The Driftwood #33: Faculty Profiles

Humanizing Our Professors:
Keith West, Ph.D., Natural Science

Some might find fulfillment in a job that provides financial stability and lifetime experience. For Professor West, however, why have one exciting job when you can have several? Over the years, Professor West served as a National Park Ranger, oversaw an ice rink and bowling alley, served as a museum educator, and taught in every grade starting from third grade all the way to high school. He considers his crowning achievement to be his time at Marinette campus. As Professor West said, “The 20 years I spent on the Marinette campus have been the most rewarding of my career.”

West is a professor of natural science at the Marinette campus with many educational accomplishments. He got his Bachelor of Arts degree in history at Western New Mexico University, followed by a Master of Science in Geography at the University of Idaho, and finally, his Ph. D. in Geography at the University of Milwaukee.

With his two decades of experience at the campus and years of working in K-12, his biggest advice to teachers is to not let materials or methods get stale. Try new things without exiting your comfort zone. For the classroom environment itself, he advocates engaging with students and never being afraid of leaving behind old methods and trying new ways to interact with your students!

Whenever Professor West is not traveling; investigating landscapes, battlefields, and old buildings; or just reading a book by a stream, he is working hard on his career and his research. Currently, he is focusing on how environmental education can be more accessible to a wider range of people. For his work in Natural Science, one of his favorite parts of his subject is maps! They always grab his attention and can provide a plethora of information. Yet there is one thing about his field that always interested him. As he said, “I’ve always been fascinated by how certain groups of people come to identify so strongly with a particular place that they feel that it is necessary to defend it.”

No matter if he is driving around on a Zamboni or walking through the forests as a ranger, Professor West has been a profound influence on students over his decades of work. Yet, for Professor West, there is always more to learn out there. His favorite quote comes from a Shakespeare play Hamlet’s titular character. “There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” His own wisdom is just as incredible. As he said about the quote, “The universe is a much bigger place than any of us can conceive. Never believe that there isn’t anything more you can learn.” There is way more out there. Never stop learning.