Eight professors and staff members at Farmingdale State College have been honored by SUNY with its Chancellor’s Award for Excellence. Two adjunct professors were honored earlier this year.

The Chancellor’s Award is conferred to acknowledge and provide recognition for consistently superior professional achievement and to encourage the ongoing pursuit of excellence.  Through these awards, SUNY publicly proclaims its pride in the accomplishment and personal dedication of its instructional faculty, librarians and professional staff across its campuses.

The awards provide SUNY-wide recognition in five categories: Faculty Service, Librarianship, Professional Service, Scholarship and Creative Activities, and Teaching.

The winners include:

 

  • Dr. Robert A. Saunders, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities. A member of the Department of History, Politics and Geography, Dr. Saunders joined Farmingdale in 2006.  His teaching philosophy includes four areas which he believes are vital to student growth: intensive writing assignments; personalization of politics; utilizing instructional technologies; and use of the Socratic Method. He has authored four books, including one on actor Sacha Baron Cohen, and his movie character “Borat.”

 

  • Dr. Matilde M. Fava, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Faculty Service. Dr. Fava is a 28-year member of the Department of Modern Languages, where she specializes in Italian, Italian Culture and Italian Cinema. In addition to being a two-time Chancellor’s Award winner, she is also a recipient of the Ambasciatori Awards/Outstanding Italian-American Leader.  She serves on the boards of the Italian Hospital Society and the Italian-American Committee on Education.

 

  • Dr. Kathleen Walsh, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. Dr. Walsh joined the Nursing faculty in 2001. Her other awards include the Farmingdale Foundation/Theresa Santmann Nursing Faculty Development Award. She is a licensed Registered Nurse in New York State, and a National League for Nursing Certified Nurse Educator. 
  • Professor George Fernandez, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. Professor Fernandez has been teaching art and graphic design since 2006. A member of the Society of Illustrators and former director of Farmingdale’s Memorial Gallery, he has shown his work at more than 15 exhibitions in New York and New Jersey. He is a past winner of the Farmingdale Foundation Award for Excellence in Teaching.

 

  • Daniel T. Arcieri, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Professional Service.  Arcieri is both an adjunct associate professor and lab manager in the Department of Biology.  He is also an award-winning playwright whose one-act plays have been performed across the U.S. and internationally.

 

  • Carol McNamara, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Professional Service.  McNamara is clinic manager in the Department of Dental Hygiene. In addition to her SUNY award, she also owns the Farmingdale Foundation Award for Excellence in Professional Service. She is a registered dental hygienist and holds memberships in the American, New York and Long Island Dental Hygienists’ Associations. 

 

  • Theresa Zahor, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Librarianship.  Zahor is an Associate Librarian in Farmingdale’s Thomas D. Greenley Library. She won the college’s CARES Award in 2011, and is a member of four professional societies: the Long Island Library Resources Council; State University of New York Librarians Association; American Libraries Association; and New York Library Association.

 

  • Vanda Bordies, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Classified Service.  Bordies has held the position of Secretary in the Department of Urban Horticulture & Design for the last eight years.  Dr. Jonathan Lehrer, chair of the department, says of her: “Vanda is the face of the department and our best ambassador.  She is a caring mother to many of our students, always ready to listen to their daily travails.”