The Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion is proud to extend our congratulations to Dr. Dali Tan, recipient of the 2021 Marshall Brannon Award for Virginia Post-Secondary World Language Teacher of the Year, which is presented by the Foreign Language Association of Virginia (FLAVA).

Dr. Tan has been teaching at NOVA for over a decade. As the award committee wrote, "Dr. Tan is a tireless advocate for her students. She serves as Northern Virginia’s World Languages Discipline Chair where she has founded a thriving Chinese program. Many of her students have gone on to study in China or complete their Chinese studies majors upon transfer to other universities. Dr. Tan has students participate in a pen pal program with a university in Hebei, China. She also brings her students to the high school level to help students learning Chinese there. She finds multiple ways for students to continue to learn and use Mandarin beyond the classroom, supporting them long after they have completed her course. FLAVA is delighted to announce that Dr. Dali Tan will be representing Virginia as our Teacher of the Year candidate at the regional level at SCOLT March 31-April 2."

You can watch the award ceremony at this link. In regards to that ceremony, Dr. Tan noted:

"In one of the two award ceremony videos at the FLAVA website (the last part of the video) where I thanked the Virginia Board of Education for its Resolution of Recognition, I also had the opportunity to thank Dr. Jimmie McClellan, College Dean of Liberal Arts at NOVA, for his staunch advocacy for and tireless promotion of the study of world languages, and for encouraging us to connect our students to the people and the cultures of the target languages through e-pal exchanges, telecollaboration, and study abroad programs. I also thanked all my WL department colleagues as well as all my colleagues at NOVA for their passion and dedication in supporting all our students to ensure their college success."

And when asked about her proudest achievement at NOVA, Dr. Tan added:

"I am so proud of being part of such a caring NOVA community in which we define all our own contributions to the world through all the achievements of our students!"