Please join us in congratulating this year’s
winners of the Distinguished Teaching Prize!
March, 31st, 2022
Gregory Donaldson, Associate Professor,
Communications and Theater Arts Department
Greg Donaldson is a writer, actor and teacher and has taught in the Communications and Theater Arts department for many years. His students consistently praise his teaching and mentoring that engages them both inside and outside of the classroom, in-person and online. A previous winner of the Distinguished Teaching Prize in 2014, Associate Professor Donaldson impressed the award reviewers with his attentive and innovative transformation of classroom strategies from physical to virtual presence and with his dedication to consistently student-centered and empowered learning.
Donaldson has written for several newspapers including The New York Times and Newsday. His first book The Ville: Cops and Kids in Urban America (Houghton –Mifflin, 1993) was published by Fordham University Press (2015). His second book, Zebratown (Simon and Schuster, 2010), chronicles the attempt of a violent felon to reinvent himself after his release from prison. Donaldson has taught at every level from elementary school in Brooklyn to high school equivalency at the Brooklyn House of Detention and police training for the U.S. State Department in Budapest, Hungary. A teacher in the City University system for thirty years, Donaldson was awarded the Scholar on Campus award at New York City College of Technology in 1997 and the Distinguished Teaching Award at John Jay College in 2104. In 2017-18, he partnered with the TLC as a Faculty Fellow to co-teach a seminar on “Practical Teaching.” He is currently heading "Brownsville Think Tank", a project which provides college level instruction in public speaking to high school students in Brooklyn.
Click on these links to hear, read, and learn more about Greg’s approaches to teaching and learning:
- https://anchor.fm/teaching-and-learning-center/episodes/John-Jay-Distinguished-Teaching-Prize---Interview-with-Gregory-Donaldson-ecf32q
- https://johnjaysentinel.com/11874/campus-news/professor-donaldson-and-his-mission-at-john-jay/
A new production of the post - Paris version of Extreme Whether,
Directed by Karen Malpede.
March 1-18, 2018 – was presented in LaMama
“Extreme Whether gives great insight into the reality of climate scientists. It shows the struggles of an activist who is fighting for the betterment of the human race through protection of the Earth, all the while dealing with personal family issues…"
Starring:
Rocco Sisto, Clea Straus Rivera, Khris Lewin, Dee Pelletier, Emma Rose Kraus and George Bartenieff
Extreme Whether is the story of a family divided over climate change. Premiered at Theater for the New City in New York, in 2014, it has been seen in Paris in 2015, as part of ARTCOP21, during the historic UN Cop21 which produced the international Climate Accord; it has been staged in Copenhagen, Tennessee and Oklahoma by student and amateur groups.
Written and directed by Karen Malpede, Set Design by Gian Marco Lo Franco, Lighting by Tony Giovannetti, Costumes by Carisa Kelly and Sally Ann Parsons, Music by Arthur Rosen.
The Beekeeper’s Daughter
by Karen Malpede
Theater for the New City and Theater Three Collaborative
June 20 - June 26, 2016
Photo by: Beatrice Schiller
The Beekeeper’s Daughter, set on an idyllic island in the Adriatic during the Bosnian wars of the former Yugoslavia. A young, pregnant Muslim woman is befriended by a disparate American family and reveals the horrors of one of the most brutal and cruel wars on European soil. It not only tells her heart-rending tragic story but contrasts attitudes to sex from the free-love attitude of the post-hippy West to forced sex i.e. rape, being used as a weapon in modern warfare.
Karen Malpede, Theater Three Collaborative:
I am pleased to share with you a wonderful review of "Blue Valiant" which is still available on YouTube
2016
Subpoetics International
At the
Lesia Ukrainka Dramatic Theatre in L’viv
Port d’Alger 1962
An allegory about children, joy, and war
- January 25, 26, 26, 27, 28 -19:00 at Lesia Ukrainka Dramatic Theatre in L’viv
Director, Seth Baumrin (USA) – Creators - Madeleine Bongard (Switzerland), Alireza Daryanavard (Iran), Guilluame Harry Francoise (France), Eva Goldenberg (France), Fatma Guetary (Tunisia), Anne Mourier (France), Cassagnol Leonides Jr. (USA), Vernice Miller (Jamaica), Sylvain Paolini (France), and Anne Wiederhold (Austria)
Videography – Fesih Alpagu (Austria); Graphics – David Matthews (India).
Dramaturgy: Margit Edwards (USA), Roxane Revon (France), and Neja Tomšič (Slovenia),
AND
Gershom: Stranger in a Strange Land -- Director, Seth Baumrin - workshop performance of new work by students of Oleh Stefan - An allegory about global migration - January 30 - 13:00 at Lesia Ukrainka Dramatic Theatre in L’viv
(followed by a discussion with the Students)
Creators – Bohdan Hrytsiuk, Mariya Kmit, Valeriya Kotelenets, Olha Kovalchuk, Anastasiya Lisovska, Oleksandr Mishchuk, Dmytro Naumets, Anastasiya Perets, Andriy Petruk, Yurii Sulyk, Marko Svizhinskyi, Vasyl Sydorko, Vira Tsihatska, and Vita Yanchuk
Lv’iv Videography Bohdan Koshyk (Ukraine)
Project Manager – Sofiya Harbuziak L’viv coordinators – Olga Chystoklietova and Uli Ray
2015
On Thursday, April 23, 2015, two members of the Department of Communications & Theatre Arts received college-wide recognition at the Faculty Recognition Awards Ceremony. Professor Elton Beckett received the Distinguished Service to Students Award presented by Lynette Cook-Francis, Vice President for Student Affairs. Professor Lorraine Moller received the Scholarly Excellence Award presented by Anthony Carpi, Associate Provost and Dean of Research.
2013
polip festival – one of the Top Ten Summer Events In Europe !
The Chair of Communication and Theatre Arts Department Seth Baumrin in Kosovo, Europe http://polipfestival.wordpress.com/news/
Professor Seth Baumrin at the polip International Literature Festival in Prishtina, Kosovo, May, 2013 http://www.flickr.com/photos/95747199@N06/.
Seth Baumrin on Polish TV
Video Interview
