Coauthor

Ronald B. Meyers coauthored chapter 4: Ethical Reasoning and Conservation Planning. Thank you, Dr. Meyers!

Ronald B. Meyers is an Associate Professor of Practice in the Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation at Virginia Tech. Here he teaches courses including Fish and Wildlife Conservation Policy, Environmental Ethics, and First-Year Experience in Natural Resources and Environment. His scholarly interests involve the social, economic, and environmental considerations in renewable energy siting, renewable energy policy, environmental ethics, and research methods. In his work he emphasizes meaningful public engagement and development of community decision-making resources. In addition, he advises students in the Virginia Tech Wind Turbine Siting Team. His BS, MS, and PhD were earned from the Ohio State University. He is active in local governance in Craig County, Virginia.

Reviewers

Undergraduate student reviewers Haley Billings, Josh Mottola, and Ty Stephenson greatly helped to improve the readability and make the textbook as student friendly as possible.

Many experts took time to review entire chapters and provide important background information. Many thanks go to the following individuals:

• Aaron Adams, Senior Scientist, Mote Marine Laboratory; Director of Operations, Bonefish and Tarpon Trust
• Kristen Anstead, Stock Assessment Scientist, Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission
• Culum Brown, Professor, Macquarie University
• Leandro Castello, Associate Professor, Virginia Tech
• Felicia Coleman, Professor, Florida State University
• Alfred “Bubba” Cook, Western and Central Pacific Tuna Programme Manager, World Wildlife Fund
• Andy J. Danylchuk, Associate Professor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
• Sascha Clark Danychuk, Co-Executive Director, Keepemwet Fishing
• Daniel C. Dauwalter, Fisheries Science Director, Trout Unlimited
• Solomon David, Assistant Professor, Nicholls State University
• Kafayat Fakoya, Senior Lecturer, Lagos State University
• Sarah Foster, Research Associate and Program Manager, University of British Columbia
• Francesco Ferretti, Assistant Professor, Virginia Tech
• Emmanuel A. Frimpong, Professor, Virginia Tech
• Anna George, Vice President of Conservation Science and Education, Tennessee Aquarium
• Larry M. Gigliotti, Assistant Unit Leader, South Dakota Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit
• Andrij Z. Horodysky, Associate Professor, Hampton University
• Holly K. Kindsvater, Assistant Professor, Virginia Tech
• Bernie R. Kuhajda, Science Program Manager, Tennessee Aquarium
• Mimi E. Lam, Affiliate Assistant Professor, University of British Columbia; Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow, University of Bergen
• Yvonne Sadovy de Mitcheson, Professor, University of Hong Kong
• Karen J. Murchie, Director of Freshwater Research, Shedd Aquarium
• Adrian Pinder, Associate Director, Bournemouth University Ecology
• Peter Potter, Publishing Director (former), Virginia Tech
• Andrew Rhyne, Professor, Roger Williams University
• Steve Sammons, Research Scientist, Auburn University
• Dennis Scarnecchia, Professor, University of Idaho
• Andrew Taylor, Assistant Professor, University of North Georgia
• D.G. Webster, Associate Professor, Dartmouth
• Shannon W. White, Post Doc, USGS

Editorial Team

Anita Walz, Managing Editor

Anita Walz is Associate Professor, Assistant Director of Open Education, and Scholarly Communication Librarian in the University Libraries at Virginia Tech. She received her MS in library and information science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has worked in university, government, school, and international libraries for over 20 years. She is the founder of the Open Education Initiative at Virginia Tech and the managing editor of several open textbooks adapted or created at Virginia Tech, many of which may be found here: https://vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/handle/10919/70959. She has provided overall planning, project coordination, rights negotiation, day-to-day management, coaching, problem-solving, oversight, and post-production marketing for this book.

Kindred Grey, Graphic Design, Editorial, and Production Assistance

Kindred Grey joined University Libraries as the Graphic Design and OER Specialist after receiving her B.S. in Statistics and Psychology from Virginia Tech in 2020. Her main focus is publishing open textbooks that are visually appealing, accessible, student oriented, and technologically advanced. She works one-on-one with students and professors to provide project coordination and editorial assistance. Kindred’s contributions have resulted in texts that are accessible to a wider range of readers and visually sophisticated in hopes that the conceptual information in these books is more clear and useful for students. She provided project coordination and editorial assistance, including transferring newly drafted text from a collaborative writing environment into the Pressbooks publishing software, formatting, editing, and proofreading.

Heather Blicher, Production Assistance

Heather Blicher is the Resident Librarian for Open Education with University Libraries. Prior to joining Virginia Tech in 2023, she held a broad range of roles that included OER and led to this move to focus on digital publishing technologies, marketing, and public findability. Her main area of interest is the intersection of OER and diversity, equity, and inclusion. Blicher is a curriculum designer and presenter for the ACRL OER and Affordability Roadshow, an alumni of ALA’s Leadership Institute, and a recipient of ACRL’s Distance Learning Librarianship Award. Heather provided coaching on accessibility, production assistance including proofreading, and post-production marketing.

Voices for Profiles in Fish Conservation

Many thanks to the following faculty and students who made the narrations of Profiles in Fish Conservation possible:

• Joseph Forte, Media Projects Manager, University Libraries at Virginia Tech
• Ayana Bullock, Student, Virginia Tech
• Giello Capate, Student, Virginia Tech
• Nathan Ferguson, Student, Virginia Tech
• Payton Harman, Student, Virginia Tech
• Emma Hultin, Student, Virginia Tech
• Leilani Hyatt, Student, Virginia Tech
• Jonathan Low, Student, Virginia Tech
• Andrew Luhan, Student, Virginia Tech
• Nisha Natarajan, Student, Virginia Tech
• Josie O’Brien, Student, Virginia Tech
• Priscila dos Reis Cunha, Student, Virginia Tech
• Emily Shawish, Student, Virginia Tech

Special Thanks

Publication of this work was made possible in part by grants from VIVA, the Virtual Library of Virginia (https://vivalib.org), and the University Libraries at Virginia Tech through its Open Education Initiative (https://guides.lib.vt.edu/oer/grants), which provides development assistance and financial support to Virginia Tech faculty who wish to use, create, or adapt openly licensed teaching materials to support student learning. The University Libraries also contributed faculty and staff support. Donald Orth’s contributions were supported in part by the U.S. Department of Agriculture through the National Institute of Food and Agriculture Program and Virginia Tech Polytechnic Institute and State University. Additional funding support was provided by the Thomas H. Jones Endowment.

I thank comedian Hannah Gadsby for the evocative image of “pufferfish moments,” where we become so overcome by anger that we float around in our own bubble of fury, unable to do much else with it.

Many others contributed directly and indirectly to my in-class presentation of specific topics, including Ross Boucek, Solomon David, Alissa Ganser, Matthew Miller, David Shiffman, Steve Sammons, and Annie Stevens.

Finally, my biggest thanks go to Valerie for her many significant contributions to this project. I am extremely grateful for her timely proof readings, critiques of organization and formatting choices, editing photos, organizing my home office during pandemic disruption, and providing indispensable advice and encouragement. I could not have undertaken this journey without her.