• AMATYC 1997 Award for Teaching Excellence, Mid-Atlantic Region Recipient.
• MATYCNJ 1999 Outstanding Service Award

Prof. Azzolino Receives National Recognition

With 1000 members in attendance, Agnes Azzolino and 7 others received the American Mathematical Association of Two Year Colleges Award For Teaching Excellence at the November 1997 Annual Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia. Prof. Elaine Klett of the Brookdale Community College mathematics department nominated Prof. Azzolino and said, "I greatly admire the energy that Aggie brings to her professional life. To be a great teacher one must be constantly learning and that is what Aggie loves to do - learn and teach. She remains a vital, enthusiastic and caring individual. She truly epitomizes all that is great in our profession."

Michael Drulis, a former student of Ms. Azzolino at Middlesex County College, said, "Professor Azzolino has touched my life in ways which she will never know. Her numerous perspectives and love of the field comes through everyday in her class. Her example is one that is phenomenal in innovation, teaching, and supporting students. My life's dreams have grown to a larger height because of her influence."

Dr. Harold Gladstone of the MCC mathematics and chemistry departments commented, "Professor Azzolino always brings an enormous amount of energy and enthusiasm into the classroom as well as much empathy for her students. She also brings calculators, overheads, handouts, writing activities, and manipulatives to teach and motivate her students. She was the first professor in the department to introduce the use of graphing calculators in precalculus and calculus courses. She has done this with TI-81s, TI-82s, HP-48s and Sharp graphing calculators. Following her lead we now use graphing calculators in almost all of our math courses. She was most helpful in getting many of us started in using this new technology and helping us see where this all fits in teaching our courses."

AMATYC members who are full-time teachers were nominated based on classroom expertise, professional involvement, service to the college, professional development and renewal activities and then judged by a national committee. Professor Azzolino was the Mid-Atlantic Region Awardee. This region includes Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia.

Agnes is President of Mathematical Concepts, inc., a consulting firm and publishing house. She is the author of Math Games for Adult and Child a book of language-based math games for 2 through 7-year-olds, Math Spoken Here! an arithmetic and algebra dictionary, and Exploring Functions Through the Use of Manipulatives. She lives with her son Michael Vinik in Keyport, NJ.

      Susan McLoughlin, MATYCNJ President, presented the Outstanding Service Award to Agnes Azzolino, saying, "Our first recipiant is always willing to step up to the plate and do what is needed. She has been a presenter at our meetings and she is our unofficial photographer. She has been on the executive board and has opened up her home to executive board meetings. She was President-Elect, President, Past-President twice, from '85-'88 and again from '94-'97. It is with great pleasure, that I present the Outstanding Service Award to Aggie Azzolino."

© 2008, Agnes Azzolino www.mathnstuff.com/papers/prof/educ927.htm