diverse. This work reinforces the importance of emphasizing sustained effort, rather than natural inborn talent, as a critical inclusive teaching practice. Daniel has also served as the Co-Chair of STP’s Early Career Psychologists Committee, delivered 13 presentations at STP’s Annual Conference on Teaching, and currently maintains a YouTube channel with over 30,000 subscribers to share digestible explanations of psychological phenomena with students around the world. 

The 2026 recipient of the Robert S. Daniel Excellence in Teaching Award for faculty at four-year colleges and universities is Dr. Ashley Waggoner Denton, an Associate Professor, Teaching Stream in the Department of Psychology at the University of Toronto and a familiar face among STP award winners. As the recipient of the 2019 Jane S. Halonen Excellence in Teaching Award for early career faculty, Ashley is just one of six people in the organization’s history to earn two STP Excellence in Teaching Awards dedicated to two different career stages. Whether she is teaching an upper-level seminar of 15 students or an introductory psychology lecture of 1500 students, Ashley excels at helping students apply their newfound scientific knowledge in ways that are personally, professionally, and socially impactful. In her courses, students have the opportunity to make TikTok videos to share empirically-informed tips for college success, write advocacy briefs and letters to public officials, and serve as research design consultants in partnership with local community-based organizations. Ashley also has an extensive track record of service to her fellow educators and to the field more broadly, having served as the Co-Chair of the APA’s Committee on Associate and Baccalaureate Education and the Editor of STP’s Best Practices in Teaching and Learning. Most recently, she has served as the sole Canadian author of Discovering Psychology: The Science of Mind (First Canadian Edition), which has been praised for its accessibility and its efforts to Indigenize the curriculum.

The 2026 recipient of the Wayne Weiten Excellence in Teaching Award for faculty at two-year colleges is Jennifer Merrill, a Professor of Psychology at Skyline College in San Bruno, CA. Above and beyond teaching core concepts, Jennifer employs empirically validated community-building strategies and calls upon students to share their knowledge to benefit others. In conjunction with their coursework, Jennifer’s students have created empirically informed resources focused on suicide and substance abuse prevention to distribute on campus. They have also partnered with Skyline College’s Food Bank–which Jennifer and a team of colleagues worked to establish–to create and share brain-healthy recipes that use ingredients that are regularly in stock. In addition to her collaborative work on the Food Bank, Jennifer also established Skyline College’s chapter of the Psi Beta National Honor Society and has served as the faculty advisor since its inception. In this role, she seeks to give students a real-life glimpse into careers in psychology and regularly accompanies a group of students to attend the annual conference of the Western Psychological Association. Jennifer has also been instrumental in providing students with the opportunity to conduct and present their own research; she co-founded Skyline’s Undergraduate Symposium of Academic Research and is currently working to establish a district-wide Institutional Review Board to broaden access to research for even more students.

The 2026 recipient of the Wilbert J. McKeachie Excellence in Teaching Award for graduate students is Bayla Thompson, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Psychology at Florida State University. As the instructor of record for a 100+ student section of Social Psychology, Bayla strives to help students move from rote memorization to application. Whether teaching relationship science through the lens of reality TV dating shows or teaching theories of aggression through tense games between athletic rivals, she makes a special point to ensure that students can see how psychology is directly relevant to their lives and can “see themselves in the science.” To help her students succeed, Bayla solicits concrete study tips from the highest scorers on each exam and anonymously shares them with the entire class, a strategy that helped yield a nearly 10-point increase in exam grades across the semester. In her courses, she also employs a novel token system that gives students the flexibility to decide how they would like to earn and apply extra credit points throughout the semester, an approach she will present at FSU’s Provost’s Showcase of Scholarly Teaching. Finally, Bayla is committed to introducing students to the research being conducted by FSU faculty and helping them secure placements in labs that match their interests. Thus far, five of her students have been accepted as undergraduate research assistants in her PI’s lab.

