
Longtime UW-Green Bay faculty member Denise
Scheberle recently earned a nationwide teaching
award from the American Political Science
Association.
It’s a remarkable honor -- perhaps even
more so because Scheberle didn’t set out
to become a teacher at all.
Denise Scheberle:
“I had had another career, and was teaching
just one class at a community college.
And I had a student come up to me and she
handed me a letter.
Then she said to me, ‘you know, you’ve
given me faith in myself.
And you ought to make your avocation your
vocation, and become a teacher.’
And the more I thought about that, you know,
the more I realized that she was right -- that
for me teaching would be my life’s work.”
That life’s work has included more than
two decades at UW-Green Bay, in Public and
Environmental Affairs.
It’s brought with it the 2012 National Teacher
of the Year accolade -- the inaugural honor
-- from the American Political Science Association.
It’s featured two UW-Green Bay Founders
Association awards and a UW System teacher
of the year honor.
But perhaps above all, Scheberle says, it’s
introduced her to some incredible people.
Scheberle:
“I think, over the course of 20 years, I
mean, we’ve always had wonderful faculty
-- I’d put our faculty up against any on
any campus.
It’s been just a treasure for me to get
to know my colleagues -- and also our students,
and I think they’re amazing.
We have a new building; we have some renovation,
but the people have stayed just really sort
of down-to-earth -- thoughtful, caring faculty
and staff and students.
So it’s a nice place to be.”
Scheberle stepped back from full-time classroom
teaching in 2011, and now teaches a limited
number of online courses for UW-Green Bay.
It’s a teaching method she never anticipated
20 years ago, but Scheberle says she still
finds ways to connect -- even without the
face-to-face interaction.
The format may be different, but her passion
has remained the same.
Scheberle:
“As we look back on the last two decades,
in many senses we have made progress -- you
know, our water’s cleaner, our air is cleaner,
we’re doing better with managing hazardous
waste.
But we still have a long ways to go -- we
have to keep pushing at it.
So I hope that people get involved and stay
in tuned and do what they can to protect the
environment.”
