Medical Partnership and School of Medicine employees honored

Augusta University/University of Georgia Medical Partnership and UGA School of Medicine faculty and staff gathered in George Hall on Tuesday, Feb. 24, to celebrate extraordinary employees for AY25 (2024-25). Awards presented during the ceremony were: AU/UGA Medical Partnership Faculty Teaching Awards, MCG Exemplary Teaching Awards, MCG Educator of the Year Awards, MCG Basic Science Educator Award, Outstanding Staff Award, and Years of Service Awards.

Medical Student Advisor of the Year Award

The advisor’s achievement was assessed using the following criteria: exemplary academic support for students, exemplary career advising, specialty navigation and/or residency planning with students, and exemplary mentorship of students.

Dr. Scott Richardson

Excellence in Faculty Leadership Award

The leader’s achievement was assessed using the following criteria: established a collaborative environment for the team, used effective team management strategies, and effectively used data to appropriately evaluate project/initiative outcomes. This role is nominated by faculty and senior leadership.

Dr. Ellen House

Excellence in Scholarship Award

Eligible faculty members must have shared his/her scholarship with national/international forums. Eligible types of scholarship include peer-reviewed publications, peer-reviewed teaching repositories, invited publications, books/book chapters, editorials, oral abstracts, and poster abstracts.

Medical Education Scholarship: Dr. Amy Baldwin

Translational Scholarship: Dr. Deborah Barany

Peer-Nominated Teaching Award

Open to faculty who teach in Years 1-2. Criteria: effective engagement of teaching methods, effective communication while teaching, and effectiveness of session organization

Small-Group Teaching, Basic Science: Dr. Andrew Sobering

Small-Group Teaching, Clinical: Dr. Greg DeLaurier

Large Group Teaching: Dr. Melanie Wooten

Clinical Teaching: Dr. Kate Meixner

Faculty Mentor of the Year

Eligible faculty members must have served as a mentor in the Campus Mentoring Program. Criteria: how your mentor helped the mentee make progress for promotion and/or advancement, how your mentor helped the mentee improve his/her research/scholarship skills, and how your mentor helped the mentee improve his/her teaching skills.

Dr. DeLoris Hesse

Best Guest Lecturer

Criteria: Effective teaching as noted by formal student feedback and informal weekly curricular feedback.

Year 1: Dr. Cristina Elstad

Year 2: Dr. Beze Adogu

Medical College of Georgia’s Exemplary Teaching Awards

Faculty members in Years 1 and 2 had to teach a minimum of 6 sessions and received top 25% scores in student evaluations. Awardees for Years 3 and 4 are community faculty members in Northeast Georgia who scored in the top 20% of their evaluations.

Years 1 & 2

Dr. Deborah Barany

Dr. Molly Bond

Dr. Greg DeLaurier

Dr. Kurt Horst

Dr. Ellen House

Dr. Tom Howdieshell

Dr. Carrie Kelly

Dr. Robert Mackin

Dr. Aimee Martin

Dr. John Norris

Dr. David Paulk

Dr. Theresa Rohr-Kirchgraber

Dr. Don Scott

Dr. Scarlett Schneider

Dr. Les Watters

Dr. Melanie Wooten

Years 3 & 4

Dr. John Allen (Psychiatry)

Dr. Sergio Angel (Family Medicine)

Dr. Maria Angel (Family Medicine)

Dr. Amy Bailey (Family Medicine)

Dr. Erin Baldwin (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Alan Carnes (Surgery)

Dr. Devon Carr (Pediatrics)

Dr. David Cazares (Pediatrics)

Dr. John Chestnut (Emergency Medicine)

Dr. Samuel Church (Family Medicine)

Dr. Anthony DeMarco (Opthamology)

Dr. Kerese Downer (Family Medicine)

Dr. Kenny Esho (Pediatrics)

Dr. Casey Evans (Obstetrics-Gynecology)

Dr. Nick Fox (Emergency Medicine)

Dr. Daniel Gordon (Family Medicine)

Dr. James Griffin (Surgery)

Dr. Lara Hart (Obstetrics-Gynecology)

Dr. Addie Hill (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Renee J. Himmelbaum (Pediatrics)

Dr. Trammel Jones (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Peter Kaplan (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Andrew Ke (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Lori Lucas (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Brian Maloney (Surgery)

Dr. Dan McAvoy (Family Medicine)

Dr. Angela McSwain (Neurology)

Dr. Robert Meyer (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Brian Mitchell (Neurology)

Dr. Eva Moore (Surgery)

Dr. Alan Morgan (Neurology)

Dr. Ndubuisi Ndukwe (Family Medicine)

Dr. Uzoma Ndukwe (Family Medicine)

Dr. Julian Price (Surgery)

Dr. Fareha Rahim (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Kim Rathbun (Emergency Medicine)

Dr. Fred Reifsteck (Family Medicine)

Dr. Jacqueline Rosenthal (Neurology)

Dr. Catherine Schwender (Surgery)

Dr. Amir Shirazi (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Michael Schuler (Surgery)

Dr. Michael Smith (Surgery)

Dr. Michael Steadham (Neurology)

Dr. Kimberly Stoud (Pediatrics)

Dr. Denise Taylor (Neurology)

Dr. Ben Thrower (Neurology)

Dr. Akilah Tomingas (Pediatrics)

Dr. Cameron Wagenbrenner (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Thomas Wells (Internal Medicine)

Dr. Neil Woodall (Surgery)

Dr. Fred Young (Internal Medicine)

Excellence in Teaching for Part-Time Clinical Faculty

These awardees must be part-time clinicians who participate only in Clinical Skills or only in Community and Population Health. They also must receive a quantitative evaluation score of five.

Dr. Brett Atchley

Dr. Karl Barnett

Dr. Jean Chin

Dr. Alan Moore

Dr. Susan Podolsky

Educators of the Year

Selected annually every spring by each class of students at the Medical Partnership. Each class is polled to select the Educator of the Year, and the results are compiled to select the winner.

Class of 2025 – Dr. Kurt Horst

Class of 2026 – Dr. Melanie Wooten

Class of 2027 – Dr. Don Scott

Class of 2028 – Dr. Theresa Rohr-Kirchgraber

MCG Basic Science Educator Award

Awardee must demonstrate excellence as an instructor and as a mentor and receive outstanding evaluations from students. Must be nominated by the chair of basic sciences campus dean, with supporting recommendations by colleagues

Dr. Ariel VanLeuven

Outstanding Staff Award

Recognizes a staff member whose outstanding performance contributes to the overall success of the Medical Partnership. Awardees should model excellence and outstanding job performance and consistently go above and beyond their job expectations in supporting the Medical Partnership.

Jen Stowe, MS

2026 Years of Service

10 Years of Service

Dr. Amy Baldwin

Dr. Bryson Greenwood

Suzanne Hall

Dr. John Norris

Dr. Davis Paulk

Dr. James Pippim

Dr. Donald Scott

5 Years of Service:

Dr. Brett Atchley

Joshua Emond

Jeni Fitzpatrick, RN

Dr. Kimberlee Giffen

Sharon Golden, MS

Dr. Kearney Gunsalus

Dr. Laurel Murrow

Chuck Pierce

Dr. Susan Podolsky

Dr. Theresa Rohr-Kirchgraber

Dr. Andrew Sobering