Rural Community College Alliance Honors UA Education Professor

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Dr. Stephen Katsinas, director of the Education Policy Center and professor of higher education at The University of Alabama, recently received the George Autry Award from the Rural Community College Alliance for his lifelong commitment to scholarly research, advocacy and service to America’s rural community colleges.

During his 20-year career in higher education, Katsinas’ research and service have focused on the challenges faced by rural community colleges and the ways in which policymakers and practitioners can lift up the lives of rural people and create sustainable rural communities through the improvement of these institutions.

“It is seldom that someone so young receives a ‘lifetime’ achievement award. Dr. Katsinas has brought much deserved recognition on himself, but at the same time has brought recognition to our College and University,” said Dr. Jim McLean, dean of the UA College of Education.

This year, Katsinas’ 10-year work on developing a typology of U.S. community colleges similar to that of four-year institutions led to a publication by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

Katsinas has authored, co-authored and edited more than 50 articles, policy briefs, book chapters and monographs, and he’s made nearly 150 refereed and invited presentations and speeches to a variety of audiences.

In the spring of 2006, he was invited to write the chapter on rural community colleges with his Education Policy Center colleague David Hardy for the 2007 update of the U.S. Department of Education’s “The Condition of Education in Rural America,” last released in 1994.