Teaching Academy Innovation Award. Mike DeMers OTLC (2007, NMSU), Ph.D. (1985, University of Kansas) is associate professor of geography. A winner of the 2010 James R. Anderson Medal of Honor in Applied Geography, he is the author of four books including Fundamentals of Geographic Information Systems (4th Ed) (Russian and simple Chinese Translations); GIS Modeling in Raster (Arabic translation), and GIS for Dummies. He is the co-editor of the UCGIS Body of Knowledge, considered the gold standard for GIS curriculum. DeMers' current NSF funded research deals with the use of persistent virtual environments for online course delivery and research collaboration. Such environments, like Second Life, are 3-D worlds where people interact as digital versions of themselves (avatars). Many universities, including NMSU, have been experimenting with such immersive environments for online education. Research shows they promote collaborative learning communities, provide a sense of 'being there'-called social presence-and allow faculty to create shared intellectual landscapes, which essentially are common visual and tactile experiences that help students gain a deeper understanding of course content.

2011 Teaching Academy Awards