Dick Richardson

R. H. (Dick) Richardson

Office: Patterson Lab, Room 607

Phones: 471-4128 (office); 371-1885 (home); 471-9651 (fax) Calls to the home phone may be taken by an answering machine. If you leave a message, please speak clearly and leave a phone number s.l.o.w.l.y so that I can understand what you say. Indicate times that you do not want me to return your call.

Office hours: Call me to make arrangements.

Personal goal in teaching

After teaching high school for a year, I changed my mind about many theories I held for learning and teaching. Since that time I have experimented with many different approaches to university-level teaching. It is no exaggeration to say that every semester is a new research project, built upon the experiences of the previous semesters. The result is that I learn a lot, but the students may not know how much I am learning, since many of the benefits come with new mistakes. Sometimes these seem to overshadow the improvements. In all parts of the course, however, I greatly appreciate feedback and suggestions from members of the class. I hope that this semester is a very rewarding experience for you. With all of the complexities -- teams of mixed graduate and undergraduate students, projects in the "real world", and distant education to UTEP -- this is one of the largest, and most exciting experiments to date, and I will especially rely on your help to make it successful!

I want students to learn things that will be of great personal value for the rest of their lives. I want them to realize that the "facts" and theories that they learn today are useful, but will be modified or discarded tomorrow. I want students to become life-long learners, and enjoy the process. I want students to be prepared to lead successful professional and personal lives, which requires skills and attitudes that will develop for many years. I hope that a course that I teach always will be a catalyst and aid to this development. As a result, each course that I teach will also be part of my personal continuing education. I learn a vast amount from teaching, since the students and their reactions to me and my efforts are primary catalysts.

This is the first course that I have had the ability to include essentially all of the content that I believe to be very important for the success of our graduates. With rare exceptions, most of the skills you will begin to develop are not being addressed in other courses on this campus. Therefore, from your perspective, this course is certain to seem strange. It is, but I hope that this is a good thing, and that you will increasingly appreciate these tools as you enter professional careers.

Special experiment for this semester

We are have a unique opportunity this semester to join with two classes taught at UT-El Paso, Communication, and Anthropological Ecology. The focus of these courses will be problems with natural resources and people along the Rio Grande border between Texas and Mexico. These courses compliment this course because we are greatly concerned with building effective teams, which requires good communication, and with utilizing the very best possible approaches to living in our ecosystem. In a region with two cultures meeting along an international border, the task is very challenging. However, through appropriate decision making processes in managing our natural resources success is possible. This class represents an expensive project, which is being sponsored by the ACITS (Academic Computing and Information Technology Services) on our campus, and by funds from the UT-El Paso administration. This is a new experience for all of us, faculty and students alike. I hope that you will help us make it a successful effort. Your ideas and comments are greatly appreciated.

Personal odds 'n ends

I'm very pleased that my wife, Pat, will be an informal part of the efforts this semester. She has been a great critic and supporter in several of my previous classes, and has elected to be active this semester. Feel free to visit with her, and you will learn some of the reasons that I consider her to be my best friend.

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We decided that one of our values was to work together. Pat's Ph.D. is in biochemistry, and her avocation is backpacking in the high tundra, rafting whitewater rapids, and flying gliders. My Ph.D. is in crop and soil science, genetics, and experimental statistics. My avocation is (or has been) scuba diving, hiking and working in deserts and tropical forests, training dogs and horses, and flying. In our research, we do a number of things, but one of them is gathering and analyzing data using aerial photographic techniques and computer analysis. I fly the aircraft (partly visible above) and Pat operates the cameras. She's an accomplished glider pilot and has been flying since she was a teenager living in France. She learned to fly while she was a student in France, and flew aerobatics in an open cockpit biplane. It was her "push" that induced me into aerobatic training for the safety of developing the unique skills that are involved. Your TA, James Wilson, is working on some of the analyses of data that Pat and I acquired over the Onion Creek Nature Preserve (east of "Bergstrom soon-to-be Austin's municipal airport"), and that may become a part of his dissertation research.

Pat and I have worked with a variety of governmental, NGO and private land managers over the past several years, ranging from the Bureau of Land Management and US Forest Service (US Public Land issues) and the Texas agencies such as the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, and the General Land Office. We presently are collaborating with the Texas Nature Conservancy, the National Wildflower Research Center, TP&WD, Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Asso., Texas Sheep and Goat Raisers Asso., Holistic Resource Management of Texas, and other organizations. Pat is a member of the EcoFair Board of Directors, and I am a former member of the Board of Directors of Holistic Resource Management of Texas, and Pat is currently a member of the Board of Directors. Several years ago I was the editor of the newsletter for the Native Prairie Association of Texas, and we presently are members. I recently served on the Texas Ag Summit III sponsored by a coallition of agricultural organizations and Texas A&M University. During the course of the class you will learn more of our professional "pedigree".

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