Students repeatedly tell me that I shine in the field, that my lectures are well organized and informative and that I hold them to high standards but I am fair. I aspire to teach effectively about plants, but I try to do more than have students absorb plant biology content. I strive to help students cultivate a passion for plants that has the capacity to change their life. William Butler Yeats said it well when he wrote, “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” I often integrate service learning into my teaching such as being involved in the creation and tending of teaching gardens on campus. Service learning also occurred in the program I cotaught with political economist Matt Smith called Restoring Landscapes. In that program students collected specimens for a study being coordinated through the University of Washington herbarium to better document the distribution of weeds in the state. I take seriously the covenant as a tool for creating a learning community within which all of us can thrive.
Upcoming Programs:
W13 Botany: Plants and People (Undergraduate/All Level) – book list & schedule available at Nov 28 Academic Fair
Sp13 Picturing Plants with Ruth Hayes (Undergraduate/All Level) - book list & schedule available at March 8 Academic Fair
Past Programs:
| Intro to Plant Biology | Basic Botany: Plants & People | W 00, Sp 08, FW10/11 |
| Intro to Env. Studies | FW 96-97 | |
| Natural Histories | FWS 98-99; FWS 00-01 | |
| Picturing Plants | FWS 02-03 | |
| Up Close | Sp 2004 | |
| Plant Ecology+Taxonomy | Plant Ecology & Taxonomy | Sp 97, 00, 02, 05, 11 |
| Picturing Plants | Sp 03 | |
| Restoring Landscapes | Sp 07 | |
| MES Floristics | Sp 09 | |
| Natural History | Natural Histories | FWS 98-99; FWS 00-01 |
| Sense of Place | FWS 97-98 | |
| Jefferson’s American West | Sp 06 | |
| The Nature of Natural History | FW 06-07 |