Diane Browder, Snyder Distinguished Professor of Special Education, was honored today as the 2011 recipient of the prestigious O. Max Gardner Award, the highest faculty accolade presented by the UNC Board of Governors.

Browder, UNC Charlotte’s first-ever recipient of the award, is recognized as one of the nation’s leading experts on academic instruction and assessment methods for severely disabled children; her work is fundamentally changing educational expectations for disabled children and impacting educational policies and practices at the local, state and national levels.

“Diane Browder has flourished at UNC Charlotte, helping our special education program become one of the very finest in the nation,” said Chancellor Philip L. Dubois. “She is conducting research that sets new standards for what we expect from and how we support children with significant cognitive disabilities. Diane is a wonderful asset for the University and the community.”

Browder has developed and scientifically tested standards-based curricula in reading, math and science for severely disabled children and designed alternative assessment systems to gauge their learning gains. As a result, disabled students, who had previously been excluded from state testing programs because no one could figure out how to assess them, are now included in standardized assessments specifically modified according to Browder’s research and recommendations.

She also led the development of UNC Charlotte’s doctoral program in special education and continues to serve as the program coordinator. U.S. News and World Report recently ranked the program as one of the top 20 in the nation.

“For most of the history of humankind, children with severe intellectual disabilities were not given many opportunities to learn,” said Mary Lynne Calhoun, dean of the College of Education at UNC Charlotte. “Diane Browder’s research, done in partnership with Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, has opened doors for children with learning challenges and provided the means for them to become successful learners. Her work is changing classroom practice for children throughout North Carolina and beyond.”    

Browder’s Early Learning Skills Builder, a specialized reading program for severely disabled students, has been implemented in more than 800 schools systems and 3,000 schools nationwide. It is helping more than 20,000 disabled students learn to read, and these materials have been translated and incorporated into special education classrooms in Egypt and the Ukraine. Twenty-seven states have adopted her assessment system.

A member of the UNC Charlotte faculty since 1998, Browder earned an undergraduate degree in psychology in 1975. She then earned master’s and doctoral degrees in special education from the University of Virginia.

The O. Max Gardner Award, given annually since 1949, was established by the will of Gov. Oliver Max Gardner to recognize faculty who have “made the greatest contributions to the welfare of the human race.” It is the only award for which all faculty members of the 17 UNC campuses are eligible. Recipients are nominated by their chancellors and selected by the Board of Governors. The 2011 award carries a $20,000 cash prize ; it was presented by Board of Governors Chair Hannah Gage and Gardner Award Committee Chair John Blackburn of Linville.