Nearly 29 years into my teaching profession, one of my graduate students came to me in a flurry of excitement, asking me to run (not walk) to our Geography lab where he revealed a project that would revolutionize my teaching. Collecting aerial images with a drone, he had solved a fundamental problem of integrating images and data for mapping landscape change. Emerging from these efforts was my commitment to build a critical bridge for undergraduate and graduate students to work together with the goal of “learning how to learn” while utilizing drone mapping to advance knowledge of surface processes on Earth.

I am honored to receive the Distinguished Teaching Award and excited to continue mentoring students who are tackling challenges in the environmental sciences using scientific reasoning and contemporary technology.