Alumni News
We Need Your Alumni Career Summaries !
The Department of Geography needs your story for our Alumni Career section of the department website. We would like to hear about your career, research, field travel, awards, and professional life. We would especially be interested in stories that tell how your work here at Science Hall helped in your career path. Thanks to those who have already sent in stories!
The Alumni Career section of the website is a permanent feature and is encouraging to new graduate students and early career professionals. Submittals of any length and style are welcome, as well as photos (such as that at right of Naijun Zhou PhD '05) or links to other sites about you. The email address for submittals is news-madgeognews@geography.wisc.edu or use the online form.
Tom Small
Tom Small (PhD '73) writes that after five years as Chair of the Department of Geography at Frostburg State University (Maryland), I stepped down in July to allow newer (and younger) blood to take over the helm of the department. During my five years as Chair we moved to a completely renovated building we had an input in designing (including mapping science, environmental engineering, hydrology, and soil laboratories), acquired hardware and a wide variety of software current with business world standards (including six total stations), got two additional concerns to move onto campus (USGS and VARGIS) to complement the Maryland Bureau of Mines who has been with us for the past 20 years, and garnered $1.3M dollars in grants to lead the FSU campus in the latter regard.
Fran retired this past June and I plan to take that step this coming June. After 36 years of full time university teaching and visiting professorships at several other universities, it is time to refocus energies and get some long lingering projects underway. Good to hear from you. My best wishes to all in the department. Say "hi" for me to Jim Knox and Bob Ostergren.
Steph Larsen
Steph Larsen (MS '03) has recently moved to Washington, D.C. to work as the Policy Organizer with the Community Food Security Coalition, a non-profit that advocates for sustainable agriculture, anti-hunger, and nutrition issues. She is in love with her new job and her new city, and her job is a mix of grassroots organizing, tracking activity on Capitol Hill, and meeting with legislative staff. She misses everyone in Science Hall and the Farmers Market in Madison, but is quickly getting to know her local farmers at her Mount Pleasant neighborhood market. She can be reached at stephanielarsen@gmail.com
Matthew Edney
On July 1, Matthew Edney (PhD '90) succeeded the late David Woodward as Director of the History of Cartography Project , while on leave from his regular faculty position at the University of Southern Maine. You can read the longer article on this at http://www.geography.wisc.edu/News/matthew_edney.htm . He is also editor, with Mary Pedley, of Volume Four of the series, Cartography in the European Enlightenment.
In addition to several conference presentations in Europe, the U.S.A., and Canada, he has recently published "The Origins and Development of J. B. Harley's Cartographic Theories", a special issue of Cartographica 40, nos. 1-2 (2005): Monograph 54, and "Putting 'Cartography' into the History of Cartography: Arthur H. Robinson, David Woodward, and the Creation of a Discipline," in Cartographic Perspectives no. 51 (2005): 14-29.
Tim Cresswell and Carol Jennings
Tim Cresswell (PhD '92) (users.aber.ac.uk/tjc) and Carol Jennings (MS '90) now have three children with the birth of their daughter, Madison, on June 25th 2004. Tim has recently published Place: A Short Introduction (Blackwell, 2004) and his new book On the Move: Mobility in the Modern West (Routledge) is to be published in Spring 2006. They live in Aberystwyth in west Wales where Tim is a professor of geography and Carol is a midwife. Their eldest son, Owen (12), is a keen geographer. To early to tell with Sam (6) and Madison.
Roger DuBois
Roger N. Dubois (MS '70; PhD '72) retired at the end of the 2005 spring semester after serving 30 years at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County (UMBC). He plans to continue his coastal research, to travel with Pat, and to work on his home, which has been neglected for well over a decade.
Serge Dedina
Serge Dedina (MS '91) and WilDCOAST recently brokered a deal to protect 120,000-acres of land surrounding Laguna San Ignacio, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in partnership with a local agrarian cooperative or ejido. This is the largest community-based conservation area in Mexico. The deal is part of an ambitious one million acre conservation project that will provide economic development trust funds for ejidos that manage theirs land sustainably.
Serge has now returned WiLDCOAST to the subject of his M.S. research--the political ecology of the Tijuana River Valley. WiLDCOAST has launched a major initiative to clean up the Tijuana River funded by the Calfornia Endowment and the Alliance Health Care Foundation.
Serge has published op-eds on the U.S.-Mexico border environment in the San Diego Union-Tribune and Voice of San Diego. He has also published articles in Surfermag.com, surfingthemag.com and The Surfer's Path. Serge enjoyed meeting California's Governor Schwarznegger on a trip to Sacramento in the summer to talk about preserving California's state parks.Serge's environmental work with WiLDCOAST was covered by The New York Times, Sunday Times, The Guardian, Los Angeles Times, BBC, San Diego Union-Tribune, National Public Radio and in newspapers in Israel, Germany, France, Thailand, and India.
Serge and Emily Young (MS '90) continue to enjoy life on the beach in Imperial Beach, California, with their sons Israel and Daniel. Recent adventures include hiking and river rafting in Colorado as well as surfing in Mexico. Their new family Video Channel is at:: http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos.php?user=Surferserge and they can be contacted at 652 Donax Ave, Imperial Beach, CA 91932 or sdedina@wildcoast.net .
