Dorian Canelas

University Duke University · 2025 Award Details from Duke's Office of Undergraduate Education: "This award illuminates and celebrates teaching excellence at Duke—in and outside of the classroom. The award winners will be thought leaders in the field who have a substantial track record of profoundly and positively affecting student learning and lives. " More about this award

Marcus Hobbs Award

Scholarly Society North Carolina Section of the American Chemical Society · 2020 From the NC ACS website: "The Marcus E. Hobbs Award was established in 1988 to recognize members who have made significant, long-term contributions to the North Carolina Section of the American Chemical Society. The award was named for Marcus E. Hobbs, a model member who worked closely with the North Carolina Section since becoming Chair in 1945. Dr. Hobbs was a professor emeritus of chemistry and University Distinguished Service Professor at Duke University and Distinguished Governor Emeritus of RTI International; he was also instrumental in the creation of the Research Triangle Park." More about this award

David and Janet Vaughan Brooks Award – Excellence in undergraduate teaching

University Trinity College of Arts and Sciences · 2017 DORIAN CANELAS Department of Chemistry, David and Janet Vaughan Brooks Award Dorian Canelas Students generally struggle in introductory chemistry courses, and many fall by the wayside. Dorian Canelas, instructor for the “Introduction to Chemistry and Chemical Problem Solving” class, has changed the standard narrative of what an introductory chem class is supposed to be, department chair Stephen Craig said. “The students are very bright and highly motivated students who come from a high school background in which they have not been challenged to develop the type of problem-solving skills required to succeed in the sciences at Duke, and/or did not have an adequate chemistry background to compete with their peers,” Craig said. “Dori has implemented a course design that has proven to be very successful and appreciated by her students, and as a result she has fundamentally changed the persistence and success landscape for close to 100 students a year.” The course has been so successful that Canelas, an assistant professor of the practice, has turned it into a popular Massive Open Online Course – or MOOC - on Coursera, the online education platform that Duke partners with. Craig said this work has made her a national expert and a mentor to other Duke faculty interested in advice on MOOCs, flipped classrooms and technology in the classroom. And students love her, Craig said. To emphasize the point, he repeated it three times in his nomination letter. “Even while being rigorous about pedagogy and continually pushing the envelope, her course evaluations are consistently high, and we see in enrollments that students have pegged her sections as among our most desirable options when multiple sections of a given course are offered,” he said. More about this award

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