Graduate Teaching Assistants play an important role in the department. Every year since 2011, we have recognized GTA excellence via the Statistics Department's Graduate Teaching Award.
David Kepplinger is this year’s recipient of the award. David has been, and continues to be, an important part of the Department’s teaching mission. He has served for two years in the training of Department Teaching Assistants and has furthered training in modern methods in statistics through his teaching assistant work in STAT 406 and his R programming workshop leadership in the Department’s partnership with the UBC CREATE program, ECOSCOPE. In addition, he has contributed to hands-on training through his mentorship of co-op students. In everything he does, David shows not only a high level of expertise in statistics and computing but also a reflectiveness and spirit of personal growth, coupled with a supportive and community-building approach.
This year, like every year, the Adjudication Committee was impressed by David and ALL of the GTAs nominated for the award. The choice was not easy. The department is fortunate to have many dedicated and excellent students involved in our teaching mission.
The financial component of this award is supported by the donor-funded Statistics Fund for Excellence (https://support.ubc.ca/projects/statistics-fund-excellence/).
To see a list of previous award winners, visit here: https://www.stat.ubc.ca/statistics-graduate-teaching-assistant-award.