UA Board of Trustees Approves Kurtz appointment to Distinguished Professor

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — The University of Arkansas Board of Trustees has approved the appointment of David L. Kurtz, university professor and holder of the R.A. and Vivian Young Chair, to distinguished professor, effective August 1, 2005. Kurtz is a UA alumnus and a member of the marketing and logistics faculty in the Sam M. Walton College of Business.

“Dr. Kurtz has brought national recognition to the University of Arkansas for his market-leading textbooks in business and marketing,” Dean Doyle Z. Williams said. “This wonderful acknowledgement of his achievements is well deserved. Many students, around the globe, have learned from and benefited from Dr. Kurtz’s textbooks”

According to the University of Arkansas faculty handbook, distinguished professor is conferred on “those individuals who are recognized nationally and internationally as intellectual leaders in their academic disciplines for extraordinary accomplishments in teaching; published works, research, creative accomplishments in the performing arts; or in other endeavors, and who have gained such recognition for distinction at this or another university prior to appointment as distinguished professor.”

Some 6 million students have studied from Kurtz’s textbooks. Kurtz is the author, co-author, or editor of 51 books and more than 133 articles, papers, cases, and proceedings. Two of his books are market-leading textbooks, “Contemporary Business,” and “Contemporary Marketing,” which were co-authored with another Walton College graduate, Louis Boone. Boone received his doctorate in marketing along with Kurtz in 1969 and was professor emeritus and former holder of the Ernest G. Cleverdon Chair of Business and Management at the University of South Alabama (USA), Mobile, Ala., when he passed away this past January.

“Contemporary Marketing” was published in 1974 and “Contemporary Business” in 1976. Boone and Kurtz, through the years consistently revised the text, updated the examples and later added computer and Web-based instructional aids. “Contemporary Marketing” is now in its 12th edition. Both books have received the prestigious Williams Homes McGuffey Award for textbook excellence and longevity.

Thomas Jensen, the Wal-Mart Lecturer in Retailing and chair of the marketing and logistics department, said: “What was unique about the textbooks is that Dr. Kurtz and Dr. Boone actually wrote for students. At that time, it was considered to be risky to write for students as compared to writing for the faculty that would make the textbook adoption decision. In those early days, Kurtz and Boone did what some would classify as strange things, including cartoons to keep students interested. They experimented with anecdotes at the beginning of chapters as well as setting off topics or issues from the main text. They were also the first authors to pair textbooks with videos.”

Kurtz received a Bachelor of Arts degree in business management from Davis & Elkins College at Elkins, W.V., in 1963. He earned an Master of Business Administration in 1963 and a doctorate in marketing in 1969 from the Walton College.

Kurtz began teaching in 1967. He said, “Textbooks were appalling back then. They were only printed in one color, and examples consisted of make-believe problems and strange, nonexistent products such as widgets.” While teaching at Eastern Michigan University, he began working on his own version of a textbook.

In the spring 2004 issue of Marketing Education Review in an article titled “The Scholarship of Teaching: A Study of Marketing Education Journal Publications,” Walton College marketing and logistics faculty were ranked second in number of research articles published in the Journal of Marketing Education and fifth in the Marketing Education Review.  Kurtz, whose major research interest is marketing education, ranked fourth over all in specific faculty research productivity.

Kurtz's academic articles have also appeared in such publications as the Journal of Marketing, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Retailing, and the Journal of Business Research. He has taught courses such as principles of marketing, seminar in marketing theory (Ph.D. level), international marketing (MBA level), sales management, and others.