Dr. Melissa Kenny Awarded 2025 Teaching Professionals Award for Excellence in Teaching
By Erin Marlow, Communications Specialist in the Office of the Dean of the College
The 2025 winner of the Teaching Professionals Award for Excellence in Teaching goes to Dr. Melissa Kenny.
Since arriving at Wake Forest in July 2019 as Assistant Teaching Professor and a founding faculty member in the Department of Engineering, Dr. Kenny has made contributions that are foundational to the success of the department.
A dedicated educator, mentor, and leader, Dr. Kenny has taken on a range of responsibilities within the department, from curriculum development to student advising. She has been instrumental in shaping five engineering courses as well as coaching multiple capstone design experiences, including the “Appendiceal Cancer Detection Algorithm” that brought together clinicians, computer scientists, and engineers. Her leadership has led to successful student-centered pedagogies that foster innovative thinking and student engagement.
Dr. Kenny is also credited with restructuring the first-year Engineering courses. Now centered on design and experimentation, they offer students an invaluable foundation for classes they will take later in the major. She also led the curricular efforts to position EGR 111 as the department’s first-ever divisional course and developed the inaugural MATLAB module, used to help first-year students appreciate coding as an effective engineering tool.
Dr. Kenny connects her engineering work and teaching to broader conversations across campus, specifically related to virtues and character. In one of her elective courses, Dr. Kenny assigns a “Found Object Exploration” project that encourages students’ curiosity and highlights it as a virtue necessary to make morally responsible design decisions. Her work is vital in infusing virtue and character education across the curriculum.
Beyond the classroom, she is a dedicated mentor, advising over 100 students each semester, is the faculty advisor for the WFU chapter of the Society of Women Engineers, and pioneered the creation of the Engineering Learning and Support Center. Dr. Kenny has also played a critical role in our ABET accreditation efforts, taking the lead with mapping course outcomes and supporting continuous improvement.
Dr. Kenny’s infectious enthusiasm and devotion to her students and the Engineering department represent the highest ideals of our Teacher-Scholars, and it is a pleasure to announce she was just promoted to Associate Teaching Professional starting in July.
For all of these reasons and more, the Dean and the faculty congratulate Dr. Melissa Kenny as this year’s recipient of the Teaching Professionals Award.
