An engaging teacher and a prolific scholar win awards

The university recently presented its Distinguished Teaching Award to Matthew Weinstein, an education professor at UW Tacoma since 2006. Rich Furman, associate professor and director of the university’s Social Work program, received the Distinguished Research Award.

Separate university committees selected the faculty members for the prestigious awards.

Distinguished Teaching Award: Matthew Weinstein

Weinstein teaches freshmen how to learn on a university level and instructs master’s of education students in how to teach science to teenagers. Students who nominated Weinstein for the award say his teaching provides a model of excellence for them to follow.

Weinstein’s interactive teaching style encourages student teachers to practice a teacher persona. He gets them to think about how teachers act, whether it’s talking or writing on a chalkboard, so they’ll be prepared to manage and engage a classroom of teens.

A self-described ethnographer who’s interested in the links between social justice and science, Weinstein draws upon his research to inform his teaching. Earlier in his career, he studied people who earned a living as human subjects in scientific experiments. More recent research involves “action medics” or “street medics” who are trained to give medical aid in chaotic situations, such as public protests.

Distinguished Research Award: Rich Furman

The university recognized Furman for his extensive and significant work as a scholar. In addition to teaching social work classes, Furman has written 88 published, peer-reviewed journal articles and 10 academic books and workbooks.

His 2010 book, Social Work Practice with Men at Risk, has been praised as an interdisciplinary approach to the psychological and health risks faced by vulnerable men, including veterans, displaced workers, substance abusers and mental health consumers. It was the first scholarly book in social work to treat men as a culturally distinct group with unique problems and behaviors.

Furman’s research spans several other topics, as well: social work practice with at-risk populations, transnational social work, and service to Latino populations. A qualitative methodologist, Furman is dedicated to innovations in expressive and creative approaches to research. He has been one of the pioneers in developing the uses of poetic forms in structures in data representation.

“It is clear that Dr. Furman is engaged in ‘research that matters’ for students and the clients whom they service,” the selection committee wrote. “The scope of his work goes beyond the usual research and writing and extends to humanities, to historically marginalized communities and to gender issues that remain ever-present in our society but largely ignored."