Dr. Duane Keown, who retired from the University of Wyoming 11 years ago, dreamed of becoming a professional baseball player, but became a professor of science education instead.
Keown was raised in a small town in Colorado. He said when he learned science in high school, it did not seem that important, “but it didn’t take long in college.” Dr. Lawrence Walker was his biology professor in college.
“I came out of there thinking ‘Hey, biology has got a lot of answers,'” Keown said. “He really seemed like he could relate what was happening in biology to the future. When he would talk about what some of the first scientists had discovered, I would think ‘My God. How did he ever figure that out?’”
Even though Keown graduated at the top of his class in high school, he said he felt like he was not really a student. College was when academics finally took hold of him. “I can remember the names of every freshman professor I had because I just saw that all of a sudden school was important.”
In the ‘70s, the United States was trying to catch up with Russia in the realm of science. The National Science Foundation put together a scholarship that allowed high school science teachers to return to college. The scholarship paid well so Keown decided to attended Ball State University. He said he remembers that after his tuition and books were paid, what he took home was $17 a month less than what he was making as a teacher.
He had planned on returning to Colorado after he finished school, but jobs were scarce so he put in his application at UW. His education at Ball State had prepared him to be a biology professor in a small college, but “the job here was actually in the lab school at the college of education,” he said.
“I am most passionate about educating to public concerning our environment,” he said. “It just seems like it is so overlooked. Kids take a biology class and they come out of there knowing a little bit about the Krebs cycle and a little bit about photosynthesis, but they never tie it to themselves.”
“If I had a passion for anything it would be how tied we are to the environment. Here we are prancing around on the Earth thinking we’re champions when we’re really just a part of it,” he said.
Since the time Keown attended school at Ball State, America has caught up with Russia in the science race and science scores on tests have improved. “I think there are a lot of folks who would say you can’t throw money at it. Right now, Wyoming is throwing a lot of money at science education.”
Although Keown has a list of honors and accolades as long as his arm, he said he is most proud of the work he did helping educators implement environmental and conservation education. He worked with a doctoral student who had a plan to spread conservation education throughout the state. “His plan was to bring teachers into the university from high schools and put together activity manuals that they could take back and do with their classes at Wyoming high schools,” Keown said.
After the student he was working with graduated, Keown took over. “Wild Wonderful Wyoming: Choices for the Future” is the result. The program included workshops for teachers and manual that contained a series of activities teaching children about the natural world and the humans place within it.
