Eric Larsen

Eric Larsen refuses to play the lottery at work. He prefers the name game.

The technique works, he said, because he fell victim to it as an undergraduate at Kansas State University.

Part of the allure in engaging students during lecture is that Larsen finds it depressing if they seem bored by a subject he finds fascinating.

His interest in ecology developed at an early age, during family camping trips across the country that often involved mandatory visits to nearby museums. During one family vacation, Larsen’s parents brought their children to see an African elephant on display in the Main Hall of the Field Museum.

Over the course of these trips, Larsen developed an interest in the biology of aquatic insects—a curiosity that led him to conduct fieldwork throughout the United States, as well as Canada, Europe and Central and South America.

But it was earning his master’s degree at Utah State University and his doctorate at the University of Arizona that enabled Larsen to hone skills in his true area of interest: desert ecology.

A postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Iowa brought him back to the Midwest, where he now resides, following a teaching stint at Villanova University and his appointment to the Chicago faculty in 1999.

He returns annually to the Southwest to lead a two-week trek for biology majors that culminates with fieldwork in the Sonoran Desert.

Back on campus, Larsen draws students into the course material by pointing out when he finds an idea particularly interesting.

Still, the name game remains the most consistent part of his teaching method, Larsen said, because knowing students’ names makes them feel like a faculty member cares enough about them to invest in their success on a personal level.

Education

• PhD University of Arizona (1979 — 1986)
• Master of Science (M.S.) Utah State University (1975 — 1978)
• Bachelor of Science (B.S.) Kansas State University (1971 — 1975)

Companies

• Instructional Professor University of Chicago (1999)
• Assistant Professor Villanova University (1989 — 1999)
• Postdoctoral Teaching Associate University of Iowa (1986 — 1989)