Dr. Thomas Schmidlin is a Professor of Geography at Kent State University and a Certified Consulting Meteorologist.  He has been on the faculty at Kent State since 1985 and served as Program Director in Geneva during the spring semester of 1999.  He also taught “Geography of Europe” at the John Knox Center in Geneva during summer 2006.  Dr. Schmidlin received degrees from Iowa State University, the University of Nevada-Reno, and his Ph.D. from Cornell University.

He focuses his research on the hazards of severe weather, especially methods to reduce deaths and injuries from tornadoes and hurricanes.  He was invited to participate on a national panel to evaluate and revise the Fujita Scale for rating tornado intensities.  Professor Schmidlin has conducted disaster field work after tornadoes and in hurricanes.  He also led student field trips in winter to the Arctic shores of Hudson Bay and to the Presidential Range of New Hampshire.

Dr. Schmidlin and his wife Jeanne are co-authors of Thunder in the Heartland: A Chronicle of Outstanding Weather Events in Ohio and he has authored several book chapters and study guides.  His research on severe weather and cold climates has been published in numerous articles in scientific journals.  Dr. Schmidlin served for five years as Editor of The Ohio Journal of Science. 

Schmidlin is a frequent speaker at national and international professional conferences and locally in schools, parks, and libraries.  At Kent State, Professor Schmidlin has served as Chairperson of the Department of Geography and was a finalist for the Distinguished Teaching Award in 2005.  He has directed numerous graduate students and served on dissertation committees at Texas State University-San Marcos and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

In his five trips in Europe, Dr. Schmidlin has visited 27 nations, from the Mediterranean to the Arctic Circle.