Computer Science professor honored with teaching excellence award

June 2, 2022, Blue Bell/Pottstown, Pa.— For in excess of two many years, Dr. Kendall Martin has been introducing her students at Montgomery County Local community School to a new superpower you won’t find inside of the internet pages of a comic guide. The Computer Science professor has aided them uncover the full potential of technological innovation that surrounds them and learn to use it techniques they never ever dreamed achievable, switching their life forever.

In a typical instance, just one former student informed Dr. Martin she believed she was destined to devote her existence functioning as a beautician in a hair salon ahead of having a Computer Science class.

“Everybody in her household reported ‘You’re no very good at technology. That is for your brother. Why never you go understand to do hair?’” stated Dr. Martin of Lansdale. “And now she’s at Lockheed Martin, operating as a computer system programmer. So, you can commence to see oneself in a different light and see a distinct long term for on your own. At the time you see you can be taught how to do these points, then you have it. It’s your superpower and you can use it on the other hand you want. That can be a everyday living-changing instant.”

Dr. Martin’s attempts to improve the lives of her college students for the superior is now staying celebrated. At this year’s Graduation ceremonies, she was named the recipient of the 2022 Gladys and Raymond Pearlstine Award for Teaching Excellence.

The award recognizes a total-time school member whose instructing is intellectually stimulating, obtainable for all college students, and demonstrates a dedication to the perfectly-currently being of learners both of those inside and outside the house of the classroom.

Mastering she’d been named the receiver of the award was “thrilling,” she mentioned and felt like she was “walking on air.”

“The purpose the award suggests so significantly to me is that the legacy of names on that listing of earlier recipients is amazing,” mentioned Dr. Martin. “It’s these an honor to be capable to see that group of folks and to know how a lot of individuals have dedicated all of their occupations to supporting the students in Montgomery County and earning the journey of finding out be section of someone’s daily life. It’s a superb matter to have a position in that legacy.”

Martin’s legacy commenced 23 yrs ago when she approved a position at MCCC, adhering to past teaching stints at Ursinus University and Villanova University. She also worked earlier at Texas Instruments and Bell Laboratories.

“I begun receiving into educating when my kids were being born,” she said.

Dr. Martin, who holds a doctoral diploma in Engineering, from the College of Pennsylvania, fell in like with Computer Science, not only for its mental worries, but also the variety of occupation pathways it opens for students and its geographic flexibility.  

“It’s just these a fantastic stepping-stone for students coming into the local community college or university to sort of shift their daily life in a path that provides them a large amount of handle and challenge,” she claimed. “A whole lot of our students occur in less than resourced in publicity to engineering, in encounter and self-assurance in mathematics, and so they shy absent from Computer Science. So, I have genuinely labored difficult to attempt and draft folks and get them into the pipeline. If they get a supported practical experience, a whole lot of them locate it is a fantastic match for their pursuits.”

About the many years, Dr. Martin has come up with distinctive and creative approaches to expose distinctive groups of college students to Computer Science outdoors the classroom, commencing at an early age.

In 2018, she and Sound Recording and Songs Technological innovation ( SRT) Instructor Jen Mitlas, launched a Pennsylvania chapter of Beats by Girlz for learners in the Center for Lifestyle, Art, Coaching and Training ( CCATE) in Norristown. The plan is a non-common, resourceful way of finding out music that was began at the Berklee School of Tunes by Affiliate Professor Erin Barra-Jean. She wrote a audio curriculum in reaction to the lower numbers of females moving into the subject and made use of the Abelton Drive, a new digital instrument, to inspire girls’ interest in tunes.

Following the achievement of their program, Dr. Martin and Mitlas then effectively introduced Beats by Girlz plans at The Pathway School, a faculty for pupils predominantly on the autism spectrum The Lakeside Ladies Academy, which delivers informed educating for women who’ve suffered traumatic activities The Crefeld College, a non-public large school in Chestnut Hill and a summer months plan for women at the North Wales Space Library and at Abington Senior Significant College. Dr. Martin and Mitlas then transitioned from training the software specifically to instruction faculty and workers at each and every school to run it them selves.

In 2021, Dr. Martin and Mitlas launched a new system at the College called “The Language of Digital Media,” which teaches pupils to use point out-of-the-artwork tools in digital audio and video clip manufacturing. Then as the pandemic continued to rage, the two ladies commenced web hosting “ Montco@House,” a digital job interview collection on digital new music generation, that includes artists from around the environment. Dr. Martin and Mitlas ended up awarded an MCCC 2020-2021 Yr of Studying Innovation Grant for their endeavours.

