Bruce G. Stewart

Professional and Educational Background

Natural history and related biological and wildlife fields have been the primary foci of my educational and professional endeavors for many years. Early in my career, I spent seven years conducting ecological baseline studies for an environmental consulting firm in Austin, Texas. I have been a biology faculty member at Murray State College for over a quarter of century where I continue as professor of biological sciences. Over the years, I have also taught occasional field-oriented courses at the University of Oklahoma Biological Station, East Central University in Ada, Oklahoma, the Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos in Cuernavaca (Mexico), and at the Universidad de Leon (Nicaragua). Sharing the wonders of the biological sciences through teaching is one of my passions, and I love the experience of learning and teaching in Latin American settings. Occasionally, I do also do some professional conservation work in addition to my teaching. At the time of this writing, for example, I am working with a conservation group in central Texas on an endangered species conservation project involving the Golden-cheeked Warbler. I like this a great deal because it keeps me in touch with current issues that I can then use to enhance my teaching, particularly in wildlife conservation classes.

I have a passion for guiding students to an understanding of scientific thought processes and how practicing such logical thought can enrich and improve their own life experiences. My students are challenged to critically examine their beliefs, biases, and opinions and to accurately categorize them as scientific, non-scientific, or pseudoscientific. Students are encouraged to recognize that spirituality, morality, and ethics are invaluable aspects of our human existence but that science also serves a distinctive and equally invaluable role in human society.

Perhaps my most unique course is "Mexican Ecology and Culture." This three-credit-hour course includes a weekly readings and discussion plus a two-week March field trip to the tropical coast of southwestern Mexico. There we join faculty and students from Mexican universities participating in the "Regional Network in Biological Resources" and "Intercambio Cultural Mexico-Estado Unidos" for study of field biology of vertebrates. This course promotes cultural understanding and appreciation in addition to excellent exposure to tropical field zoology. My good friends and respected colleagues, Topiltzin Contreras MacBeath and Humberto Mojica Mejia, at the Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas of the Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos have made this possible. I owe a great deal of gratitude for their friendship and enthusiasm in working together on such a program.