Dennis Riley
Title: Professor Emeritus
Email: driley@uwsp.edu
Ph.D., University of Michigan
M.P.A., Syracuse University
B.A., Willamette University
Introduction to American Politics, Introduction to Public
Administration, The American Presidency, Public Personnel
Administration, Government Finance, American Political Thought, and
Administrative Law. An informal set of descriptions of these courses is
available upon request.
Coming to the realization that to find a viable career he would have to
find one in which a lack of talent would be easy to conceal or largely
irrelevant, Riley quickly went from baseball player to baseball coach to
baseball announcer to lawyer to city manager. Amazingly, he had made
this remarkable progression by the age of 21 and without ever actually
performing any of them as a professional. Well, he did get paid $10 per
game as play by play man for Lodi California’s Post 22 American Legion
baseball games in the summers of 1963 and 1964. Fortunately, the
intervention of Professor Edwin James Stillings in the spring of 1965
brought Riley around to the idea of becoming a college professor. Hence
the PhD in 1971 and stints at Gonzaga University from 1969-1973, the
University of Minnesota, Duluth from 1973-1978, and at the University of
Wisconsin-Stevens Point from 1978 to the present. Along the way, he was
lucky enough to win UWSP Excellence in Teaching Awards in 1980 and
1998, the Eugene Katz Award from the College of Letters and Science in
2007, and to be voted Best Professor on campus in an on line poll
conducted by the Pointer in the spring of 2009.
Prof. Riley was recently voted the "Best Professor in Point" by the UWSP Pointer newspaper.
Bureaucracy and the Policy Process by Dennis Riley and Bryan Brophy-Baermann. (Rowman Littlefield, 2006).
Relatively speaking, the following people make me who I am:
Pam Becker. We married in 1997. I am very glad about that. I’m pretty sure she is, too.
Then there are three magnificent daughters and five incredible
grandchildren. Oh yeah, and two fine sons in law. They are listed below
by family groupings:
Emily Sipiorski. Emily is married to Justin Sipiorski (Biology Professor
here at UWSP), is a fine violinist, fantastic cook, and great Mom. Her
daughter Sophie (15) was our first grandchild and was the subject of
hundreds of stories told to dozens of classes during the past decade.
Her son Hugo is a year old and nearly ready to lead Grandpa on many a
merry chase. Both Emily and Justin have Bachelor’s degrees from UWSP.
Ann Galloway. Ann graduated with honors from UWSP (Psychology) and
completed an MS in Psychology from Western Washington University. Chewed
up a bit by nearly a decade in social service work, she is about to
begin preparing to be a registered nurse. She currently lives in
Southern California.
Helena Collins-Price. Helena is married to Scott Price, actor, juggler,
stilt walker, and, alas the need for money what it is, trainer/account
representative for Skyward, the Stevens Point educational software
company. Helena is an actor and singer who worked for Star Trek the
Experience in Las Vegas for a few years. She also worked for a bank in
Las Vegas, but Star Trek is more fun to talk about. She and Scott have
three magnificent boys, Aiden who is 11, Jonah who is 7, and Liam who is 4. Liam has already led Grandpa on enough merry chases to last
the old guy for a while, but Hugo (3) is so close to sharing that role with
Liam that Gramps has his work cut out for him. Oh yeah, Helena’s
Bachelor’s degree is from Illinois Wesleyan and Scott’s is from Stephens
College in Missouri. Scott is a certified public school teacher –
Illinois State – with several years of experience in Las Vegas schools.
Helena plans to pursue a degree in Communicative Disorders here at UWSP.
I cannot begin to list all of the great students I have taught in my 32
years here. Seriously, I can’t. There have been so many. There still are
so many. There will even be many more. Thanks to all of you.