Mediated Learning Newsletter

Vol. 5, Issue 4: February 2006, page 2

Jakki Mohr: CASE Professor of the Year

Johnny Lott
Center for Teaching Excellence

Jakki Mohr

Having graduate school as an ace in the hole and having tragedy lead to opportunity eventually resulted in Dr. Jakki Mohr being named as the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) Professor of the Year at The University of Montana.

How Dr. Mohr began the rise to this pinnacle of academic success rests on three factors: (1) having Dr. Doug Lincoln of Boise State University as a marketing professor and mentor for undergraduate studies, (2) completing an undergraduate degree as an outstanding scholar coupled with the lack of challenging job opportunities, and (3) working in Silicon Valley in corporate America.

Jakki describes Lincoln’s classes as demanding, rigorous, and challenging to the point of frustration, yet she describes him as a mentor who made her think about what she wanted to do. Clearly, Lincoln became a role model for her future classes because those tenets were described in the same terms by both her and her students. Janna O’Connell, former student writes, “Dr. Mohr is known as a professor who works hard to motivate and encourage student learning but in return holds particularly high expectations.”

Out of undergraduate school, Jakki pursued an occupation in the business world, but with the 1982 recession, positions were not readily available. As a result, she returned to Colorado State University to pursue a master’s degree. While Jakki was a graduate assistant in Colorado, her advisor died unexpectedly and she was asked to
teach his classes. Out of this tragedy came an incredible learning experience. She was thrust into academia in a different role than previously expected. She enjoyed the experience but still was set on becoming a role model for women in Corporate America with Hewlett-Packard.

Dr. Mohr describes this position as one, not of the best pay but, loaded with potential. However in a very short time, it became clear to her that though she had the opportunity to spread her wings, this was still not what she wanted for a future. Again
returning to graduate school, this time for a doctorate at the University of Wisconsin, she began academics and teaching in earnest. This time she describes her teaching experiences as very rocky but again had a great mentor in Dr. Mike Rothschild, an advertising professor, who helped smooth her teaching path.

Dr. Mohr had a circuitous trail to the university. Along the way, she found that the west offered her a place where she could be a “real person,” where she could work but not compartmentalize her life into school/home, where her children could be a focus, and where teaching could be a dual focal point with them without one being
slighted under the other. This approach to being a holistic person is an integral part of what makes Dr. Mohr the outstanding professor that she is.

Mario Schulzke, manager of Business Development for a Los Angeles firm and former student, describes the holistic approach of Dr. Mohr when he discusses how she “constantly brought the Missoula and University community into the classroom.” In the same vein, O’Connell describes the “experiential learning, from building
web pages and researching new technology to actually working in groups with local businesses.” Jakki wanted to give students formative lessons and teach them about choices, not just about content and knowledge, but finding one’s own integrity in the process.

She describes herself and her students as multidimensional people. She works to help them as she helps herself learn how to juggle options, how to weight tradeoffs, and how to be professional as the juggling is done. One might say that she is driven to be the best and to expect the best from the students. Expecting the best is not the same as being rigid in the process. O’Connell mentions grading as one place where expectations were high but not rigid. She describes Mohr’s reading of exams at least twice to make sure that she had a strong understanding of the variation in responses and thus being able to assign grades fairly. Additionally, she describes Mohr’s allowing students to justify answers to multiple-choice questions as a part of the exam.

Mohr modestly says that her job is to engage students whether it is in class discussions, in the comparison of advertisements in marketing, or having them demonstrate shaving products in class. The continual goal of her class is having students reason, but reason with facts and knowledge. She describes one class where students announced, “We want to do a good job, but you need to decide what you want us to do a good job on.” Jakki describes this class as one concerned with quality, not an unwillingness to work. This class presented a compelling argument for changes in her teaching which she accepted and modified as a result.

Mohr provides students a safe environment for learning. She does this by using small group work from the start of a class. She mentions that the first three days of a class are the most important for setting the tone both for the class and the instructor. This is the time that the safety zone in class must be established.

With a safety zone in place, one of the strategies for teaching for her is the use of props. In her particular classes in marketing, packaging is the content vehicle for props and lessons. Demanding and genuine with a hint of fun are other features of these classes as the semester develops. Developing her teaching style that began with a tragedy and led to opportunity caused Mohr to think long about what other new faculty members might need to consider as they begin a career. She recommends (1) prioritizing what you want students to know and letting the students know what those priorities are, (2) being honest about your decisions that affect students, and (3) making sure that you enjoy what you are doing so that the students recognize that enjoyment.

Just as companies use the power of advertising, one gets the impression that Mohr is marketing both the content of her classes and the method of delivery to students. It is clear that her ideas of teaching hold promise for others on campus.