May 4, 2021

Congratulations to Nikolaus Dean and Kieran Forde on their 2020-21 Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Awards

As one of six Killam institutions, UBC offers yearly awards from the Killam Endowment Fund to faculty and teaching assistants who demonstrate excellence in teaching.

In recognition of the valuable role that teaching assistants play in our programs, UBC annually honours 16 graduate teaching assistants with the Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award, honouring candidates who meet criteria that demonstrate a high level of respect for the candidates from undergraduate students and supervisors. The UBC Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award adjudication takes place within faculties.

Nikolaus Dean is a teaching assistant and a SSHRC-funded, PhD student in the School of Kinesiology in the UBC Faculty of Education. Using qualitative methodologies and critical social theory, his research explores areas related to youth (sub)cultures, risk, pain, injury, and disability in action sports. His current doctoral research explores the emerging action sport of adaptive skateboarding and skaters with disabilities’ experiences within skateboarding’s larger (sub)culture.

Kieran Forde is a teaching assistant for the technology education cohort of the BEd program. He is also a PhD student in the Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy in the UBC Faculty of Education, and a facilitator for the Instructional Skills Workshop in the Centre for Teaching, Learning and Technology. In 2019, he completed a UBC MEd in media and technology studies education and continued his research in the area of teacher professionalism and its conflicts with online reputation and the permanence of digital memory. Before moving to Canada, he completed a BA at the National University of Ireland and a MA from the University of Limerick, and worked in China for over a decade where he delivered courses for Lambton College (Ontario), Memorial University (Newfoundland), and Northwood University (Michigan). During this time, he also worked on language assessment projects with the British Council in China and, later, in Nepal and India.

To learn more about the Killam Graduate Teaching Assistant Awards, visit the Office of the Provost and Vice-President Academic’s Teaching Awards page.