ATLANTA -- The College of the Arts proudly presents the honorees of the 2026 Outstanding Faculty and Staff Awards. This year’s cohort of exceptional individuals includes:
- Outstanding Faculty Award in Service: Dr. Lara Saville Dahl, School of Music Principal Lecturer of Oboe, Graduate Director and Woodwind Coordinator, and College of the Arts Non-Tenure Track Faculty Advocate
- Outstanding Faculty Award in Teaching: Neill Prewitt, Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design, Senior Lecturer in Foundations and the Foundations Coordinator
- Outstanding Faculty Award in Research and Creative Activity: Dr. Robert Ambrose, School of Music, Director of Bands and Professor of Music
- Outstanding Junior Faculty Award (Tie): Alessandra Bautze, School of Film, Media & Theatre, Assistant Professor of Screenwriting; and Emily Baker, Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design, Assistant Professor, Sculpture
- Outstanding Staff Award: Tony Davis, Director, College of the Arts Office of Academic Assistance
The annual awards honor outstanding College of the Arts faculty and staff for their accomplishments and contributions to student success and elevating the arts at Georgia State University and beyond.
“Our honorees have distinguished themselves in their creative practice, research and dedication to delivering the highest quality education and service to our students,” said Interim Dean Wade Weast. “Congratulations and thank you for your lasting impact at the College of the Arts.”
Faculty award recipients were selected by their peers according to robust criteria, which consider publishing, research, exhibiting and performing, among other scholarly and artistic contributions to their fields.
The Outstanding Staff Award recognizes an individual for excellence in their area, promotes a positive and pleasant work environment, displays exceptional dependability, and consistently performs high-quality work, among other criteria.
Outstanding Faculty Award in Service
Dr. Lara Saville Dahl, School of Music Principal Lecturer of Oboe, Graduate Director and Woodwind Coordinator, and College of the Arts Non-Tenure Track Faculty Advocate
Dr. Dahl has performed with the Atlanta, Utah and Phoenix Symphony Orchestras, the Arizona Opera Company and the Sunflower Music Festival Chamber Orchestra. In addition, she performs regularly with the Atlanta Opera Orchestra, Atlanta Ballet Orchestra and Columbus Symphony. She was a founding member of Atlanta Chamber Winds, which published a CD entitled “Music from Paris” on the Albany label, and is currently a member of Ensemble ATL. Dr. Dahl performs frequently with Chamber Music Atlanta, is an active freelance musician throughout Atlanta, and is also in demand in the metro Atlanta area as an adjudicator, master-class clinician and sectional coach. Read more here.
Outstanding Faculty Award in Teaching
Neill Prewitt, Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design, Senior Lecturer in Foundations and the Foundations Coordinator
Neill is a performance artist working in sound, video, sculpture, theatrical and participatory performance. He has performed rock operas and participatory sound art events at sites nationally, including Whitespace in Atlanta, GA, and Amos Eno Gallery in Brooklyn, NY. Neill has produced videos and installations that have been exhibited nationally at Lump in Raleigh, NC, University of Notre Dame AAHD Gallery, and 621 Gallery in Tallahassee, FL. With the collective Yuxtapongo, Neill has produced art for public spaces, including public access TV, as well as installations that have been shown at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University and CAM in Raleigh, NC.
As Senior Lecturer and Director of Foundations, Neill’s teaching combines a disciplinary focus with interdisciplinary opportunities, exploring the necessity of drawing and other foundational skills and how they can be augmented through expanded media. As Director of Foundations, he implements a strategic direction centered around placemaking, including leading a public mural project created collaboratively by 100+ students each semester, resulting in murals of student work on the GSU campus and in downtown Atlanta. Read more here.
Outstanding Faculty Award in Research and Creative Activity
Dr. Robert Ambrose, School of Music, Director of Bands and Professor of Music
Dr. Ambrose's duties at Georgia State include conducting the acclaimed Symphonic Wind Ensemble, running the highly successful graduate wind conducting program and overseeing the entire large, comprehensive university band program. His graduate conducting students have received multiple honors and hold conducting and teaching positions throughout the United States and in multiple foreign countries.
Dr. Ambrose is in constant demand as a guest conductor and has performed on four continents. Recent engagements include performances in Australia, Canada, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, and Taiwan, as well as across the United States. He is Founder and Music Director of the National Chamber Winds, the Atlanta Chamber Winds and Ensemble ATL.
Dr. Ambrose has strong ties to the Finnish music community. He is frequently engaged in that country as a guest conductor, teacher, master clinician, and lecturer. Ambrose is a prolific arranger with nearly two dozen publications to his credit. His transcriptions and editions have been performed around the world. Read more here.
Outstanding Junior Faculty Award (Tie)
Alessandra Bautze, School of Film, Media & Theatre, Assistant Professor of Screenwriting
Professor Bautze's work seeks to reflect the diversity of the American experience while also embracing a socially-conscious, realist approach to narrative. Her screenplay “Racing the Wolf God” won Best Screenplay at the 2021 Anchorage International Film Festival, and the revision of the screenplay was a finalist for the Athena List 2025. The short film “Baying in the Night,” with a screenplay by Bautze and directed by Susan G. Reid, premiered at the Indie Short Film Festival in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2025. She has received residencies from the Nanjing International Writers’ Residency Program, the Storyknife Writers Residency Program, the Mountain Words Writer-in-Residence Program, and the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, and she was named the Tangerine Entertainment Fellow for Stowe Story Labs’ 2023 Narrative Lab. Read more here.
Outstanding Junior Faculty Award (Tie)
Emily Baker, Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design, Assistant Professor of Sculpture
Emily Baker’s sculptural practice explores the histories embedded within industrial materials, particularly steel, and the infrastructures that shaped twentieth-century American cities. Drawing from archives, abandoned manufacturing sites, and processes of metal fabrication and casting, her work reimagines fragments of industrial history through large-scale sculpture and photographic intervention. Recent projects examine labor, landscape, and the evolving legacy of the American steel industry.
She received an Exploratory Research Grant from the Hagley Museum & Library which supported research into DuPont’s contribution to the rebirth of nylon’s image post-WWII. In 2024, she held her first international solo exhibition at ProjeckTraum FN in Friedrichshafen, Germany. She was the recipient of the 2024 Reed Fink Award in Southern Labor History at the Southern Labor Archives at Georgia State University Library. In 2025, she received a Nexus Grant from Atlanta Contemporary to further the inclusion of neon into archival photographs, as well as the Pre-Tenure Scholarly Support Grant from Georgia State University. This supported her most recent large-scale, site-specific sculpture cast at Carrie Furnaces in Pittsburgh, PA and fabricated and installed at West Virginia University in April of 2026. Read more here.
Outstanding Staff Award
Tony Davis, College of the Arts, Director, Office of Academic Assistance
Tony is a higher education administrator with over a decade of experience in academic advising and student support services. He began his career at Georgia State University in 2014 as an academic advisor in the University Advisement Center, where he developed a strong foundation in student success and retention initiatives.
Tony transitioned to the College of the Arts in 2017, expanding his leadership and administrative expertise, and in 2024, he was appointed Director of the Office of Academic Assistance. In this role, he oversees undergraduate and graduate advisement, graduation clearance, the catalog and curriculum cycle, and course scheduling, ensuring effective academic operations and student progression.
Tony holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Secondary Education from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and a Master of Education in Higher Education Administration from Georgia Southern University.