faculty
Meet the faculty
Dr. Tih-Fen Ting
Assistant Professor, Environmental Studies Department Chair
Areas of Interest: Resource ecology and conservation, population-environment interactions, ecosystem management, and sustainability studies.
Phone: (217) 206-7876
Email: tting1@uis.edu
Tih-Fen Ting completed her Ph.D. in Natural Resources and Environment at the University of Michigan in 2003. She has a B.S. in biology and a M.S. in wildlife.
Her work before Michigan focused mainly on the ecology, behavior, and demography of various avian species (including Northern Spotted Owls). At Michigan, as a doctoral student, Professor Ting began an interdisciplinary exploration on issues regarding interactions between human populations and the environment. Her dissertation focused on how resource accessibility affects individual reproductive decision-making in China. At UIS, Professor Ting has been very active in campus sustainability initiatives.
Since 2001, Professor Ting has also been involved in an interdisciplinary project on public health and environmental integrity along the Danshui River ecosystem in northern Taiwan. In 2002, Professor Ting was selected as a LIFE fellow in the International Max Planck Research School.
Dr. Denise Keele
Assistant Professor, Environmental Studies
Phone: (217)206-7895
e-mail: dkeel2@uis.edu
Denise Keele holds a B.S and M.S in Forest Resource Management from the University of Tennessee and her Ph.D. in Environmental and Natural Resources Policy from SUNY-ESF in Syracuse NY. Her teaching interests include core natural resource policy courses which present a broad range of issues that illustrate the outcomes associated with various policy strategies, administrative and environmental laws, and agricultural systems. Dr. Keele’s research focuses on environmental conflicts and contentious natural resource issues in all policy arenas with a special focus on litigation on public lands.
Dr. Keele is a member of the Society of American Foresters (SAF), the American Political Science Association (APSA), and contributes her expertise as a member of the National Environmental Policy Working Group Section of the National Association of Environmental Professionals (NAEP) and as a member of the Education Committee for Springfield’s own Lincoln Memorial Gardens.
Dr. Dennis Ruez, Jr.
Assistant Professor, Environmental Studies
Director of Graduate Admissions
Phone: (217)206-8425
e-mail: druez2@uis.edu
Dennis Ruez, Jr., received his Ph.D. in geological sciences from The University of Texas at Austin in 2007 and joins UIS after spending three years teaching at Auburn University. Dennis is a vertebrate paleontologistwith research interests inthe relationship of past climate changeand fossil mammal communities. This includes the rigorous testing of paleoecological models and developing new quantifiable methods of examining past environmental change. To this end, Dennis has done field work throughout the US - coast to coast, and border to border. His work is published both in regional journals and international ones (including Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, Journal of Human Evolution, and Journal of Paleontology).
Jeff Payne
Visiting Lecturer, Environmental Studies
Phone: (217)206-7805
e-mail: jpain01s@uis.eduJeff earned a BS degree in Agricultural Communications from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a MA degree in Environmental Studies during the transition years when Sangamon State University became the University of Illinois at Springfield.
He has worked as a reporter, photographer and newspaper editor in Charleston and Mattoon, Illinois. He then went to work for the Illinois Department of Nuclear Safety here in Springfield, where he was an editor, writer, photographer and jack-of-all-trades. He entered the Doctor of Public Administration program in the spring of 2004, and is currently working to finish his dissertation this summer.
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Associated Faculty
Professors from the natural and social sciences and the humanities often lend their expertise to broaden the educational experiences of our students.
Harshavardhan Bapat,Gary Butler, Michael Lemke, Robert McGregor, Amy McEuen, William Siles, Roy Wehrle.
Emeritus Faculty
Not completely retired, these professors often lend a hand to teach classes in their field of expertise.
Dr. William D. Warren
Professor, Environmental Studies
Areas of Interest: Environmental planning, energy planning, transportation and land-use problems.
Phone: (217) 206-7877
Email: warren.william@uis.edu
Additional Emeriti Faculty:
Alexander Casella, Edward Hawes, Malcolm Levin, John Munkirs, Charles Schweighauser.
Adjunct Faculty
The department brings in individuals from the surrounding community whose professional expertise in a particular subject allows the students to broaden their educational experience.
Deanna Glosser, Tom Heavisides, Roger Kanerva, Mehdi Nassirpour, Mohammed Shahidullah, John Sherrill, Darlene Snyder, Lucas Westcott
