Roger Ekirch, University Distinguished Professor in the Department of History, received a 2022 Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV), one of only 12 faculty members so recognized this year. The SCHEV Outstanding Faculty Award recognizes “superior accomplishments in teaching, research, and public service.”

Ekirch’s scholarly work, which includes six books, has received international acclaim. In particular, his study of sleep patterns, examined in detail in At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past (W. W. Norton, 2006), has garnered him wide recognition. A fellow of the Society of American Historians at Columbia University, he served as Cambridge University’s first Paul Mellon Fellow and has received four National Endowment for the Humanities fellowships as well as a Guggenheim Foundation fellowship. Ekirch joined the Virginia Tech faculty in 1977; he earned his bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College and his master’s and doctoral degrees from Johns Hopkins University. He was appointed University Distinguished Professor by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors in 2019.