Remembering a Passionate Teacher: Robert Backoff

Alumni and colleagues remember Professor Robert Backoff as a champion for keeping students at the core of the John Glenn College of Public Affairs.

Backoff, who joined Ohio State in 1973 and retired in 2000, passed away March 10, five days shy of his 85th birthday.

Backoff prioritized teaching in his career, remembered Douglas Jones, Professor Emeritus at the Glenn College.

“His teaching techniques were storied at the college, often unconventional, but always effective,” Jones said. “Surely in the history of the Glenn College, Professor Backoff stands tall as a memorable player in its formative years and beyond.”

In fact, in 1993 Backoff received the university’s Alumni Award for Distinguished Teaching, for which faculty members are nominated by present and former students and colleagues and selected by a committee of alumni, students and faculty.

Long before that, he was a member of the faculty committee that in 1978 undertook the School of Public Administration’s first peer review by the Network of Schools of Public Policy, Affairs and Administration (NASPAA), leading to the school’s being recognized as in conformity with the organization’s guidelines in the summer of 1980 (one of only two in the Big Ten and 45 in the U.S. at the time). In addition, Backoff was a member of a faculty team that studied the feasibility of a trash burning power plant for Columbus in the 1970s. In 1994, he and co-author Paul Nutt, a Fisher College of Business faculty member, published “Strategic Management of Public and Third Sector Organizations: A Handbook for Leaders,” which that year won the Best Book Award presented by the Public and Nonprofit Sector Division of the Academy of Management.

“He was an intellectual giant who had influenced the careers of many professionals; he and Paul Nutt had written the definitive text of strategy for public sector organizations. Colleagues in the field had high esteem for Ohio State’s then-School of Public Policy and Management solely because of Bob,” Brown said. “It’s one of the reasons we’ve hired a cluster of public sector management scholars over the years. We wanted to make sure to carry on his tradition of excellent scholarship and teaching.”

The Glenn College annually presents the Robert W. Backoff Research Award in his honor to recognize outstanding research by doctoral students. 

In addition, the Robert W. Backoff Scholarship defrays the cost of tuition for master of public administration students in the college.

“Bob saw connections and structures in concepts in his field that others didn’t see,” Jones said. “His research contributions to organizational theory and strategic practice were substantial, and his ability to convey these insights was outstanding, as his students would attest.”

In the 1990s, Don Stenta was an educational policy and leadership doctoral student with a minor in public policy and management. He remembers taking several leadership development classes where Backoff presented the syllabus as a blank piece of paper; the students actually designed the course. Stenta, now a Glenn College instructor who is assistant vice president of The Ohio State University Alumni Association, asked Backoff to serve on his doctoral general exam and dissertation committees.

“Bob’s office was full of books on shelves all around his office. I recall two or three area rugs that overlapped one another and a lot of mismatched furniture. We sat at a table, and I talked with Bob about my dissertation topic. When he realized I was interested in studying a group of students in a learning community where their focus was on the intersection between leadership and community service, he perked up around the construction of a learning community. We had wonderful conversations around this topic, and he would send me resources that usually included citations of articles he would come across,” said Stenta, adding that Backoff agreed to serve on the committee and supported him through his exams and research.

“Years later, when I was working with the then-Glenn Institute and we formed the Glenn School, Bob was always a champion for keeping students at the core of what we would build with the Glenn program, seeing lots of value in the high school and undergraduate programs we had in place to build the next generation of informed and engaged citizens,” Stenta said.

“I remember Bob with affection as a friend, colleague and mentor,” said Charles Adams, Glenn College Professor Emeritus. “I remember a steady flow of students visiting with Bob and count myself as one. He always gave generously of his time and advice. He introduced me to one of my favorite books, Abraham Kaplan’s ‘The Conduct of Inquiry,’ in one of those sessions. I also shamelessly chatted up his students along the way to pick their brains for suggestions and ideas. Bob taught us all, one way or another.”  

Read Robert Backoff’s obituary.