Academics
Faculty
Valerie S. Banschbach
Environmental Studies Program Director
Professor of Biology
B.A. Pomona College; Ph.D. University of Miami
View Dr. Banschbach's Curriculum Vitae
Courses Taught: Population Ecology; Animal Behavior; Biological Reading and Writing; Biology Senior Seminar; First-Year Seminar: Solving Environmental Problems; Tropical Ecology
Areas of Expertise: Behavioral and population ecology, especially of ants, bees and other social insects; conservation biology; evolution of social behavior; pollination biology and other plant-animal interactions
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Dr. Banschbach was a co-presenter at the 2007 annual meeting of the Entomological Society of America, giving a talk on "Ants as bioindicators: Does habitat edge affect community or social structure of north temperate deciduous forest ants?" In 2005 and 2006 she was awarded faculty development grants in for work on ant research in Costa Rica, and then at the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University and at Ohio State University.
On Teaching and Research: Dr. Banschbach's research in behavioral ecology and conservation biology focuses on specific questions that she can discuss in her courses, but the process of engaging in original research also informs her teaching. For example, designing ecological research studies is something she teaches students to do and that teaching is informed by her own working experience. Dr. Banschbach's discoveries also provide material for her classes. For example, she documented the function of tool use in a particular forest ant species in Vermont and she discusses this work extensively in her Animal Behavior class. Her teaching also leads her to new ideas for research. The Tropical Ecology course that Dr. Banschbach teaches in Costa Rica spurred her to spend part of her last sabbatical doing a research project on the use of ants as bioindicators in Monteverde, Costa Rica.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Banschbach owns a Staffordshire bull terrier (a breed known as the "Nanny Hound" in the U.K.). She is a big fan of bull breed dogs.
Learn more about Dr. Banschbach in her faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Cheray Science Hall 302A
Phone: 802.654.2633
Box 283
E-mail: vbanschbach@smcvt.edu
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Jeffrey M. Ayres
Professor and Chair of Political Science
B.A. University of Virginia; M.A., Ph.D. University of Wisconsin-Madison
View Dr. Ayres' Curriculum Vitae
Courses Taught: Introduction to International Relations; Politics of the World Economy; Global Governance; Global Problems; American Foreign Policy; Social Movements and Contentious Politics
Areas of Expertise: International Relations; Global Governance and Globalization; Social Movements and Contentious Politics; Canadian and North American Politics
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Dr. Ayres co-edited the forthcoming book, Contentious Politics in North America: National Protest and Transnational Collaboration Under Continental Integration (Palgrave Macmillan) and co-authored the article "Divergent Campaigns towards Global Health Governance: Canadian and U.S. approaches to the Global HIV/AIDS Pandemic," with Patricia Siplon (Canadian-American Public Policy, January 2007) and "Deep Integration and Shallow Governance: the Limits to Civil Society Engagement Across North America," with Laura Macdonald (Policy and Society, 2007).
On Teaching and Research: Dr. Ayres' research interests continue to filter into and enhance his teaching. His research and publication in such areas as global governance, globalization and transnational politics, and social movements and contentious politics, have shaped the organization (and sometimes the assignments) in such courses as Politics of the World Economy, Global Governance and Global Problems and Social Movements and Contentious Politics. At the same time, he has been able to experiment in class with some of his research ideas and theories and frequently flesh out new areas for future inquiry in the field.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Ayres' hobbies include: skiing; biking; surf-fishing on the beaches of North Carolina; reading widely; gardening; trying to support his perennially disappointing Virginia Cavaliers football and basketball teams; and listening to the Grateful Dead played loud.
Learn more about Dr. Ayres in his faculty spotlight.
