Visiting an ed leadership student while he was teaching on his campus to bring him a UTT shirt.
Celebrating these future school leaders!
Celebrating a successful dissertation defense for Dr. Trevor McCray! He had 125+ in the audience!
So honored to receive the 2025 White Fellowship for Excellence in Teaching Award.
Graduation day is my favorite! It's exciting to see our students in person instead of virtually.
Visiting an ed leadership student while he was teaching on his campus to bring him a UTT shirt.
Celebrating these future school leaders!
Celebrating a successful dissertation defense for Dr. Trevor McCray! He had 125+ in the audience!
So honored to receive the 2025 White Fellowship for Excellence in Teaching Award.
Graduation day is my favorite! It's exciting to see our students in person instead of virtually.
If you are an educator, then you may nod your head in agreement when I say that it is so hard for us to brag on ourselves! I am incredibly honored to do what I do, and I feel even more privileged to give back to the community that prepared me to be an educator. Below are some sample, anonymous student comments from my summative course evaluations. To my students, thank you for your kind words; you encourage me to bring my best every day!
- Dr. Watters is my favorite professor. She knows how to approach our learning in such a way that we are reflective on the learning and all of the information that she teaches is useful to our future in the field. One of the main parts of her teaching strategy is to use techniques for our product submissions that we can in turn use when we work as an instructional coach/IC. Because she has experience in the classroom as a teacher, IC, and principal, she understands and presents valuable strategies that are meaningful. She does not do the same boring discussion boards for submissions and quizzes every week. She spends time making videos for our weekly overview as well as writes detailed to-do lists for us. I have been in the classroom for 30 years so for me to go back to school at this point, I hoped that my courses were worth my time and my money. Her courses all meet my expectations and make me thankful that I have gone back to school. I cannot say the same about all of my courses. She is amazing! Please use her to train all of the professors in our field!!!
- I have learned more from Dr. Watters than all of the other classes combined that I have taken for my masters program. Excellent courses and teacher. She really understands how people think and allows her students to develop new ways of thinking while still being able to use their own.
- Dr. Watters’ course reflects her instruction. She enhanced our professional learning based on adult learning theories which made modules engaging. By providing us time to read and reflect on information gleaned from readings, I was able to grasp, retain, and apply my new knowledge to practice. I look forward to my final two courses with her and wish she were able to teach them all. I have grown so much from her, and she is the reason I continue in this program.
- I know this is an area for where to "improve", but I want to shout out Dr. Watters. Her class is absolutely amazing and one of the best laid out classes I have taken in my life. While the course requires a lot of work and/or thought to complete, I never once had any concerns on what to do. Dr. Watters is consistently available and ready to help when needed. She is truly the best and I feel I will be a better administrator because of her!
- I know this is an area for where to "improve", but I want to shout out Dr. Watters. Her class is absolutely amazing and one of the best laid out classes I have taken in my life. While the course requires a lot of work and/or thought to complete, I never once had any concerns on what to do. Dr. Watters is consistently available and ready to help when needed. She is truly the best and I feel I will be a better administrator because of her!
- Dr. Watters is amazing. She works hard to make the activities intentional and impactful. She is supportive when campus admins are not helpful or supportive with projects. She helps figure out solutions. She is innovative and creative, and she is very thoughtful in how she lays out her coursework.
- I love Dr. Watters’ courses. They feel very personal and interactive, despite being online. She is always quick to respond and provides meaningful feedback.
- Dr. Watters is an incredibly clear, kind and responsive instructor. I greatly appreciated her communication style and how she shared expectations in multiple ways. I also loved the way she created a sense of community with other students by hosting panels and learning community meetings. She covers all the bases by having exemplars for each stage and for providing supports. Dr. Watters also understands the content incredibly well. It is obvious that she has been a coach, that she values coaching and that she knows what it takes for us to be successful in the future. This elevates the learning and is inspiring and motivating for her learners. I was fortunate to have her for all of my coaching and adult learning courses. She is the perfect person to teach these classes!
- Dr. Watters has gone above and beyond in our course. I appreciate that what she preaches is what she practiced in our class. She would adjust and monitor the course to meet the needs of her students. This is a great example of how this course helped me see that in real time. Curriculum, Instruction & Assessment was an area I felt I needed more support and guidance in as a leader. This course has given me a bigger understanding in this area. I also appreciated the introductory and pacing guides for the modules--it definitely helped keep me focused on the course. She was quick to respond to emails and even had extra office hours to help with our pillar projects.
- I enjoyed the layout of the course, the intentionality of the work, and opportunities for deep reflection on leadership and leadership styles. Dr. Watters is highly organized and many of the collaborative activities I will use again as a campus administrator.
- No improvements! I really liked how Dr. Watters structured course content in her modules. It allowed time to complete coursework and reflect on it, rather than hurrying through the material without sufficient time to process and apply it. I also really liked how encouraging and supportive Dr. Watters is. She encouraged us to think critically and asked tough questions, but it helped connect content learned to ourselves and she helped make content easier to learn. Love this course!
- Once again, Dr. Watters has done an excellent job in this course. She communicates her expectations and is always there if we need any help with anything. She goes above and beyond to make sure we succeed and learn.