Sarah Dammeyer Awarded Provost's Excellence Award for Professional Track Faculty

Embodying exemplary leadership, strategic thinking and passion for inclusive excellence, Senior Lecturer Sarah Dammeyer is a relentless advocate for fellow professional-track faculty, her own students and those across the university.

Dammeyer earned two bachelor’s degrees and an M.A. in English language and literature at UMD, where she has taught in the department’s Academic and Professional Writing Program since 2009. Her courses span technical writing, science communication, narrative nonfiction, writing pedagogy and literature; colleagues call her a gifted instructor. 

For the last three years, Dammeyer was the Professional Writing Program’s (PWP) faculty fellow, supporting its 90 professional-track teaching instructors through mentoring, designing professional development experiences and encouraging them in their curriculum development projects. 

“She has taken on this work with deep empathy and care for the faculty she serves, and in everything she does, she aims to enhance PTK faculty’s sense of dignity and respect,” says the program’s director, Associate Professor Scott Wible.

After the pandemic, Dammeyer created pre-semester events for PWP faculty that helped them to reconnect with colleagues in fun and invigorating ways, and she offered opportunities for PWP faculty to deliver workshops to each other. Moreover, she organized an event last year in College Park for writing program administrators from across the DMV, with a bonus meetup four months later to share updates and to develop projects together. 

Most recently, Dammeyer collaborated with Kisa Lape and Daune O'Brien in the PWP and College of Education to garner a $50,000 TLTC Grant to launch the Disability Resource and Technology Hub for Writing Instructors. The hub offers activities and mentoring to reduce barriers for students with disabilities, while providing instructors with tools to lead anti-ableist classrooms. 

As further evidence of her commitment to champion policies and initiatives that support UMD’s mission, she served for years on the University Senate’s Executive Committee, balancing a range of voices and synthesizing diverse perspectives into actionable recommendations. She is now chair of the full Senate. 

“Sarah’s leadership has strengthened our institution,” says Senate Director Veronica Marin, “setting a standard for excellence in service that inspires her colleagues and benefits the university as a whole.”