Best Practices at Work: Lessons Learned by MSU Innovators

Prof. Rique Campa (CANR)
Prof. Kathy Hoag (CNS)
Prof. Brad Marks (EGR)
Prof. Aaron McCright (LBC)
Prof. Mark Voit (CNS)

Thursday, April 12, in Engineering 3405 (Dean's Conference Room)
11:30am - 1:30pm
(Lunch will be served)
(Note Room Change from 105 Nat Sci)
About the Session:

 How do you learn to innovate as an instructor?
How do you deal with the risks involved?
How do you know if your teaching innovation is working?
How do you balance the demands of teaching and research?

Join us in a discussion of these and other questions about teaching innovation with a panel of leaders in teaching innovation at MSU.

About Rique Campa:

Henry (Rique) Campa, III is an Associate Dean in the Graduate School and a Professor of Wildlife Ecology in the Department of Fisheries and Wildlife at Michigan State University (MSU).  In his roles as an Associate Dean, he develops, implements, and evaluates career and professional development programs associated with MSU’s  PREP (Planning, Resilience, Engagement, and Professionalism) program.  In addition, he also directs activities at MSU associated with the NSF-funded CIRTL (Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning) Network.  Rique’s research interests are in the areas of wildlife-habitat relationships, ecosystem management, effects of disturbances on wildlife, and the professional development of graduate education.  He has conducted ecological research throughout the U.S. and in Kenya and Nepal.  Before coming to MSU, Rique worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as a Wildlife Biologist and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources as a Wildlife Research Biologist.  Rique has served in leadership positions for The Wildlife Society (TWS) at the national, regional, and state levels and is a Certified Wildlife Biologist with TWS. Rique teaches undergraduate and graduate courses and has taught study abroad courses in Kenya and the Bahamas.  At MSU, he has been awarded a Lilly Teaching Fellowship and the MSU Teacher-Scholar Award.  In 2004, Rique was selected as an “exemplary teaching professor” to participate in the National Case Study of Learner-Centered Approaches in Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources.  In 2011, Rique received The Wildlife Society’s Excellence in Wildlife Education Award.  He received a B.S. in wildlife management from the University of Missouri-Columbia and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in wildlife ecology from MSU.  

About Kathy Hoag:

Dr. Kathleen (Kathy) Hoag is an Associate Professor in the Biomedical Laboratory Diagnostic Program. Dr. Hoag joined MSU as an Assistant Professor in 2001. She was a Lilly Teaching Fellow in 2003-2004, and her project for the Fellowship was to develop group-based case studies for use in BLD 434, Clinical Immunology. Dr. Hoag published her work from her Lilly Teaching Fellowship, and earned a Teacher-Scholar Award from MSU in 2005 as a result. The case studies are still utilized in the course to augment lectures and provide deeper student understanding of the workings of the immune system. In addition to BLD 434, Dr. Hoag teaches BLD 450 (Medical Parasitology content of Eukaryotic Pathogens), and a portion of BLD 498. Dr. Hoag is married and has a 5 year old son, and enjoys teaching water aerobics in her spare time.

About Brad Marks:

Dr. Bradley Marks is a Professor in the Department of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, with a joint appointment in Food Science and Human Nutrition.  Dr. Marks has 18 years of university teaching experience – having taught 11 distinct courses at two universities during that period (including development of 5 new courses at the 100-, 300-, 400-, and 800-level).  Dr. Marks has received teaching awards at the department/college level, the university level (MSU Teacher-Scholar), and the national level (professional society).  He also has published and presented on various aspects of engineering education, including utilization of web-based tools for motivating student preparatory reading and design of unique, discipline-specific engineering courses.  As undergraduate program coordinator in Biosystems Engineering, Dr. Marks also has principal responsibility for managing the continuous curriculum improvement process, including on-going outcomes assessment and preparation of multiple successful accreditation reports. 

         About Aaron McCright:

Aaron M. McCright is Associate Professor of Sociology in Lyman Briggs College, the Department of Sociology, and the Environmental Science and Policy Program at Michigan State University.  His sociological research investigates how interrelationships among scientific developments, political processes, and social dynamics influence society's capacity for recognizing and dealing with environmental degradation and technological risks.  His recent work analyzes the political dynamics and public understanding of climate science and policy in the United States and the roles of public opinion for social movements.  His SoTL work focuses on the effectiveness of inquiry-based learning projects for affecting students' scientific and statistical knowledge, skills, and attitudes.  He has published one book, has authored several chapters in edited volumes, and has written a few commissioned reports.  His work also has been published in such scholarly journals as Global Environmental Change; Climatic Change; Public Opinion Quarterly; Social Problems; Social Science Quarterly; Theory, Culture, and Society; The Sociological Quarterly; Population and Environment; and Environmental Politics.  He was named a 2007 Kavli Frontiers Fellow in the National Academy of Sciences, he served as a 2008-2009 Lilly Teaching Fellow at MSU, and he received the 2009 Teacher-Scholar Award and the 2009 Curricular Service-Learning and Civic Engagement Award at MSU.

About Mark Voit:

Dr. Mark Voit is a Professor of astrophysics in the Physics and Astronomy Department who has been at MSU since 2003.  He often teaches ISP 205, an introductory astronomy course taken by 1500 MSU students annually to satisfy their physical science requirement, and he was the main curriculum developer for the ISP 205L astronomy lab course, taken by 1000 MSU students per year.  Dr. Voit is co-author of the Cosmic Perspective textbook series, the most widely-used collegiate textbooks for introductory astronomy, and a contributor to the Mastering Astronomy online homework website.  When not teaching ISP courses, he teaches a graduate-level course in Radiative Astrophysics.  Among his recognitions for teaching are the Loreena Blinn Endowed Teaching Award in Integrative Studies, the CNS Teacher-Scholar Award, and the Thomas Osgood Award in Physics and Astronomy.  Before coming to MSU, he was Lead Outreach Scientist in the Office of Public Outreach for the Hubble Space Telescope, where he helped develop a major traveling exhibition on the telescope in partnership with the Smithsonian Traveling Exhibition and HubbleSite.org, the main public-outreach website for the Hubble program.