2024 McCaig-Killam Teaching Award winner David Nicholas finds powerful synergy between teaching and research

It feels like Faculty of Social Work researcher Dr. David Nicholas must be exempt from the whole “only 24 hours in a day” rule that the rest of us follow. After a brief, but dizzying, tour through his current projects, I’m led to suspect that he possesses some hidden superpower that allows him to wring a few extra hours each day to accomplish what he does. 

Nicholas, BSW'85, MSW'88, PhD, recipient of the 2024 McCaig-Killam Teaching Award, is one those people who seems to excel at everything. He’s known nationally and internationally for his research supporting neurodiverse individuals and social work in health-care settings and also revered by his students as a teacher and valued mentor. He also helps to lead research and partnerships within the faculty as an associate dean.

“We are a research-intensive university, and, certainly, there’s a strong focus on that here,” says Nicholas. “But I value and enjoy teaching, and I see it as essential to the transformative experience that students go through.”

A continuum of professional development

Behind Nicholas’ passion for teaching is a conviction that research and teaching are closely connected — two sides of the same coin. Done well, both advance knowledge and support the social work profession, including every future client the future social workers will help.

“I try to embed the research I’m doing within coursework, but also vice versa, to make teaching and learning integral to advancing a field of study forward,” he says. 

“I think about how to make that field come alive for students in ways that really invite them and inspire them to learn and grow in the areas they choose to pursue. I see research and teaching as quite connected, and that’s part of what drives me in terms of teaching.”

Preparing students for health-care practice through simulation

With an eye toward what his students will achieve in the future, Nicholas never views a course or a class as a singular event. He views it as another stop on a student’s professional journey where they move from learning about a field, to becoming engaged in it, to finally pursuing that field, or area of practice, as their career. 

To that end, Nicholas has increasingly focused on helping students to understand how the theory they learn in class translates into real life, preparing them to move into professional settings such as health care. 

This focus has led him to partner with frontline health care social workers who have helped him in course development, and who do so much for the profession by supervising students in their field-education placements. He’s also relied on the faculty’s dynamic field education team, who bring innovation in developing meaningful practicum opportunities in health-care settings. 

In some of the social work in health-care courses that Nicholas has developed, he’s gone as far as bringing the entire class into hospitals and clinical settings.

“We’ve trialed bringing the class to health-care settings and collaborating with colleagues so students can engage on the ground with professionals doing good work,” he says. 

“That led me down a path of working collaboratively with health-care colleagues to identify the information that is essential for student success in that area of practice.”

Another experiential learning approach that Nicholas has used is simulation with trained actors, which allows students to try therapeutic assessments and interventions in a safe, controlled environment. Each “case” helps students think deeply about the kinds of information and practice theories that will inform their decisions in professional practice.  

A humble perspective on shared learning

Nicholas’ trophy case (in the very unlikely event that he has one) features almost as many awards for teaching as for research, including a University of Calgary Teaching Award, and the Faculty of Social Work Award for Student Supervision, Mentorship and Support.

In comments provided by students, a few words repeatedly pop-up, including, “humble," "respectful" and "inclusive." Not surprisingly, Nicholas continues these themes when he reflects on the award.

“I feel honoured, but I’m also grateful to my students and colleagues,” he says. “I feel like they have taught me so much, and the learning has been bi-directional. I hope I have supported students in advancing their learning and professional growth, but they, along with my colleagues, have shared in developing innovation and ideas that have deepened my thinking.”

So, Nicholas — like so many of the great UCalgary researchers and teachers — sees no dichotomy between teaching and research. In fact, you get the distinct impression that he views his McCaig-Killam Teaching Award as more of a shared honour that marks the virtuous circle he has created. 

His thought-leading research engages and inspires future social workers, advocates and researchers to advance knowledge and practice within a field and to make change. They, in turn, deepen his thinking even as they graduate with the knowledge and skills to find solutions well ahead of tomorrow.