Mark Huber, a senior lecturer in the Terry College of Business, received the 2022 Lee Anne Seawell Faculty Recognition Award from the University of Georgia’s Career Center.
The recipients of this honor are identified via feedback from the annual Career Outcomes Survey, administered by UGA’s Career Center. This year’s survey gave members of the Class of 2021 the opportunity to identify a faculty or staff member who had a positive influence on their career development. The nomination of 1,213 faculty members indicates the tremendous commitment of UGA faculty to students’ professional development.
Huber received his doctoral degree in Management Information Systems (MIS) from UGA in 1998. The following year, he became a senior lecturer with Terry’s Department of MIS. He currently serves as the vice chair of UGA’s Teaching Academy’s executive committee and co-directs the early career faculty mentoring program.
According to Huber, the key to his teaching style involves connecting with his students and helping them grow both inside and outside the classroom.
“My primary job is to teach, but it’s the way I interact with students that helps me connect with them. They grow to trust me enough to come to me to ask about their careers and things like that,” Huber said. “Creating trust with the students starts in the classroom.”
During the pandemic, as UGA transitioned into hybrid learning, Huber continued to teach synchronously. He set up 30-minute, one-on-one sessions with each of his students to get to know them and give them any advice they may have needed.
With a LinkedIn profile that has more than 3,000 connections, Huber also encourages his students to join his network and use his name to connect with other UGA MIS alumni. He prides himself on helping all his students, even if they later decide not to follow the MIS pathway.
“If a student comes up and says, ‘My four-year MIS degree is great, but I’ve decided I love animals, and I want to go to vet school’,” he said. “I might say to them, ‘Well, I don’t know enough about vet school to help you, but I can connect you to someone who does.’ So, I also act as a hub for networking.”
Huber believes that building connections allows students to find success in their education and careers as well as in life. He attributes much of his success with his students and their careers to the companies that are willing to hire UGA graduates and the alumni from those companies who commit to helping their fellow Bulldogs.
This is Huber’s second year winning the Seawell Award. He first won it in 2019 and, while pleased to receive the award again, he is most grateful to see that his methods of teaching and advising still resonate with students.
“Mark Huber is the very first two-time recipient of this award,” said Scott Williams, the executive director at UGA’s Career Center. “His commitment to students’ career success is evidenced by a record-high 35 students naming him as a faculty member who actively contributed to their career development and success. Mark’s not only an outstanding teacher, but he complements his instruction by serving as a student career advocate outside the classroom.”
This award was endowed by the late Lee Anne Seawell. She joined UGA in 1947 as one of the university’s first female administrators, and she worked in career services and student financial aid until her retirement in 1987. The award has been presented annually since 2017.
“I’m honored, but I don’t do it to win the award,” said Huber. “I’m just happy to reach students that felt I helped them get to the next step.”
For more information on the Class of 2021, visit career.uga.edu/outcomes.
To learn about hiring UGA graduates, visit career.uga.edu/hireuga.
