QUT law lecturer Professor Des Butler has won the university's 2015 David Gardiner Teacher of the Year Award for inspiring and supporting students through personal leadership and innovative, multimedia-based teaching.
Professor Butler has excelled at teaching for 25 years, with a focus on developing teaching technologies.
He has previously won national and international awards including an Australian Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC) Teaching Fellowship and the Carrick Australian Award for Teaching Excellence.
The QUT Teacher of the Year Award recognises sustained excellence in the creative and effective use of technologies to enrich students' learning and engagement.
The late Professor David Gardiner AM, former Dean of the Faculty of Law and former Deputy Vice-Chancellor, saw the potential for the improvement of the learning environment through multimedia technology.
In 2001 Professor Des Butler was first to innovate the traditional didactic learning and teaching approach in Contract Law units for first-year students.
He then went on to develop interactive modules for students using complex narratives and simulations using CGI videos.
Professor Butler is the creator and/or leader of 16 different technology-based innovations which have influenced advanced teaching methods in the new Bachelor of Laws (Honours) degree.
His students consistently rate him highly in feedback and evaluation processes because of his support towards their learning.
Professor Butler is himself a QUT graduate, having completed his Bachelor of Laws and PhD at the university, where he was also a law medallist and dux.
He then worked as a solicitor specialising in insurance litigation before joining QUT's Faculty of Law full-time in 1989. He became a senior lecturer in 1995, Associate Professor in 2001 and Professor in 2004. He was appointed Assistant Dean, Research from November 1997 to 2002 and was acting Dean in February 2002.
Professor Butler is the only academic to win the prestigious LexisNexis/Australasian Law Teachers Association Award for Excellence and Innovation in the Teaching of Law twice - first in 2008 and then again in 2014.
He has been chief investigator for many projects granted funds by the Australian Research Council and is a member of the editorial boards for the Torts Law Journal and the Legal Education Review.
Media contact: media@qut.edu.au
