Faculty Member Doug Sprick Wins Ivy Tech Award for Excellence In Instruction

Ivy Tech Evansville Adjunct Faculty Member Doug Sprick Wins
Award for Excellence in Instruction

EVANSVILLE, Ind. – Doug Sprick, an adjunct faculty member in the School of Advanced Manufacturing, Engineering & Applied Science at Ivy Tech Community College Evansville, has been honored with  Ivy Tech’s Adjunct Faculty Award for Excellence in Instruction. Sprick’s students nominated him for the award.

“We are very fortunate at Ivy Tech Evansville to have faculty with the background, experience and passion for teaching that Doug brings to our campus,” said Ivy Tech Chancellor Daniela Vidal. “This is a testament to the passion for our mission of changing the lives of students.”

Sprick has been an instructor in technical laboratory classes at Ivy Tech since 2017 including Hydraulics, Mechanical, and Mechatronics on the Evansville campus, as well as the Princeton and Tell City Career & Technology Centers. He has also taught non-credit classes for Ivy Tech on-site at Alcoa.

His grading centers around his belief that students exhibit effort in their work, showcased by attendance at class, timeliness of getting to class and submitting homework, as well as preparedness and attitude. “That said, I give lenience…and accommodate a student’s needs, whenever possible,” Sprick said. “Most of my students are working full time. A vast majority are full-time employed with families.”

He said he knows what it is like to work and earn a degree, citing what he did during his time with General Motors. “I earned my Master’s degree at night school over a period of four years and I know how much effort it takes to balance work, home, and school. It is not easy.” However, he said he expects the effort to take place and the work to be completed.

“I want students to learn something they did not know when they started the course or help them understand an old concept better. In many cases, the students already have experience in the field and the class is more of a stepping stone to a certificate or a degree.”

Ever the innovator, Sprick strives to try something new in each course each semester. “I have always believed in continuous improvement and continue to look at a class in the same way. Do something new. Experiment. Many attempts fail but can lead to something even better.”

He comes early and stays late to help students, as needed, he said.

Prior to Ivy Tech, Sprick was a product development engineer at then Rexam (now Berry Global, Inc.) from 1992 to 2017. He developed and commercialized new consumer closure systems for consumer packaging like child-resistant safety packaging for cleaning, agricultural, and personal care.

He completed more than 32 different production projects while at Berry, including molds and assembly machines, starting with part design through project launch. Many of these programs were in excess of $1 million in annual sales. Sprick also holds more than a dozen utility patents in packaging.

Prior to Berry, he was employed as a senior product manufacturing engineer and product engineer at Sundstrand Aerospace in Rockford, Ill., a manufacturing engineer at Warner Electric, Motion Control Systems Division, in Marengo, Ill. and as a manufacturing engineer, tool shop supervisor, and development supervisor engineer for General Motors Corp, AC Spark Plug Division, in Flint, Mich.

He holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Illinois; and a Master of Business Administration from Eastern Michigan University.

Sprick was one of 18 Ivy Tech adjunct faculty members from across the state to receive the 10th annual Adjunct Faculty Award for Excellence in Instruction. One individual of the group annually is chosen for the Gerald I Lamkin Award, named after a former Ivy Tech President, recognizing the adjunct faculty member who exhibits excellence in instruction and represents the mission of the College. Kirsten Carlson of the Ivy Tech Madison Campus won this year’s Gerald I. Lamkin Award.