The Duke Alumni Association has given its 2019 Alumni Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching Award to Leonard White, PhD, associate professor of psychology, neuroscience, and neurology. These university-wide awards showcase members of the Duke family who show extraordinary effort and dedication to Duke. His Alumni Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching Award, was presented at Duke's annual Founders’ Day convocation.
White, who teaches the undergraduate course Medical Neuroscience to Duke students and to online students throughout the world, is no stranger to teaching awards, having recently received Duke's Golden Apple teaching award. Coursera has repeatedly named his neuroscience course "one of the best online courses of all time."
"Dr. White goes above and beyond his duties as a lecturer," wrote one of White's students. "I truly believe he spends as much time preparing for his rigorous class sessions every week as his students, and he possesses a wealth of neuroscientific knowledge that is unmatched by that of anyone else I have ever met."
Another wrote, “Dr. White changed the way I think about the brain and about my own humanity…He absolutely promotes intellectual curiosity through his own love of the human brain, and his class inspired me to do all I can to delve deeper into learning about the organ that makes us who we are.”