Kelly Anthony, recipient of the Distinguished Teacher Award, 2013
School of Public Health and Health Systems
Kelly Anthony has been a lecturer for the School of Public Health and Health Systems since 2005. Recently, she has been appointed the teaching fellow for Applied Health Sciences. Her teaching can be best described as a character and perspective building experience, underscoring a level of accountability and connectivity to the community. One student claims that Anthony has been a “catalyst to opening my perspectives of the world”, and another has developed “a unique belief set regarding our moral obligations to the KW community” thanks to her instruction. Ultimately, her students not only gain knowledge but become equipped with a sense of awareness and motivation to be better and more informed participants of the world. Like the best teachers, she intuitively cultivates interest and genuine enthusiasm in her students, “[lighting] up the fire” and stirring their dormant appetites. Anthony’s interactive teaching style stresses discussion-based classes and experiential learning, deftly eluding the passive transfer of facts. These discussion-based lectures “provoke conversations that guide learning and respective epiphanies… engaging [her students] in intellectual spars fostered by an environment that was facilitated by her open nature”. Under her mentorship, several undergraduate students have developed research projects and participated in independent studies abroad. “Her passionate disposition, superior critical acumen and moral sensibility” confirms her place as a “distinguished teacher” at the University of Waterloo.