Listen to Dr. Ayres' recent Vermont Public Radio commentary on Canadian politics.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 347
Phone: 802.654.2680
Box 362
E-mail: jayres@smcvt.edu
Personal Web site: http://academics.smcvt.edu/jayres/
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Richard Kujawa
Human Geography Minor Coordinator
Professor of Geography
B.Sc. Brunel University, London, UK; M.A., Ph.D. University of Iowa
Saint Edmund's Hall 359
Phone: 802.654.2488
Box 144
E-mail: rkujawa@smcvt.edu
Dr. Kujawa's current teaching profile is diverse. At the introductory level, he offers Introduction to Human Geography. At the intermediate and upper level, he teaches the systematic courses in Urban Geography, Political Geography and Economic Geography as well as more the applied courses The Geography of Water, Environmental Policy and Urban and Regional Planning.
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Nathaniel Lewis
Professor and Chair of English
B.A. Yale University; M.A. University of North Carolina; Ph.D. Harvard University
Dr. Lewis has written on western American literature, literary aesthetics, and nature writing. He is the co-editor of True West: Authenticity and the American West and the author of Unsettling the Literary West, which won the Western Literature Association’s 2004 Thomas J. Lyon award for Best Critical Book in the field. He serves on the editorial board of the Postwestern Horizons series for the University of Nebraska Press and is a past member of the Western Literature Association’s Executive Council. He is currently at work on a collaborative book, tentatively titled Morta Las Vegas: CSI and the Problem of the West. Dr. Lewis teaches courses on literary theory, environmental writing, and multiethnic literatures.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 335
Phone: 802.654.2308
Box 245
E-mail: nlewis@smcvt.edu
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Greg Delanty
Associate Professor of English
B.A. National University of Ireland
Courses Taught: Poetry workshops; Irish Literature; Genres: Poetry; Introduction to Literary Studies: Modern American Poetry
Areas of Expertise: Poetry and literature
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Mr. Delanty was born in Cork, Ireland and is a widely published Irish poet. His latest poetry collection is The Blind Stitch (Oxford Series, Carcanet Press and LSU 2002). His other published works include The Hellbox (Oxford Series, Oxford University Press, 1998), American Wake (Blackstaff/Dufour, 1995), Southward (LSU, 1992), and Cast In The Fire (Dolmen Press, 1986). His poems have appeared in American, Irish, English, Australian, Japanese, and Argentinean anthologies, including the Norton Introduction to Poetry. He also co-edited Jumping Off Shadows: Selected Irish Poetry (Cork UP, 1995) and The Selected Poems of Patrick Galvin (Cork UP, 1995). He has read his poems widely and was invited to give a recorded reading at The Library of Congress in 2002.
On Teaching and Research: Mr. Delanty enjoys teaching all of his classes, and he considers himself a lucky person to have a job teaching what he loves - the reading and writing of poetry.
Learn more about Mr. Delanty in his faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 341
Phone: 802.654.2824
Box 383
E-mail: gdelanty@smcvt.edu
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Bret Findley
Associate Professor of Chemistry
B.A. Willamette University; Ph.D. Dartmouth College
View Dr. Findley's Curriculum Vitae
Courses Taught: General Chemistry I and II; Physical Chemistry I, II, and III; Concepts in Chemistry; Chemistry Senior Seminar
Areas of Expertise: Experimental Physical Chemistry; Photo-Induced Electron Transfer Reactions; Molecular Spectroscopy; Physical Chemistry Pedagogy
On Teaching and Research: While Dr. Findley enjoys teaching all of his classes, Physical Chemistry II is a favorite, he says, because the subject material, quantum mechanics and spectroscopy, challenges students to recognize that Newtonian physics does not adequately describe nature. He finds that this recognition opens up new ways of perceiving their surroundings.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Findley enjoys sports with racquets (especially squash and tennis), running, hiking, skiing of all varieties, gardening, bridge, and playing with his labradoodle, Maddy.
Learn more about Dr. Findley in his faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Cheray Hall 212
Phone: 802.654.2218
Box 131
E-mail: bfindley@smcvt.edu