Dr. Bob Hickey

Ph.D. University of Idaho

Interests and expertise: Environmental Science and modeling, ore deposit geology, and erosion modeling. 

Bob is a Geologist/GIScientist who relocated to CWU from Western Australia in 2000.  While Down Under, he worked in the Department of Spatial Sciences at Curtin University in Western Australia as a Lecturer and later a tenured Senior Lecturer (1997-2000). Before that, he was an Assistant Professor of Geography/Geology at the University of West Georgia (1994-1996).  

One of Bob’s nightmares is doing the same thing year in and year out.  As a result, his career at Central has been as varied as possible, not only playing geography faculty, but serving as director/developer of the GIS Certificate program (2002-2013, 2015-2018), President of United Faculty of Central (2006-2013), doing strategic planning, chairing various committees, serving on Faculty Senate, working with people from all over campus, and developing/coordinating a new Certificate in Science Dissemination.  He’s also escaped to Hungary and Australia a couple of times for faculty exchange or research leave.

His teaching largely revolves around Environmental Science, though he also teaches Our Dynamic Earth, GIS classes, and others in an outside Geography. 

His research revolves around GIS and remote sensing applications in environmental science and resource management. Bob is the author or co-author of over 25 peer-reviewed papers and numerous other publications and presentations. 

Bob holds a PhD in Geography from the University of Idaho (1994), a MS in Geology from Washington State University (1990), and a BS in Geology from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania (1987).

In his spare time, he can be found chasing his dog in the hills, pumping iron, making sawdust in his woodshop, or working with various professional groups including the Smithsonian, AAAS, and the Institute of International Education.  There's also his computer gaming addiction, though it's not nearly as bad as it used to be.

Visit his real website at http://www.onlinegeographer.com