Most just lately, Dr. Martin helped launch Java Bootcamp, a 4-7 days, no cost on line training course in coding and laptop or computer programming taught by college students through summer months and wintertime breaks to give Pc Science learners a refresh in material they’d quickly be researching in the forthcoming semester. The application is run via the Gals In Science and Technological know-how ( WIST) method, of which Dr. Martin is a member, and funded by the WIST/STEM office. At its start off in summer months 2021, the software experienced 10 learners in attendance. When it was presented once more for the duration of wintertime split, attendance for the class quadrupled.

Outside of her operate to encourage the Pc Science application, Dr. Martin was also identified for assisting advertise other campus wellness center sources that support students, like cost-free on the web treatment with TimelyMD and on-line tutoring out there 24 hours a working day, seven times a week for learners.

Dr. Martin saluted the College’s administration for supporting these varieties of packages and encouraging carry them to fruition. For a long time, she said, school associates would be on the front traces helplessly watching learners wrestle. Now they can offer hope.

“I’m grateful to the administration for all the do the job they’ve performed to produce this established of assets,” she claimed. “Now we can wander up to college students who are having difficulties and give them some possibilities. If you give them an choice, they’ll run with it. I’m satisfied to see the full photograph of a student is seen and supported.”

In the course of Graduation, Dr. Gloria Oikelome, Vice President of Academic Affairs, examine prices from some of Dr. Martin’s college students, who praised her super heroic ability to get them as fired up as she is about Laptop or computer Science and for her never-ending struggle to see them all succeed.

“She is so passionate about laptop science and teaching to college students!” wrote one college student. “She wants to see her learners thrive. I enjoy it when she will get thrilled with us when we figure out how to do something.”

“She constantly instructed us about all of the distinct resources college students at Montco have,” said one more university student. “Even while it wasn’t right associated to coding, she still made confident all people understood about the psychological overall health resources accessible, and it aided me significantly.”

“Dr. Martin has labored about the past summertime and wintertime breaks to organize and operate an on the net Java Bootcamp that is open up to all programming learners,” said a person college student.

A further university student shared that “Dr. Martin is an outstanding professor and mentor. She is generally pushing me to do improved and acknowledging my tricky function.”

With the Pearlstine award now in hand, Dr. Martin reported she’s planning a sabbatical to broaden upon the associations she’s made in Norristown and continuing to endorse the electronic audio system at the Faculty. She’s also psyched for the start of the Challenger Mastering Middle at Pottstown Campus this tumble and presently has tips for her learners to build interactive museum parts for the room. Finally, she strategies to proceed tutoring college students on the autistic spectrum in digital music to increase their abilities in technologies and unlock their creativeness.

“I’m psyched about how quite a few items could happen around the up coming 10 a long time,” she said. “I’m on the lookout forward to the up coming 10 years.”

Written by Eric Devlin

Photo 1 caption:  Montgomery County Group College Vice President of Academic Affairs Dr. Gloria Oikelome presents the Gladys and Raymond Pearlstine Educating Excellence Award to Professor of Laptop or computer Science Dr. Kendall Martin for the duration of MCCC’s 55^th Graduation ceremonies. Picture by David DeBalko

About Montgomery County Local community School 
For extra than 57 yrs, Montgomery County Local community College has grown with the community to meet the evolving instructional requirements of Montgomery County. The College’s thorough curriculum incorporates far more than 100 affiliate degree and certification systems, as well as customized workforce education and certifications. Pupils love the flexibility of understanding at the College’s thriving campuses in Blue Bell and Pottstown, at the Culinary Arts Institute in Lansdale, and on the net.  

As an Achieving the Aspiration Chief Higher education of Difference, the institution is positioned at the vanguard of countrywide endeavours to take out limitations to obtain, improve understanding outcomes, and maximize completion for all students. The Higher education also is recognized regionally and nationally for its sustainability leadership, work with army veterans, group services and provider-finding out prospects, and use of classroom technology. For 6 consecutive years, MCCC has been named one particular of the Most Promising Areas to Get the job done in Neighborhood Colleges in the country by the Countrywide Institute for Team and Organizational Progress for its motivation to diversity by way of inclusive learning and do the job environments, pupil and employees recruitment and retention tactics, and meaningful group service and engagement alternatives. For much more information and facts, go to https://www.mc3.edu.

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