Published: July 07, 2008 11:54 am      

Markey honored by ACM peers

Professor named college's Faculty Member of the Year

CUMBERLAND - E. Lowell Markey has been named Allegany College of Maryland's Faculty Member of the Year by a panel of his peers.

Markey, a professor of political science and program coordinator, was recognized with the Sanner Award for Excellence in Teaching.

The award is granted each year to a full-time ACM faculty member for outstanding service to advisees and exceptional human relationship skills as well as teaching excellence.

This distinguished honor coincides with Markey's retirement from the college, but he plans to resume teaching on a part-time basis in the spring semester.

Markey, who joined ACM as dean of student and administrative services in 1988, began teaching part time at the college in the mid-1990s. He became a full-time faculty member in January 1995.

He now resides in Rehoboth Beach, Del., where he leads an outdoors-oriented life that includes work as a part-time seasonal naturalist at Delaware Seashore State Park.

On the inland bays of the park's undeveloped beaches, Markey conducts visitors on nature walks, sea kayak tours and 40-passenger boat excursions.

In addition to political science, Markey taught criminal justice classes, especially for students aiming for careers in law enforcement. He was also instrumental in the start-up of a legal assistant program in the office technologies department, where he also taught.

"The things I enjoy reading about are the things I like teaching," Markey said. "Things keep changing and I like to keep up.

"Contact with students, most of whom are really interested in advancing their lives, has been really gratifying."

He particularly enjoys his work when he sees learning put into practice.

"When the students apply things they learned, and they ask me about it, that's really exciting," he said.

Markey came to ACM with a varied background in law and college administration.

Prior to moving to Cumberland, he practiced law for more than two years with a Martinsburg, W.Va., firm. Before that, he spent five years in Elkins, W.Va., with the U.S. District Court of the Northern District of West Virginia.

He was for three years the law clerk to the district's chief judge, then was clerk of the court, one of only 95 such administrative posts in the federal system.

Before earning a juris doctorate from the West Virginia University School of Law, Markey worked for seven years at Potomac State College of WVU. He held administrative posts in student services, learning resources and institutional development.

Previous to his work at Potomac State, Markey was director of public relations at Alice Lloyd College in Kentucky and was assistant director of publicity at Wittenberg University in Ohio.

A native of York, Pa., he earned a bachelor's degree in English literature from Lycoming College and a master's degree in community development from the University of Louisville.

Markey and his wife, Terri, a registered dental hygienist, are the parents of a daughter, Michelle, who lives with her husband in Delaware, and a son, Nathan, a law student at Pace University in New York.

Miriam Sanner, a former ACM Board of Trustees chair, and her late husband, Chauncey, established the Sanner Award for Excellence in Teaching. She presented the award at a college staff meeting that concluded the 2007-08 academic year.