January 31, 2025
Travis Balthazor and Tom Sarmiento recognized as Professor of the Week on Jan. 29
Travis Balthazor, instructor in uncrewed aircraft systems at K-State Salina, and Tom Sarmiento, associate professor of English, were recognized as Professor of the Week at the Jan. 29 men's home basketball game.
Balthazor, a K-State Salina alumnus, joined the uncrewed aircraft systems program in 2014 as a UAS pilot for the Applied Aviation Research Center. He serves as deputy director of the center. At K-State Salina, Balthazor earned several flight ratings including commercial instrument multi-engine airplane and certified flight instructor instrument airplane. As a flight instructor, he trained, soloed and endorsed students for check rides.
Balthazor is the recipient of K-State Salina’s Machbanks Memorial Award for Teaching Excellence. Balthazor recently helped navigate two major curriculum changes to ensure that the UAS program keeps pace with the rapidly advancing industry. He also showcased a commitment to noncredit education and research that will benefit the drone industry for years to come.
Sarmiento joined K-State as a visiting lecturer in 2014 and became a tenured associate professor of English in 2021. They served as director of the master's graduate track in cultural studies in 2021–22 and began serving as director of undergraduate studies in fall 2023 for the English department. Sarmiento specializes in Asian American and diasporic U.S. Filipinx literature and visual media, queer-feminist theories, and cultural representations of the U.S. Midwest. They teach courses on Asian American literature and visual media, Midwestern literature and culture, film adaptation, queer cinema, television, feminist-queer theories and expository writing.
Sarmiento was a visiting faculty fellow at the Suzy Newhouse Center for the Humanities at Wellesley College in Massachusetts in 2022-23, where they completed their first book manuscript, "The Heartland of US Empire: Race, Region, and the Queer Filipinx Midwest." Sarmiento received the 2019 Student Association of Graduates in English Graduate Faculty Distinguished Service Award and the 2022 Award for Excellence in Teaching from the Department of English as well as the 2022 William L. Stamey Award for Undergraduate Teaching from the College of Arts and Sciences. Sarmiento's motivations for becoming a professor include wanting to teach and inspire, as well as to learn from young minds who will work to make our society and culture more inclusive and just for the historically marginalized.
The Professor of the Week recognition is coordinated by Faculty Senate, the Office of the President and K-State Athletics. Recipients are faculty members selected by Faculty Senate caucuses. Those selected are provided tickets to a men's or women's home basketball game of their choosing and are recognized during halftime. This is just a small token of appreciation for those who teach at K-State.