Charlie Montemayor
Charlie Montemayor (BA '51) writes: Whenever I get a chance to see it I enjoy reading the UW-Madison Geography Newsletter. Although it has been 57 years since I first took courses from Professors Finch and Trewartha, and a few years later from Arthur Robinson, it's nice to learn from the newsletter that their names are remembered, honored and have such an enduring quality.
I went on after geography to study urban planning and served for a while as the city planner of Green Bay, later as planning director of Manitowoc County, and finally as Executive Director of the Dane County Regional Planning Commission. In that position I had the pleasure of meeting and obtaining the services of Onno Brouwer who updated our mapping for the commission.
I have been retired for 15 years and living for the last 10 years in Guanajuato, in the central highlands of Mexico. I recently wrote a book: Retirement Tales: Two Gringos Living in Mexico, (available at iUniverse or Amazon). This is a lighthearted treatment of retirement in Guanajuato, a place we consider a magical city, but throughout the book I have tried to do justice with the facts. I like to think my training in geography at UW 57 years ago helped to this end. I can be reached at: charles@montemayor.org .
Makram Murad-al-shaikh
Makram Murad-alshaikh (MS '83) writes: I am still working as a senior instructor at ESRI, Inc. Educational services Department, since 1992. I am course manager and author of the "Using Maplex and Cartography with ArcGIS" courses. I am co-author of the Introduction to ArcGIS 1 & 2, and Working with the Spatial Analyst extension to ArcGIS courses. Since 1993 and in every ESRI's International Users Conference, I have been presenting a 90-minute Basic Principles of Cartographic Design workshop, and have been involved in the Map Gallery as a map judge. I was honored one time when one of my former professors, Joel Morrison, attended my 90-minute presentation. Since 1996 I have been teaching (part-time) GIS Cartography courses in the GIS certification programs in nearby colleges and universities (San Bernardino Valley College, Riverside Community College, California State University - San Bernardino - Extended Learning, University of Riverside - Extension, and Loma Linda University - Public Health Dept). You can see a longer update at the Alumni Career page.
Ann Legreid
Ann Legreid ( PhD '85) recently attended two training institutes for university administrators, i.e. the health Departments Workshop, sponsored by the AAG and held at Freeport, Maine, and the month-long Summer Institute for Women in Higher Education Administration, held at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania. She is chair of the Department of Political Science and Geography at Central Missouri State University in Warrensburg. In her tenure at CMSU she has led the way in grant writing for the GID lab, the development of a GIS minor, and major overhaul of the geography program and facilities. She has involved students in numerous service education projects including work on a historic district. She continues her research on Nordic Americans, and is now working on an atlas project with colleagues at two other universities. She can be reached at: Dr. Ann M. Legreid, Chair, Department of Political Science & Geography, Central Missouri State University, Warrensburg, MO 64093, 660-543-8835.
Norman Thrower
As the second (after James Fannery) to complete a PhD in cartography under Professor Arthur H. Robinson at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1958, Norman Thrower remains extremely active professionally. He was recently invited to present a paper at a symposium in Istanbul by Rear Admiral Nazim Cubukcu, Hydrographer of the Turkish Navy. The subject of the conference was Pirl Reis, Ottoman Admiral and cartographer (1465-1554). For failing to engage the newly-arrived Portuguese in the Indian Ocean, Piri Reis was ordered to be executed in his 90th year by Sultan Seleyman. It was a strategic withdrawal, and Piri is now a great hero in Turkey. Norman is presently working on a projected 3rd edition of his highly successful book Maps and Civilization: Cartography in Culture and Society (also in Spanish and Japanese translations, with other foreign editions proposed) for the University of Chicago Press. Norman is a Life Fellow of the Society for the History of Discoveries of which he was President and of the California Map Society of which he was Founding President. For this last Society he has recently written an autobiography: From the Stone Age to the Electronic Age: The Saga of a Cartographer in the Twentieth Century and Beyond. He recently received the esteemed Constantine Panuncio award from the ten campus University of California for being the most productive Emeritus Professor in the system.
Sara Rauscher
Sara Rauscher (PhD '04) writes: "I have been working as a Staff Associate (equivalent to a Post Doc) at the International Research Institute (IRI) for Climate Prediction at Columbia Unversity ( http://iri.columbia.edu ) since October 2003. I am part of a project that is investigating the use of a regional climate model to improve seasonal climate prediction over tropical and subtropical South America. Last summer I was invited to present results from this research at the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, Italy. My research group is also working on analyzing general circulation model output for the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report to determine the possible nature and extent of climate change over South America." Sara's dissertation was "Scale Dependent Climate Change Due to Deforestation in Amazonia" and she was advised by Waltraud Brinkmann.
Lyle Gorder (1923-2005)
Lyle Gorder (MS '49) passed away in Tucson, Arizona on July 6, 2005. Lyle received his BS in Economics and his MS in Geography at UW-Madison. Lyle was a former professor of Geography at the UW-Manitowoc campus and at UW-Green Bay from 1954 to 1980. Lyle was passionate about all things geographic, and he enjoyed lecturing, speaking to community groups, and taking part in service projects related to his professional expertise. He was a noted expert on the geography and geology of Wisconsin and the Upper Midwest. Lyle assisted U.S. Rep Henry Royce to develop the Wisconsin Ice Age Trail.
Lyle's wife, Christine, writes that the family has suggested that memorials in Lyle Gorder's memory be made to the Department of Geography through the UW Foundation (http://www.uwfoundation.wisc.edu) . The Gorder home address is 6419 E. Calle de San Alberto, Tucson, AZ 85710.
