Webster receives 2000 Benjamin Smith Reynolds Award

Professor John Webster has brought many new and innovative ideas to the College of Engineering at UW-Madison during the past 32 years. His successful teaching style and ability to communicate through writing garnered Webster one of three 2000 Benjamin Smith Reynolds Awards for Excellence in Teaching Engineers.

Webster played a major role in the introduction of the Department of Biomedical Engineering. He helped lay the groundwork for the new department and has developed new undergraduate courses in design and bioinstrumentation.

Webster often uses actual hospital instruments during his lectures. Here, he shows biomedical engineering grad students the location of a radio frequency cardiac ablation electrode. (50K JPG)

Webster is perhaps best known for his ability to create and implement successful teaching techniques and cutting-edge advancements in education. His ability to explain complex information leads to imaginative lectures that add a personal touch, as he emphasizes his own real world experiences to illustrate the course material. He also creates quizzes on the Web to promote student learning.

The courses are filled with interesting learning aids, such as actual hospital instruments like electrocardiogram machines and defibrillators. Webster uses these materials during laboratory experiments to provide his students with a hands-on learning environment.

Webster offers students the opportunity to work together in small groups, emulating the setting found in industry. This cooperative group learning allows students the freedom to explore and test the elements of engineering, while Webster acts as a consultant to answer questions and decide whether a team has completed the projects successfully.

Aside from his efforts in improving classroom presentation, Webster is committed to teaching through writing. Johns Hopkins School of Medicine Professor Nitish Thakor described Webster as one of the most distinguished educators in the fields of medical instrumentation and biomedical engineering, and his ability to create knowledge through writing is unparalleled. Webster's well-known textbook, Medical Instrumentation: Application and Design, is used by more than 55 universities, and is the most widely used textbook in biomedical engineering.

Among Webster's many honors are the Theo C. Pilkington Outstanding Educator Award from the American Society for Engineering Education, the UW-Madison Chancellor's Distinguished Teaching Award and the Holdridge Award for Excellence in Teaching from the UW-Madison Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.