2022 Outstanding Educator Award – Jennifer Elliott

Jennifer runs the Learning by Leading program (created by UC Davis) out of the UCF Arboretum which fosters over 50 interns and paid co-coordinator positions. The co-coordinators learn leadership skills and project management while managing the unpaid interns. The unpaid interns learn from the co-coordinators and Arboretum staff about different subjects (each pair of co-coordinators runs a group of 4-8 interns in different groups). The groups include subjects such as pollinators, greenhouse management, volunteer management, urban horticulture, stormwater management, and natural resources. This program not only teaches students about real world experience in natural resource related topics, but also provides students with a community structure within UCF. She also teaches an Urban Ecological Field methods course at UCF in the Spring semester where undergraduate students carry out a semester long study or experiment and present their findings at the UCF Undergraduate Research Showcase and the FLTWS Spring meeting. Students in the course gain knowledge on the importance of communicating science and the methods to do so. Science doesn't matter if people don't know about it, and that is the message of the class.

In addition to fostering learning for UCF students, Jennifer is dedicated to helping a younger audience through the Biology Summer Field Institute which is held each summer for rising junior and senior high school students. This program was created by Jennifer in 2015 and is hosted through UCF’s STEM program. High schoolers apply to get into the program, and 20 students are accepted for the week-long intensive biology program where they get to learn about Florida’s ecosystems, prescribed fire, sea turtle research, and different careers that are available in the biology world. This program

has steered so many young people into the field of biology and opened opportunities for them that they didn’t know existed. Jen’s enthusiasm for biology and teaching is the best part of this program, and any student that attends will back me up on that.

Jennifer has a passion for teaching and learning! She is an amazing mentor and program director. Her enthusiasm and passion for the program she runs is contagious in the best way. The UCF Arboretum has really taken off since she took over the program and continues to grow each year, even throughout the pandemic.