Dedication to students earns Wu endowed professorship for teaching excellence
R.H. Cintron University Professorship recognizes commitment to classroom advancements, improvements
Ben Wu, Ph.D., has been named the Texas A&M College of Agriculture and Life Sciences R.H. Cintron University Professor for Teaching Excellence, a distinction that highlights sustained, meaningful contributions to teaching.
Unlike most endowed chairs and professorships, which focus primarily on research, the College’s three-year Cintron Professorship recognizes faculty who not only excel in their own classrooms but also contribute to improving teaching more broadly across the university and their field.
Wu is a professor in the Department of Ecology and Conservation Biology and a Presidential Professor for Teaching Excellence at Texas A&M University.
He has built a career that bridges research and education. A landscape ecologist by training, he has spent decades studying spatial ecology while teaching one of the university’s largest introductory ecology courses to hundreds of students, teaching graduate-level courses and helping launch new online offerings.
“This is a land-grant university, and we are both researchers and educators,” Wu said. “Teaching is central to how we serve and advance the public good.”
A commitment to teaching and to teachers
Wu joined the department in 1995. Early in his career, he attended an intensive, weeklong conference on college teaching that shifted his perspective. What began as a desire to improve his classroom performance turned into a deeper commitment to teaching as a central part of his professional identity.
He works closely with colleagues to explore evidence-based teaching strategies designed to improve student engagement and learning, especially in large enrollment courses.
He also served as associate dean of faculties, director of the university’s Center for Teaching Excellence and later as associate dean for faculty affairs within the College, roles that expanded his focus beyond his own classroom to faculty development and institutional support for teaching.
One emerging focus is the role of artificial intelligence in higher education. Wu has begun experimenting with AI-related approaches in his classes and plans to expand that work, helping colleagues think through both opportunities and challenges.
Wu said his teaching philosophy centers on continuously refining his own practices, mentoring and supporting faculty colleagues, and contributing to education efforts within national professional societies such as the Ecological Society of America and the Society for Range Management.
As he looks ahead to the next three years of the professorship, he said he sees the award not as a capstone, but as an opportunity.
“There’s always more to learn,” Wu said. “And there’s always more we can do to help our students succeed.”
