From Theory to Practice

Evelyn Chiang’s Compassionate, Research-Driven Teaching Recognized for Excellence

By UNC Asheville

May 9^th, 2025

At UNC Asheville, students are tasked with not only absorbing knowledge, but confronting new, and often challenging, ideas. Luckily, they don’t have to do it alone. Faculty members, like Evelyn Chiang, provide the kind, guiding hand that allows students to understand theory, to examine it, question it, and apply it to practice and research.

Ash Pilo ’24 said they experienced some trepidation when first attending their senior seminar in autism and neurodiversity, taught by Chiang. By the nature of the class’s subject, there would be some difficult topics brought up.

“I didn't really know what to expect, but she very quickly established a very empathetic perspective and research-based perspective, emphasizing the autonomy of neurodiverse and autistic people. She really encouraged discussion and moderated that discussion in such a way that always felt respectful and focused on the content,” Pilo said. “Very quickly I felt like it was going to be a fantastic class.”

Evelyn Chiang, professor of psychology, is the 2025 recipient of the Board of Governors Excellence in Teaching award for UNC Asheville. This prestigious award is given to one faculty member at each of the 17 UNC System schools.

In her nomination, current department chair and colleague Mark Harvey stated,

“Having been her colleague for many years, I believe one of her secrets to success is her openness to new ideas, new methods, and current best practices coupled with a creative and critical mind that innovates… yet observes, reflects, and carefully selects out the effective from the ineffective.”

Evelyn Chiang teaches a senior seminar on motivation.

Chiang’s expertise is in educational psychology, an intersection of fields which allows her to understand the mechanics of learning, such as motivation and executive functioning skills, and apply theory to practice in her teaching.

Sometimes her students even pick up on when the exact theory they are learning about is being utilized by Chiang.

“I introduced information processing theory and I said, ‘Okay, now based on what you've learned about working memory limitations and how we store information, how would that impact your teaching?’” Chiang said. “And one student actually said, ‘That's kind of what we're doing right now. You teach us and then we get a break and talk about it and you want us to make connections to our real world knowledge.’ I'm like, ‘Yes, that's exactly what's happening!’”

She also utilizes Universal Design for learning, a way of designing instruction to reach every student. This supports students with disabilities, but benefits all students, allowing them to engage with the material in a way that works for them.

For example, Chiang allows all students to record their presentations, rather than presenting live in front of the class. This helps students with speech and language disorders, with strong anxiety around public speaking, or who may be learning English.

“But it's an option for everyone,” Chiang said. “And what I found is these presentations tend to be better structured, well-rehearsed, they adhere to time limits, and they're so organized.

Chiang's classes are largely discussion based, she encourages student to make real-world connections to material.

Just by giving students a wide variety of ways to engage, we’re meeting all learners and not just a small set of learners.”

Her approach to her teaching makes her a natural advocate for students with disabilities. She often teaches classes that cover ADHD, autism, traumatic brain injury, learning disabilities, and more.

“It's a really great class for understanding disability from a diversity standpoint, which means that all brains and humans are different,” Chiang said. “If we look at the incidence of disability in the world, everyone's going to encounter or work with folks who have disabilities, many of us have them. Learning about these populations can only benefit us in interacting with the world.”

Chiang has also been an advocate for and led research related to the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) communities. She has had several students, Pilo among them, conducting research on the model minority myth among college students, to better understand the social judgements of AAPI communities.

Chiang utilizes Universal Design for learning, an approach the provides multiple avenues for students to engage in learning.

Chiang and students in her lab conducted interviews, coded and organized them into themes which the whole research team discussed and presented at the undergraduate research symposium. Pilo said this was their first time working on research that was qualitative, and their first time using open coding.

“It was an excellent experience, it definitely went on my CV,” Pilo said. “It was a very academically enriching experience because I was able to work independently and then bring it to a group and learn so much more from the other people in the lab and from the way we organized the information.”

More than just gaining skills from research, Pilo said their experience in Chiang’s class helped set the course for the current and future academic career.

“Her class was really a turning point in my life,” Pilo said. “It helped me learn more about myself and see the world in a new way."

"I am currently studying autism and gender identity, which I don't believe would have been my thesis if I had not taken her class. It gave me a lot of confidence as well as a lot of skills.”

Ash Pilo (left) with Evelyn Chiang on the day of their graduation. Photo courtesy of Ash Pilo.

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