Mark V. Barrow, Jr.

Mark V. Barrow, Jr. is Professor and Chair of the Department of History, and Affiliated Faculty Member of the ASPECT Doctoral Program and the Department of Science and Technology Studies.  Working at the intersection of the history of biology, environmental history, and American history, he is author of two award-winning books: A Passion for Birds: American Ornithology after Audubon and Nature’s Ghosts: Confronting Extinction from the Age of Jefferson to the Age of Ecology. Since coming to Virginia Tech in 1992, he has created and offered nine new courses, and he has received three Certificates of Teaching Excellence, two XCaliber Awards for Technology-Assisted Teaching and Learning, a CLAHS Undergraduate Research Mentoring Award, two History Graduate Association Faculty Excellence Awards, and an Alumni Teaching Award. Developed in conjunction with colleagues in the Department of History, his Teaching Enhancement Project involves sharing his experiences organizing courses around the production of a class book, published at the end of the semester using an online print-on-demand service.  Asking students to work collaboratively to create an edited volume helps them develop a sense of professional identity, it builds vital research and writing competencies, and it creates a tangible product that survives beyond the confines of a particular class. It also offers a clearly sequenced structure for completing the work, with due dates of each step spread appropriately across the semester; it greatly enhances student engagement; it fosters the acquisition of collaboration skills; it encourages students to consider how to reach an audience beyond the instructor; and it transforms them from consumers into producers of knowledge.