In a cramped basement office in Silsby Hall, Education Professor Andrew Garrod rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he pondered his experiences as a teacher, community activist and scholar.
Staring into space, as if into the past, he spoke of growing up in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh as the son of an Anglican clergyman associated with the British military.
As the son of a clergyman, the grandson of a medical doctor and brother of former Commandant General of the British Royal Marines, Garrod noted the importance of service in his family.
He said his service interest is teaching, a life following that "is tremendously important to me," to "the notion of not living just for yourself but being of use to the wider community."
"I get great exhilaration from teaching, and I work at trying to be a better teacher," he said. "My full professional life has been spent teaching."
Nothing less than stellar
It has been 11 years since Garrod arrived here at Dartmouth, and his record at the College has been nothing less than stellar.
In 1991, he won the College's Distinguished Teaching Award, awarded by the graduating class, for his achievements in the classroom.
He said the award is "one of the things I am absolutely most proud of ... due to the fact that students picked it."
His emphasis on students and their experiences came through in his words, when he said "I find [young people's company] intellectually invigorating and personally rewarding."
Perhaps that was why the Class of 1993 selected him to deliver a speech on their Class Day, or why he is so comfortable as the chair of the Committee on Student Life.
Within the education department, Garrod teaches a variety of classes specializing in educational psychology and early development.
"I teach mainly the developmental courses here," he said. "I also take my turn in teaching the most well-known course, 'Contemporary Issues in Education.'"
Outside of the Education Department, Garrod teaches many experimental courses. This term he is teaching College Course 10: Coming of Age.
This course explores key aspects of growing up from an interdisciplinary perspective and is one example of Garrod's constant exchange with other departments.
Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, College Course 10 is run in concert with a course at Hanover High School, Garrod said.
"The aim of the program is to forge closer links between high schools and colleges so that they can mutually enrich each other's program," he added.
Within the College, Garrod regularly exchanges resources with the Psychology Department, bringing in guest lecturers to his classes and giving guest lectures in that department.
"I love interdisciplinary courses," he said, smiling. "In the fall, I am teaching a women's studies course."
Garrod also teaches at the graduate level.
"I teach in the MALS (Masters of Arts and Liberal Studies) Program, Garrod said. "I had an exciting summer ... we taught a course called 'Masculine Mystique,'" which was another experimental offering.
'Vitally important' courses
Garrod remained calm during his interview except for one instant.
When asked about the future of the Education Department at Dartmouth, Garrod became more stern in his outlook.
"We live in these very modest little surroundings in the Education Department," he said. "It tells you something of the College's priorities."
Although his department has frequently battled with the administration over its existence, Garrod said that he thinks "it offers vitally important courses."
"It would be tragic if the College made any move to discontinue the teacher prep program or the Ed. Studies component," he said.
"The least Dartmouth can do as an extremely privileged institution is to give back something to the American public," he explained.
"Wouldn't you want your child taught by someone who went to Dartmouth?" he asked.
A sense of service
Garrod brought his family's sense of service to Dartmouth and is one of the more active professors at the College.
Garrod has thrown himself headlong into his life's work as an educator and community leader, influencing those around him.
Looking around his office, this record of involvement is evidently commonplace in Garrod's life.
An award for the theater direction of "Hamlet" hangs proudly on the wall of his basement office in Silsby, and Garrod admits he has directed more than 40 high school student productions.
Glancing at a bulletin board filled with postcards from worldwide acquaintances, one understands that this man goes beyond the classroom.
He serves on the steering committee of the women's studies program, the Mellon Fellowships advisory board, and a number of other advisory boards that deal specifically with minorities.
Before going to Oxford as an undergraduate, Garrod served his mandatory term in the British Royal Marines where he was stationed in Cyprus during conflict.
Garrod cited this time in his life as "important to my development" and crucial "in coming to my political awareness."
Serving in Cyprus "made me highly skeptical about the notions of British dominance and empire," he said.
Garrod has since become a naturalized Canadian citizen.
Last term, in his capacity as COSL chair, Garrod delivered a speech at the rally that protested racial epithets that were found scrawled on the doors of residences belonging to Asian-American students.
"I thought students were wonderfully articulate and said things that needed to be said," Garrod said of the speeches given by handful of students.
The path to Dartmouth
Garrod, for all of his success in his field, did not follow the path most traveled on his way to Dartmouth.
Unlike many professors at Dartmouth, Garrod taught at the high school level before pursuing a future as a professor.
"I have had a very extensive career as a high school teacher," he said. "I was the head of the English Department at Saint John High School in New Brunswick," an inner-city public school in Canada.
Garrod said this time spent at the secondary level of education sets "you in good stead for working with Dartmouth students."
One of the legacies of his career as a high school teacher is a teaching style that forces student participation in the classroom, he said.
"I use all sorts of teaching methods," he added. "And I try to bring a lot of myself into the class."
Garrod said he likes to use small groups, interviews, essay revision, one-to-one contact with teaching assistants and lectures in teaching.
"I try and connect [the students' lives] with their learning," he said.
After following his path as a high school teacher to its end, Garrod decided to pursue an advanced degree in the field of education.
After earning his doctorate in human development from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, Garrod went on to teach at the Universities of Vancouver and Manitoba.
His doctorate added to his first degree from Oxford University in 1961, a bachelor's degree in English literature, which he earned before he emigrated to Canada to teach at the high school level.
Scholarly work
In addition to his classes and extensive community involvement, Garrod is in the midst of a barrage of scholarly projects.
"I do a lot of research," he said.
The first of many projects is an autobiographical look at Native Americans in higher education, which he is working on with Colleen Larimore, former director of the Native American Program at Dartmouth.
The study will examine Native Americans students who attended Dartmouth and how their College experience affected "their sense of native identity," Garrod said.
Another of Garrod's recent projects involved collecting data from a random sample of people in the Class of 1993 regarding "their development and experiences at Dartmouth," he said.
English Professor Priscilla Sears, who worked with him on this project, described Garrod as "committed" and "very dedicated to high ideals both in his scholarship and his teaching."
Sears currently team-teaches College Course 10 with Garrod and offered that "he is a very engaging person ... his lectures are very entertaining."
Yet another project that Garrod is working on will end up in a book called "Crossing Customs," and will deal with the experiences of international students in United States higher education.
For this project, Garrod has interviewed and maintained contact with international students at Dartmouth.
Frank Aum '97, who went to India with Garrod to work on the project, explained that he helped collect information in places like Delhi and Calcutta for "moral development research."
Garrod "has the vitality and energy of a 20-year-old," he said.
Aum, who has also interacted with Garrod in the classroom, said "he really knows how to direct a discussion ... he makes each person feel like their comments are valid."
In addition to these projects, Garrod published a book in 1992 called "Adolescent Portraits: Identity, Relationships, and Challenges" that is currently being used in more than 100 colleges and universities in the United States.
