Alumni Association of Lakehead University

Alumni Profile: Thomas Ryan

Professor, teacher, and author

Dr. Thomas Ryan grew up in Georgetown, Ontario but his attraction to sports and hockey brought him to the Northwest in 1981 where he enrolled in Lakehead's Physical Education program and played for the Lakehead University Nor-Westers hockey team. Thom quickly immersed himself in campus life working as the LUSU Sound Manager, deejaying at events and serving as the President of Atikokan House residence. This capacity to do many different things well has made Thom into a leading educational theorist. Fortuitously, Lakehead was also the place where Thom met his wife, Leslie, who was studying social work.

After graduating in 1985 with an Honours Bachelor of Physical Education and a Bachelor of Education, Thom taught briefly in Thunder Bay area high schools before moving to the Kingfisher Lake Reserve to teach academic upgrading through Confederation College. This experience prompted him to obtain a Master of Education in Indian and Northern Education at the University of Saskatchewan in 1988. From 1987 to 2000, Thom worked as a substitute teacher, special educator, and physical educator at elementary and secondary schools throughout southern Ontario. He also successfully pursued a Doctorate of Education at the University of Toronto's Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (2001).

Thom was hired as an Assistant Professor at the University of Lethbridge's Faculty of Education in 2000. During this period he also began working as an on-line professor with Campus Alberta Applied Psychology. In 2002, Thom felt the urge to return to Ontario and he accepted a position at the University of Nipissing in North Bay where he is now an Associate Professor in the physical and health education program.

Thom's nomadic lifestyle and sense of spontaneity is matched by the breadth of his research interests. His desire to instill teaching excellence and facilitate professional development led him to publish three books: The Reflexive Classroom Manager, The Reflexive Physical Educator, and The Reflexive Special Educator. These handbooks provide a peek inside different aspects of teaching and The Reflexive Classroom Manager, now in its second edition, has been published all over the world. Thom has also contributed chapters to books such as Passing the Test: A Book of Readings on Provincial, National and International Testing in Canadian Public Schools and is lead author of Canadian Educational Leadership. He has an impressive list of articles that have appeared in national and international journals such as The New Zealand Journal of Teachers' Work.

Thom's intellectual curiosity is often piqued by his students’ research topics. He has delved into many key issues in contemporary education and is currently examining the phenomenon of cyberbullying. Thom plans to explore ethics education in his next book which will focus on ethics, values, and decision-making, or as he puts it, "doing the right thing." Dr. Thomas Ryan has become an important voice in the field of educational philosophy and practice and he credits Lakehead University for providing an essential part of the foundation of his career development. In his words, "Lakehead gave me a lot of good food for my mind."