The 2026 recipient of the Mary Margaret Moffett Memorial Excellence in Teaching Award for high school teachers is Dr. Allyson Weseley, a Teacher and Coordinator of Secondary Research at Roslyn High School on Long Island, NY. Over the past three decades, Allyson has guided hundreds of high schoolers through conducting the kind of independent, publication-ready research expected of graduate students. Over 80 of these students have been recognized as semifinalists in the Regeneron Science Talent Search, and more than 20 have been named as Grand Award Winners at the International Science and Engineering Fair. One of those students, now a Ph.D. candidate in one of the top behavioral science programs in the country, can’t speak highly enough of Dr. Weseley’s instruction and mentorship, noting that it is on par with the methodological training provided to undergraduates at her current institution. Allyson is also passionate about broadening access to and increasing the visibility of psychological research. In 2010, she founded the Long Island High School Psychology Fair and recruited faculty judges from local universities to help students see psychology as a scientific field in its own right. Even though many of her students ultimately publish their research in peer-reviewed journals alongside Ph.D. scientists, Allyson also founded the Journal of Secondary Psychological Studies, which is run by a team of student editors under her supervision and gives students from around the country the opportunity to publish their work.

List of Past Award Recipients: 1980-present

Call for Applications

Every year, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology (STP; Division 2 of the American Psychological Association) solicits applications for six Excellence in Teaching Awards, recognizing outstanding teachers of psychology across institutions and career stages. Click the name of each award to see the full selection criteria.

• Robert S. Daniel Excellence in Teaching Award (instructors at four-year colleges or universities)
• Wayne Weiten Excellence in Teaching Award (instructors at two-year colleges)
• Mary Margaret Moffett Memorial Excellence in Teaching Award (high school teachers)
• Jane S. Halonen Excellence in Teaching Award (instructors in their first ten years of full-time teaching; all institutions and levels)
• Wilbert J. McKeachie Excellence in Teaching Award (graduate student instructors)
• Adjunct Faculty Excellence in Teaching Award (instructors classified as part-time and paid on a per-course basis at every institution where they teach)

Applicants are only eligible to apply for one Excellence in Teaching Award each year. Consistent with our Mission Statement and the Statement on Addressing Systemic Racism and Inequity in STP, we encourage applications from colleagues who are from underrepresented groups and have diverse backgrounds and experiences.

Self-nominations are both permitted and strongly encouraged. Historically, award dossiers are most competitive when prepared by applicants themselves, rather than by a third party. In addition, dossiers submitted or otherwise endorsed by a nominator are treated no differently than self-nominations in the review process.

If you would like to support a nominee’s application for an Excellence in Teaching Award, you can write a letter of recommendation that they can include in their dossier. If you would like to encourage someone to apply for an Excellence in Teaching Award, you can fill out this Google form and they will receive a message with additional details from STP’s Chair of Teaching Awards.

Award winners will receive a personalized plaque and a monetary award of $1500 or up to $1500 in travel reimbursement for attending STP's Annual Conference on Teaching in the year they have won the award.

The deadline for submissions is 11:59 PM (in the last time zone on earth) on January 15 of the award year.

  

Materials To Be Submitted in a Dossier

1. Cover sheet that includes:

• Your name and contact information
• The name of the award you’re applying for
• The name and contact information of who should be informed (e.g., department chair, dean, principal, etc.) if you win the award
• A short description of your duties (e.g., teaching load, class sizes/modalities, any administrative responsibilities or notable leadership positions, etc.)
• A disclosure statement explaining how, if at all, generative AI was used in the preparation of the dossier and/or any of the materials included in it

2. Front matter documentation that briefly describes each piece of evidence presented in the dossier and how the award criteria are satisfied by the respective pieces of evidence

There are many ways to do this well and, as a result, no particular format that is required. However you ultimately choose to approach this section, this documentation should clearly, concisely, and compellingly articulate (1) what reviewers will see in your dossier and (2) why they’re seeing it.

