Robert McDuffie, associate professor of  horticulture in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Virginia Tech, has been conferred the title of associate professor emeritus by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors.

The emeritus title may be conferred on retired professors, associate professors, and administrative officers who are specially recommended to the board by Virginia Tech President Tim Sands. Nominated individuals who are approved by the board receive an emeritus certificate from the university.

A member of the university community since 1978, McDuffie was a landscape architect and dedicated teacher. He taught hundreds of students in the area of landscape design through his courses in Small Scale and Residential Landscape Design I and II, the History of Landscape Architecture, and Landscape Construction.

In his role as a teacher, McDuffie organized more than 50 four-day field trips for students to visit gardens, nurseries, and landscape firms along the Atlantic coast, and organized and led the first Department of Horticulture student study-abroad to visit gardens in Europe, following that with more than 30 similar trips all over the world.

He also coached a dozen student teams that competed in the National Collegiate Landscape Competition.

He received many awards for his teaching, among them the William E. Wine Award for Teaching Excellence in 2008.

McDuffie was co-founder of the Hahn Horticulture Garden and served as its director for the last pwo years. He is a member of the American Society of Landscape Architects and the Virginia Society of Landscape Designers.

McDuffie earned his bachelor's degree in music from East Carolina University and a master of landscape architecture degree from North Carolina State University.

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