DoIT Remembers Professor Zane Berge

Fri, 07 Mar 2025 15:38:30 -0500

Recently, we were saddened to learn that Dr. Zane Berge, a long-time professor of Education at UMBC, passed away on Tuesday, February 25, 2025. He was 71.

Both nationally and here at UMBC, Dr. Berge was a pioneer in the use of educational technology, especially distance education. A few of DoIT’s staff remember working with him on the old Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) committee, which eventually became the Faculty Senate’s Computer Policy Committee (CPC); starting a distance education program in Emergency Health Services; and even completing a dissertation under his wise counsel.

Jack Suess, Vice President of IT and Chief Information Officer: Dr. Berge was very well respected in the online learning community when he arrived at UMBC. In that early period, just after the world-wide web (WWW) was launched, there was tremendous uncertainty as to the impact that the Internet would have on teaching and learning. Dr. Berge chaired our Technology Enhanced Learning committee and was both a practical and empathetic champion for experimentation and student-centered learning.

Jason Paluck, Enterprise Architect: “Dr. Berge was a delightful person, and absolutely instrumental in our initial Technology Enhanced Learning Committee proceedings as we worked with Tony Moreira, President Hrabowski, Graduate Dean Scott Bass and others in carving the path for online learning initiatives at UMBC. During the development of the Emergency Health Services online graduate program in the mid-1990s, the first accredited online program at UMBC, Dr. Berge played a pivotal role in guiding the departmental transition from traditional classroom-based education to the then-new frontier of online learning. His enthusiasm for innovation, mastery of his craft and enduring spirit will be sorely missed.”
John Fritz, Associate Vice President, Instructional Technology: “I first met Dr. Berge in 1999, when I switched from being UMBC’s director of media relations to becoming DoIT’s coordinator of web development. I was a naive, but eager webmaster and keen for all things online. But when I learned that the old TEL committee disbanded, I wondered why. So, he and others told me, which I included in our 2007-08 strategic plan for teaching, learning and technology (p. 27). And he liked it! Later, when I decided to pursue my Ph.D. on how UMBC faculty and students use Blackboard, he was a natural choice to be my committee chair. He asked great, tough questions, but didn’t make perfect the enemy of good. As a first generation college student, I’m forever grateful to him for shepherding me through the dissertation process.”