Tribute to
Richard A. Schmuck
Richard A. Schmuck was a professor emeritus at the University of Oregon, where he made significant educational contributions by chairing the dissertations of 132 doctoral students from all parts of the world. He has also served on the faculties of the University of Michigan, Temple University, and Leuven University in Belgium, and was the first president of the IASCE, emphasizing the importance of cooperative learning and organization development.
Richard A. Schmuck's Contributions
We are saddened to announce the passing of Richard Schmuck, a distinguished pioneer in organization development and cooperative learning. As colleagues and friends of Dick, we wish to share our reflections on the importance of his educational contributions and some personal anecdotes about this extraordinary individual.
Dick Schmuck enjoyed a lengthy and impactful academic career. After earning his PhD in social psychology and completing a Post-Doctorate with Ron Lippitt at the University of Michigan, he joined the University of Oregon where he taught for three decades. During this time, he conducted research and authored over 200 articles and academic books, focusing on social psychology in education, with notable specialties in organization development and cooperative learning.
Much of Dick Schmuck’s writing was in collaboration with others, especially his long-time colleague, Phil Runkel, and his wife Pat Schmuck. Together, Runkel and Schmuck pioneered approaches to organization development within educational settings. Dick and Pat were well-known for their influential books on group processes in classrooms and strategies to foster increased accessibility in schools. Moreover, Dick’s works on action research were influenced by his extensive engagement in research related to organization development. He generously offered co-authoring opportunities to many doctoral students, including one of the authors of this tribute.
Throughout his tenure at Oregon, Dick taught over 1,000 students and chaired or participated in over 100 thesis and doctoral dissertation committees. Highly respected and loved by his students, he was a compassionate educator who listened intently and always valued student ideas. As a dissertation and thesis advisor, his guidance was invaluable, helping to refine vague ideas and provide clarity to disorganized writing.
In addition to his research and teaching, Dick provided consultation to thousands of educators across North America, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. In various school districts, he helped establish cadres of organizational consultants, trained to work collaboratively and enhance the effectiveness of peer consultations in their schools. His consulting initiatives aimed to promote cooperative work among teachers and to make effective use of the diverse talents within their educational environments.
Throughout his career, Schmuck's primary research focus was on organization development, yet he consistently recognized the deep interconnections between organization development (OD) and cooperative learning (CL). In his chapter entitled "Mutually Sustaining Relationships Between Organization Development and Cooperative Learning" in Brody and Davidson (1998), he explored how collegial relationships among school staff and teacher-student dynamics can mutually enhance each other. He concluded that the relationship between cooperative learning and organization development is reciprocal; when teachers collaborate more closely, they can engage in constructive feedback that improves their teaching strategies. This cooperative school culture upholds norms of respect for everyone's ideas, equal teamwork, openness, candor, and a nurturing atmosphere that promotes self-esteem for all.
For over a decade, Richard Schmuck played a vital role in the International Association for the Study of Cooperation in Education (IASCE), having been involved from its inception. In 1979, at the First International Convention on Cooperation in Education in Israel, he delivered a keynote address describing how organization development principles were used in a high school setting in Oregon to foster a healthy social climate. This initiative, dubbed "Students as Participants in School-wide OD," illustrated how OD techniques could empower students, teachers, and administrators to collaboratively create a positive educational environment.
He was elected the first president of IASCE and led the organization through its formative years. Notable leadership examples include the 3rd IASCE Conference in Saskatchewan in 1985, where he diffused a tense atmosphere by advocating for a more inclusive seating arrangement between the Board of Directors and members, transforming hostility into collaboration.
At the 8th IASCE Conference in July 1994 at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon, Dick delivered a widely acclaimed presentation that likened IASCE's growth to that of a 15-year-old adolescent. He recognized and celebrated the contributions of all 54 conference presenters, fostering a sense of community and shared values within the IASCE.
Despite facing internal conflicts within the IASCE Board in 1994-1995, Dick Schmuck was called upon for his expertise in organization development to help navigate the disputes. He implemented an OD consultation process, facilitating productive discussions and guiding board members to resolve conflicts constructively.
Additionally, Dick played an instrumental role in the early publications of IASCE, contributing a chapter on "Students as Organizational Co-Participants" (Schmuck, 1980) for its first volume and serving as co-editor for its second volume, Learning to Cooperate, Cooperating to Learn (Slavin et al. 1985).
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*Portions of this appeared in our chapter, "About Richard Schmuck's Contributions to the Study of Organization Development and Cooperation in Education," In N. Davidson (Ed.) (2021). Pioneering Perspectives in Cooperative Learning. That chapter also contains reminiscences from Dick Schmuck’s remarkable personal memoir.