John has had a particularly strong year in 2000-2001 in each of teaching, scholarship and service. The activity this year continues the broad-based energetic activities that began the previous year, especially with respect to his teaching and service. In particular, John has worked very hard in renewing all of the courses he typically teaches over the course of the year based on the strategies that he found so valuable when he took the Center for Teaching and Innovation's Spring Breakout course on Process Education in May of 2000. Each of his courses was revised from top to bottom, from syllabus to projects and exams. While he did not emphasize fully the nature of those changes, the results are nothing less than spectacular as evidenced by this year's teaching evaluations. These show John to be the most improved teacher on our faculty and the unsolicited email compliments I've received regarding John and his courses from students who had taken a course from him earlier in their career are further evidence of a marked improvement.
John's energy has also allowed me to rely on him to bring our department into the present with respect to our WWW presence. Our department has not had a notable electronic presence to date, but our first web site is attractive and is serving as a vehicle to keep alumni informed about the activities and accomplishment of our faculty and current students. He has spent a great many hours in creating this site, and has had to devote whatever spare time he had to learning the skills necessary to create our site.
John's HIS 309 - World War I Aviation course has been particularly well-received and is a perfect example of how he has revised the manner in which he structures a course. Along with primary source readings, John has managed to collect a significant amount of material available on-line and students have access to a tremendous volume of audio and visual material. He has replaced a traditional paper with small group projects that have students investigate various aspects of early aviation and several of the presentations were accompanied by powerpoint or web material. While fewer papers were submitted, each was critiqued and returned for revision. The final papers were of high quality. Other faculty have remarked on the polish of work they've received in the Spring semester from students who took this course in the Fall.
John's remarkable improvement, from sixth overall in the department, to second overall in one year, is amply illustrated by the student comments which are reported (in total) in the Supporting Source Material folder. I attest to the accuracy and completeness of that report.
I applaud John's initiative in asking to be allowed to sit in on the summer orientation advisor training sessions. Our current advisement coordinator has also done that and the two of them are working on a comprehensive advisor training seminar and manual for the rest of the department.
"The Liberty Engine: America's Contribution to WWI's Air Effort," Cross and Cockade, The Journal for World War I Aero Historians, Volume 37, Number 1, (Winter) 2001, pp. 8-29.This journal is indeed the premier journal for WWI aviation historians and enthusiasts. The enthusiasts, in particular, hold the authors to very high standards and are never shy in conveying their disagreements and disappointments. That John was invited to write this paper, along with the accelerated timetable for revision and publication, is a testiment to his reputation in this area.