APLU’s Academic Programs Section Names 2025 Fall Innovative Teaching Awards Winners

APLU’s Board on Agriculture Assembly’s Academic Programs Section (APS) named winners of its 2025 Fall Innovative Teaching Awards. In their eleventh year, the biannual awards are intended to bolster innovation in the post-secondary teaching of agriculture and related fields. Awardees share up to $5,000 per project, plus $1,000 in matching funds. The awards program encourages:   

• New faculty to expand their scholarship of teaching and learning by creating projects with more senior faculty from their own and other institutions.  

• Adoption of innovative teaching and learning experiences for students.  

• Institutional collaboration that expands the impact of creative projects to more institutions and students.  

• Motivation to seek additional funding for the scholarship of teaching and learning from additional sources.  

“This may be the junior faculty’s first monetary award which, when combined with the mentoring by working with senior faculty on the project, boost their abilities as both a teacher and a researcher,” said Wendy Fink, Executive Director of APS.

The 2025 Fall winners are:  

Applying Game-Design Processes to Innovate Food Safety 
Dr. Valentina Trinetta of Kansas State University and Dr. Matheus Cezarotto of New Mexico State University 

Enhancing Undergraduate Assessment through Oral Examination in Ag Education 
Dr. Bizhen Hu of Kansas State University and Dr. Lucia Ona of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College 

AI Across Cultures: Leadership Stimulation and Bias Exploration in Global Contexts 
Dr. Pablo Lamino of the University of Florida 

Cultivating Global Citizenship: Integrating Virtual Collaboration and Service Learning in Food Security Education 
Dr. Ozzie Abaye and Dr. Pete Ziegler of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University