Nancy Frontczak, who retired in June after nearly a quarter of a century teaching marketing, attended the annual Welcome Back Ceremony on Aug. 22, where she was recognized for her emeritus status.

Metro State’s Department of Marketing has established a $25,000 endowed scholarship in the name of Professor Emeritus Nancy Frontczak. The first recipient of the scholarship will be announced later this fall.

Clay Daughtrey, interim associate dean of the School of Business and former chair of the department, says the department chose to honor Frontczak with the scholarship because of her invaluable commitment to students and her mentoring role with faculty.

“She was a mentor to all of us,” says Daughtrey, who has been working to build the scholarship since 2000. “She was kind of the heart and soul of the department. Students coming now will not get a chance to take a class with her, but through a scholarship they will get to know her.”

Daughtrey says creating the scholarship was not a lone endeavor, crediting visiting assistant professors of marketing Darrin Duber-Smith and Scott Sherwood, who “raised funds through activities in the department’s sports marketing and personal selling classes.”

Frontczak, who retired in June after nearly a quarter of a century teaching marketing, attended the annual Welcome Back Ceremony on Aug. 22, where she was recognized for her emeritus status. She says she was prepared for the emeritus in advance; but not for the scholarship announcement at the department’s annual banquet on May 4.

She says she was taken “completely by surprise” when Daughtrey announced the scholarship.

“It’s absolutely the biggest honor I could have gotten,” Frontczak says. “I could even start crying right now thinking about it. To know that each year a student will get a scholarship in my name is amazing to me. I hope I can meet the students and maybe even mentor them some.”

Frontczak says she stayed at Metro State so long because the school’s and her mission were one and the same. “Metro’s mission and mine fit perfectly. It’s all about being student-focused and educating students. I feel like I had the best career I could have ever had at Metro.”

She admits she already misses teaching. “I even visited one of my friend’s classes this summer just to sit in and be near the students.”

After receiving her doctorate from the University of Illinois in 1977, Frontczak taught at the University of Colorado before coming to Metro State in 1987. She has garnered many honors during her career at the College, including the 2004 presidential performance award for outstanding teaching, the "most loved faculty" award from Metro State alumni in 2003, outstanding paper awards from the Marketing Educators' Association in 1990 and 2004, the Bright Ideas / Best Practices award from the Academy for Teaching Excellence in 2002, and several professional development awards at Metro State.

In 2005, the national Marketing Educators' Association named Frontczak marketing educator of the year. The award is given to only one professor per year in the country. Judges look at classroom performance, mentoring students, publications and teaching-related service to schools, community and the profession.

During her career, Frontczak became known for her work in experiential teaching methods, holding coat drives for the needy and having her classes help area nonprofits with marketing plans.