Dr. Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki has been selected as a 2024 Piper Professor by the Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation, which honors the best professors in the state. Ishak-Boushaki said his teaching philosophy can be defined by two guiding principles: caring for students and inspiring them.

One of The University of Texas at Dallas’ most accomplished and dedicated researchers has received a statewide honor for another passion: teaching.

Dr. Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki, professor of physics in the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, has been selected as a 2024 Piper Professor by the Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation, which honors the best professors in Texas.

The award, established in 1958, recognizes 10 educators annually for their dedication to their profession and for their outstanding academic, scientific and scholarly achievements.

Each Piper Professor holds that title for life and receives a certificate of merit, a gold pin and a $5,000 honorarium. Selection is made on the basis of nominations from two- and four-year colleges and universities.

“I was delighted and pleasantly surprised to hear I had been named a Piper Professor,” Ishak-Boushaki said. “This honor is an important recognition and confirmation of the guiding principles I have followed over my many years of teaching.”

UT Dallas Provost Inga H. Musselman and President Richard C. Benson recognized Dr. Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki for his Piper Professor honor recently.

A UT Dallas faculty member since 2005, Ishak-Boushaki is a theoretical astrophysicist who has mentored dozens of graduate and undergraduate students, as well as high school students during summer internships. He has received several awards for teaching and mentoring excellence from the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics and the University, including the 2021 President’s Teaching Excellence Award in Graduate/Professional Instruction and the 2023 Provost’s Award for Faculty Excellence in Graduate Research Mentoring.

In 2022 he earned the Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Award, which recognizes the best educators in the UT System.

Ishak-Boushaki said that to be a successful teacher, an educator’s guiding principles are what matter most.

“When I’m asked to write down my teaching philosophy, I find it very simple and yet profound. It comes down to two principles: caring for your students and inspiring them,” he said. “Everything else, such as teaching methods and creativity in the classroom, follows from those principles.”

Physics can be a challenging subject to teach and to learn, Ishak-Boushaki said, so he emphasizes to his students that physics and math are not just formulas in a book.

UT Dallas Piper Professors

2015: Dr. John Sibert, associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry

2018: Dr. Theresa Towner, Ashbel Smith Professor of literature

2019: Dr. Karen Huxtable-Jester, professor of instruction in psychology

2020: Dr. Denise Paquette Boots, professor of public policy and political economy

“I try to inspire students by communicating to them the beauty of the science and how it can be used to understand how the world around us works, everything from the human body to trees to the universe. Once that is established, I find that students become very interested,” he said.

Ishak-Boushaki’s research focuses broadly on the origin and evolution of the universe, including studies of cosmic acceleration, dark energy, gravity and gravitational lensing, and how these parameters affect cosmological models. He is a leading member of the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) collaboration and the Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Dark Energy Science Collaboration. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and of the American Physical Society.

One of the ways Ishak-Boushaki inspires creativity in his undergraduate students is by having them watch action and adventure movies and then explain how the filmmakers got the physics right or wrong. He also creates recitation sessions in which students can work through homework problems in an interactive environment.

For graduate students, he connects his own research to the course material, including using virtual immersion techniques that simulate concepts like the expanding universe or the edge of a black hole.

“Dr. Ishak-Boushaki is both an exceptional scientist and an inspirational educator,” said Dr. Inga H. Musselman, UT Dallas provost, vice president for academic affairs and the Cecil H. Green Distinguished Chair of Academic Leadership. “His commitment to his research and to his students and their success exemplifies the outstanding dedication to higher education that Piper Professors exemplify.”

Among the thousands of students Ishak-Boushaki has taught at UT Dallas are educators and researchers in academia or alumni with successful careers in business and other fields. He believes their success in part goes back to his guiding principles of inspiring students and caring for them and their learning, while giving them time to develop their ideas.

“Doctors have the chance to save lives, and as a teacher, I have the chance to change lives,” he said. “My advice to students is to first discover something you are passionate about and to work hard. Work smart with honesty and integrity, and even if you have bumps along the way, be persistent, and it will pay off. And always remember that it is the journey that matters most.”