The University Education Association-Duluth would like to recognize the union faculty who will be retiring at the end of this academic year. Their contribution to our university in their research, teaching and service sets a standard we all can only hope to aspire to. We thank them for their membership in our union. We wish them fullfilling retirements.
Curt L. Anderson, Economics, Center for Economic Education, LSBE
Dr. Anderson came to UMD in 1980 after earning his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Wyoming with a specialty in environmental and natural resource economics. While at UMD he developed an interest in improving the teaching of economic literacy. Through his role as director of UMD’s Center for Economic Education he trained teachers on every continent, wrote numerous curriculum guides, created the Council for Economic Education’s “National Economics Challenge,” and served as President of the National Association of Economic Educators (NAEE). He is a member of UM’s Academy of Distinguished Teachers and has received numerous awards for his teaching and service including the Jean G. Blehart award from UMD, Horace T. Morse award from UM, and the Bessie B. Moore service award from NAEE.
Donald Crouch, Computer Science, SCSE
Dr. Crouch received his Ph.D. from Southern Methodist University. He has served on the faculties of the University of Florida, the University of Alabama, Cornell University, Tulane University, and as Head of Computer Science at both Alabama and UMD. Before beginning his academic career, he was a member of the technical staff at United Aircraft and Texas Instruments. His research has been funded by NSF, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, the Office of Naval Research, and MnDOT. In 2011, Dr. Amit Singhal, senior vice president of Google, on behalf of the ACM Special Interest Group in Information Retrieval (SIGIR), established the Donald B. Crouch Travel Grant to support the participation of graduate students from developing countries in SIGIR activities. Each year this endowment enables 20 to 40 such students to participate in the Annual International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval.
Kathryn Lenz, Mathematics and Statistics, SCSE
Dr. Lenz worked as a research scientist for Honeywell Systems and Research Center from 1984 until 1988 while earning her Ph.D. at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis and St. Paul. She became an assistant professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences at Worcester Polytechnic Institute before joining the faculty in the UMD Department of Mathematics and Statistics in 1990. During her 24 years at UMD, she taught a variety of mathematics courses, advised student research projects at the undergraduate and graduate levels and was a short-term visiting scholar at the University of Colorado, Boulder, the University of Bristol, England, and the University of Auckland, New Zealand. She published research in a range of areas including linear systems and control theory, mathematical modeling of tree growth and photosynthesis, and voting theory
Joseph Maiolo, English, CLA
Professor Maiolo holds degrees from University of Virginia (M.A.) and the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (M.F.A.). His short stories have been published in The Sewanee Review, Ploughshares, Shenandoah, The Texas Review, The Greensboro Review, and other magazines and anthologies. His work has been cited in The Best American Short Stories, and has won a Pushcart Prize, two NEA Literary Fellowships, and three PEN/Syndicated Fiction Awards; two have have been read on NPR's "The Sound of Writing.” His work has received a Bush Artist Fellowship and a Loft-McKnight Award of Distinction in Fiction. Maiolo has completed two novels, one set largely in the Blue Ridge; recently published a collection of his short stories under the titles Saint Matthew in Appalachia; My Turkish Missile Crisis; Boy Youth Man; Three Frays from Mallorca and Four Stories; and An Arch of Birches. He has written song lyrics and written and co-produced a forthcoming documentary. He is currently working on his memoir, set in Appalachian Virginia.
Maureen O’Brien, Economics, LSBE
Dr. Maureen O’Brien pursued her Ph.D. at West Virginia University after six years as an instructor at Clemson University. Upon completion of her Ph.D. she joined the Department of Economics in the Labovitz School of Business and Economics in 1983. A Morse-Alumni Distinguished Teaching Professor, she taught a variety of economics at the undergraduate level including Principles of Economics, Labor Economics, History of Economic Thought and Statistics. She served as Department Head for the Economics Department for 13 years. Her research focused on labor market issues as well as pedagogical issues related to teaching and learning. Dr. O’Brien plans to remain in the Duluth area.
Donald Poe, Chemistry and Biochemistry, SCSE
Dr. Poe earned his Ph.D. at Iowa State University in 1974 and joined the faculty as assistant professor in the same year. During his 40 years at UMD he has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses in analytical chemistry, introductory and general chemistry, and also has taught in the UMD study abroad program in Poland. He served as Director of Graduate Studies and Chemistry and Biochemistry, and as Director of the Trace Organic Analysis Laboratory in the Chemical Toxicology Research Center. He has involved numerous students in his research is on fundamental aspects of analytical separation science.
LeAne H. Rutherford, Instructional Development, Academic Affairs
LeAne Rutherford, associate professor, has had a lengthy connection with teaching and learning. Now in her 42nd year at the University of Minnesota Duluth, she worked in both the composition department (now writing studies) for 19 years and as a consultant and later the director of the Instructional Development Service (IDS) for approximately 23 years. Practicing what she professed, in 1984 she began in earnest to experiment with writing and publishing creative nonfiction articles in both commercial and academic magazines and journals ranging from The Wall Street Journal to the Minnesota Conservation Volunteer to To Improve the Academy. To date, she has published approximately 60 articles. Before joining UMD in 1971 as a writing instructor in a host of different writing courses, she taught for eleven years in the Duluth Public Schools.
Terrie Shannon, Education, CEHSP
Dr. Terrie Shannon received her Ph.D. degree from Cornell University. She began her employment at UMD in 1973 in the Home Economics Dept., then moved to the Dept. of Child and Family Development, which later merged into the Department of Education. She served as Department Head and Associate Dean in the College of Education and Human Service Professions for several years, with a special focus on state and national accreditation of teacher education programs. Dr. Shannon received the University of Minnesota President’s Award for Outstanding Service in 2003 for her work in establishing the Ruth A. Myers Endowed Chair in American Indian Education. Most recently she has been teaching technology courses in teacher education and doctoral programs, exploring ways to use technology to enhance student learning. Her husband, Lyle Shannon, teaches in the Biology Department at UMD.
Melanie Shepard, Social Work, CEHSP
Dr. Melanie Shepard began teaching at UMD in 1983 after working several years as a social worker. She was promoted to full professor in 2001, and served eight years as department head and eight years as director of graduate studies in the Department of Social Work. She also served in several different capacities in the University Education Association, including president. Her research career focused primarily in the field of domestic violence. She was also was the principal investigator on grants in the fields of child welfare and mental health.
Marian Stachowicz, Electrical Engineering, SCSE
Professor Marian S. Stachowicz heads the Laboratory for Intelligent Systems at the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, University of Minnesota Duluth. He received his M.S. degree in Control and Computer Engineering from LETI, Soviet Union and both his Ph.D. and D.Sc. from A G-H, Poland. He previously held academic positions in Poland, as well as a number of appointments as visiting professor, including the University Linkoping in Sweden, the University of Sydney in Australia, the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, the Warsaw School of Computer Science, Poland, and the VNU University of Engineering and Technology, Hanoi, Vietnam. From January 8, 2014 he is Professor Emeritus. Professor Stachowicz has published 7 books, 138 papers in journals, conference proceedings, and 20 patents and has been active in the research and teaching of fuzzy logic since 1982. He is a founder and President of the Soft Control Company. His work centers on artificial intelligence and soft computing, decision analysis and control. He is a co-author of the Fuzzy Logic Package for Mathematica. He is a senior member of IEEE and a consultant for large multinational corporations.
Other Retirees:
Paul Deputy, Communication Sciences & Disorders
Robert McFarland, Mathematics & Statistics, SCSE