Teaching Mentors

Postdoctoral Fellows in the Minnesota IRACDA program teach at North Hennepin Community College and Normandale Community College. These colleges are located within the greater Twin Cities metro area and serve a diverse population of students that includes many under-represented minorities within the STEM fields.

Normandale Community College highlights:

In Fall 2021 Normandale completed a $750,000 renovation of our microbiology teaching lab.

Normandale was designated as a Hunger Free Campus by LeadMN in May 2020. A Hunger Free Campus is a Minnesota State community and/or technical college that is actively taking strides to reduce food insecurity amongst students.   LeadMN, an organization that represents the 180,000 two-year college students to help transform their lives and communities.  

Normandale Community College History Instructor Jack Norton received the Dale P. Parnell Faculty Distinction Recognition from the American Association of Community Colleges.  Norton was one of 58 instructors from 24 different states to receive the award. He was also one of two instructors in Minnesota and one of three history instructors to claim the honors.

Normandale Community College dental hygiene instructor Stephanie Zarse was one of seven recipients of the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) Board of Trustees Educators of the Year awards.

Four Normandale Community College students were named semifinalists for the prestigious Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship. The scholarship supports high-achieving community college students as they transfer to some of the top four-year institutions in the country to complete their bachelor's degrees.  The Normandale students selected as semifinalists were Hiep Chau, Dang Do, Han Do and Insia Kizilbash. Normandale students represented four of the five semifinalist selections from two-year colleges in the State of Minnesota. Normandale was also one of only 27 two-year colleges in the nation to have four or more students selected as semifinalists.

Normandale students from the Politics and Law Club participated in the College/University American Model United Nations conference held at the Grand Sheraton in Chicago, Ill. from November 20-23, 2021.  Erin Keefe, Andrew Larson, Alex Teigland and Seth Koepke (now at Metro State) represented the Bahamas on the General Assembly committees, the Human Rights Council, and the United Nations Environment Assembly.  

The first cohort of students in Black Men in Teaching program started in Fall 2021 with more 4 students and 6 more joining the program in Spring 2022.

Normandale is currently the only associates of applied science program in Vacuum and Thin Film Technology in the nation.

Recent grants (2021):

• Expanding Exposure to Career Pathways in Anthropology & Archaeology, David B Jones Foundation, $125,000
• Opening Opportunities for Teacher Education, US Department of Education
• Diversifying the Special Education Teacher Corps through Accessible Pathways, Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies, $1,500,000