Dr. Lisa Melonçon was announced as the winner of the prestigious Jay R. Gould Award for Excellence in Teaching Technical Communication in May of 2019 at the Honors Reception held during the Society for Technical Communication’s (STC) Annual Summit in Denver, CO.
The Jay R. Gould Award for Excellence in Teaching Technical Communication is an annual award that honors the distinguished career of Professor Jay R. Gould and recognizes exceptional academic mentorship.
Winners exhibit a record of successful students who are actively involved in STC and working in the profession. These outstanding scholars are involved in student activities outside of the classroom. They model innovation and creativity in teaching and engage in research that leads to advances in technical communication instruction.
Dr. Melonçon is a professor of Technical and Professional Communication at the University of South Florida and has been an STC member for nearly 20 years. Dr. Melonçon organizes or heads several field-wide mentoring initiatives that provide opportunities for faculty and graduate students in the field to receive valuable advice and share ideas that improve programs, policies, and pedagogies. Groups she facilitates include Women in Technical Communication, Mentor Monday, and Faculty Office Hours.
Dr. Melonçon’s body of programmatic scholarship is pivotal in the field, and she maintains a database that makes data available to others who which to do programmatic work, further supporting scholars in the discipline. Of Dr. Melonçon’s work, colleague Dr. Johanna Schreiber extols, “It is not an exaggeration to say that Dr. Melonçon's mentoring initiatives and scholarship have served as the foundation for best pedagogical and curricular development practices for an entire generation of scientific and technical communication teacher-scholars.”
The STC proudly bestowed The Jay R. Gould Award for Excellence in Teaching Technical Communication upon Dr. Melonçon for extensive innovation in technical communication pedagogy and programmatic development and for superb mentorship of both students and colleagues in the technical communication academy.