In Memoriam: Daniel Eugene Hursh March 11, 1947–July 22, 2015

One of the founding editors of the professional journal Education and Treatment of Children (ETC) and West Virginia University Professor Emeritus Daniel Eugene Hursh passed away peacefully at home in Morgantown, WV, on July 22, 2015, at the age of 68. Dan was a gifted and respected academic whose legacy will continue through the many students he taught and mentored in his distinguished career. Above all, he was a kind and loving father and grandfather who treasured the time he spent with family. Dan earned his Ph.D. in Developmental and Child Psychology from the University of Kansas. He served as an assistant professor of psychology at Western Michigan University and as a research psychologist and director of school programs at the Carolyn Center in North Carolina, before finding his long-term academic home in 1975 at West Virginia University.

At the time of his retirement in 2014, Dan was serving as a professor and department chair in WVU’s Department of Learning Sciences and Human Development, and as an adjunct professor in the Department of Psychology. He was a teacher of teachers, and his students are carrying on his legacy of educating children throughout the world.

He was nationally known for his expertise in the area of behavior analysis and interventions; conducting research on and teaching students about designing positive supports for challenging behaviors using Applied Behavior Analysis; developing academic knowledge and skills through direct instruction; and applying evidence-based practices in education via the application of the Competent Learner Model with both typical and atypical learners. He engaged in a variety of collaborative projects with colleagues within the College of Education and Human Services as well as in Health Sciences and Psychology. He most recently helped to design the College’s new graduate program in Applied Behavior Analysis. He chaired and served on numerous doctoral committees and maintained close relationships with many individuals who went on to become leaders in higher education and business across the country.

Among his many accomplishments, Dan was one of the founding editors, along with Rob Hawkins, WVU Professor Emeritus, of the professional journal Education and Treatment of Children (ETC). ETC began publishing applied behavior analysis manuscripts in 1968 in the form of School Applications of Learning Theory (SALT). Rob Hawkins and Howard Farris at Western Michigan University developed SALT as a vehicle for publishing very practical solutions to educational problems. They sought to encourage teachers and others involved in the education and treatment of children to document the effects of their efforts and share this documentation with others.

Rob moved to West Virginia University in 1974, taking the publication of SALT with him. There he involved one of his students, Andy Reitz, and later a faculty colleague, Dan Hursh, as associate editors. In 1976 Rob turned over the editorial duties to Dan, and a year later negotiated the transformation of SALT to ETC with support from the Pressley Ridge Schools in Pittsburgh. At that time Bob Dickie of Pressley Ridge and California University of Pennsylvania joined Dan as co-editor. Clarke Luster, Pressley Ridge’s Executive Director, was instrumental in arranging for the support needed to continue and expand publication as ETC. Andy Reitz moved to Pressley Ridge and became ETC’s first managing editor. ETC has continued to evolve with its editorial review board, associate editors, section editors, and senior editors drawn from the ranks of well-known behavior analysts involved with the education and treatment of children.

The goal of ETC has been to improve services for children and youth by publishing well-documented procedures, programs, literature reviews, data-based case studies, discussion articles, and book reviews providing useful information for practitioners and those who work with practitioners. ETC annually publishes a special issue drawn from the proceedings of the Teacher Educators for Children with Behavior Disorders Conference. ETC has published important special issues dealing with numerous topics of special relevance to applied behavior analysts. These have...