As one potential example, a previous Excellence in Teaching Award winner organized their dossier using three separate front matter documents: 

Note: This front-matter documentation, along with the cover sheet, is intended to take the place of a traditional, narrative-style cover letter. An additional cover letter is not required.

3. Current STP membership card 

If you're already an STP member, click here to access your card. Award applicants must be members of STP and may join at any time. 

4. An updated curriculum vitae

5. Teaching philosophy statement

6. Evidence to illustrate award criteria

See below for general examples of evidence that might be included in a dossier and click the links under the Call for Applications heading above to see the full criteria (with additional, more specific suggestions) for each Excellence in Teaching Award.

Please also note that pieces of evidence may be submitted in different forms. For example, a syllabus can be included in a dossier exactly as-is, while relevant journal articles can be noted in a CV or in a summary document that lists the citation and abstract for each article (rather than including the full-text articles themselves).

Award Criteria and Suggestions for Supporting Evidence

This is a non-exhaustive, non-prescriptive list of suggestions for supporting evidence that could potentially be used to illustrate the general criteria for STP’s Excellence in Teaching Awards. For additional, more specific suggestions for each Excellence in Teaching Award, click the links under the Call for Applications heading above.

In preparing your materials, we encourage you to think through how each piece of evidence you include adds unique value to your dossier vis-a-vis the award criteria and meaningfully contributes to an overarching narrative about your teaching accomplishments and career.

Evidence related to teaching and fostering students’ interest in psychology

• Summary of student evaluations
• • Please do not include hundreds of pages of original evaluation forms in your dossier. Instead, summarize your quantitative and qualitative feedback (including select direct quotes as you see fit) in an organized and digestible document. In this document, please also include a link to a cloud-based folder (e.g., Google Drive, Dropbox, etc.) where the original evaluation forms can be accessed.
• Other informal student feedback
• Sample teaching materials
• Exemplary student work
• Letters of support (no more than five total)

Evidence related to mentoring

• Mentoring philosophy
• Formal or informal feedback from mentored students
• Exemplary work from mentored students
• Letters of support (no more than five total)

Evidence related to professional service or professional development

• Concrete work products resulting from committee service
• Conference posters
• List of conference talk titles/abstracts

Evidence related to the scholarship of teaching and learning

• Conference posters
• List of conference talk titles/abstracts
• Annotated bibliography
• • Please include the abstract and a link to each article in this document, rather than including full-text publications in your dossier.

Evidence related to training other teachers

• Evidence of excellence in teaching from mentored teachers
• Concrete work products resulting from teacher training initiatives
• Letters of support (no more than five total)

Review Process and Rollover Policy

Dossiers are reviewed by committees that consist of recent winners of Excellence in Teaching Awards, led by STP’s Chair of Teaching Awards.

Winners will be announced by May of each year and honored during STP’s Annual Conference on Teaching in October.

As a courtesy, first-time applicants who do not win an award will have their dossiers automatically rolled over to be reviewed in the same category the following year.

Applicants who wish to update their materials or whose eligibility has changed (e.g., a graduate student who has graduated, an adjunct who now teaches full-time) are always welcome to submit a new application via the process described below.

Each fall, the prior year’s applicants will receive an email reminding them that their applications will be automatically rolled over and that, if they wish, they can update their materials prior to the upcoming deadline.

How to Apply

Just fill out the Google form on this page, which requires that you log into your STP member account.

Award applicants must be members of STP and may join at any time. Click here to learn more about how to become an STP member.

Contact

For more information, just get in touch with STP’s Chair of Teaching Awards, Leslie Berntsen, at teaching-awards@teachpsych.org.

Fund for Excellence

The Excellence in Teaching Awards are supported and endowed by STP’s Fund for Excellence (Korn, 2009). The Fund for Excellence consists entirely of donations from individuals and organizations whose generosity helps promote and recognize excellence in the teaching of psychology.

Click here to make a tax-deductible (and greatly appreciated) donation to STP’s Fund for Excellence.