Retiring Faculty Members Leave Significant Legacies at UVA Darden

Professor and former dean Bob Harris, professors Robert Carraway and Andy Wicks, and senior lecturer Marc Modica have all changed the University of Virginia Darden School of Business for the better, each educating thousands of students, advancing their areas of study and working on consequential programs before retiring together after the 2024 – 25 academic year.

Bob Harris

Former dean Bob Harris shakes hands with current dean Scott Beardsley at a retirement celebration at Darden.

Stewart Sheppard Professor Robert “Bob” Harris joined Darden in 1988 and has served as a teacher, researcher and leader ever since, including serving as Darden’s dean from 2001 to 2005 and taking on the role of vice president of a Fortune 100 company while remaining on the faculty. Before Darden, Harris was on the faculties of the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler School and the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. “Fortunately, I had the chance to come to Darden,” he said. “As a bonus I found great colleagues and a wonderful place to live.”

In addition to teaching thousands of students about corporate finance, private equity, financial markets, and mergers and acquisitions, he made decisions as dean that “fundamentally changed the School,” said current dean Scott Beardsley at this year’s State of the School address. Harris helped launch the Partnership for Leaders in Education joint program with the UVA School of Education and Human Development, a nationally successful program that elevates the quality of education and life outcomes for students across the United States. He launched the Executive MBA format, which together with the Part-Time MBA format serves more than 500 students at Darden’s DC Metro Grounds in Rosslyn, Virginia. Significantly, he established the School’s financial self-sufficiency model which has allowed the School the flexibility to grow to new heights. “His wisdom has stood the test of time,” said Beardsley.

Harris has been widely published in leading academic and practitioner journals, authored financial textbooks and business cases, and been an active consultant to corporations and government agencies. But his work in the classroom stands out as his proudest accomplishment. “It is a delight when you see someone learn something—especially for the first time. Being able to contribute to the school in various ways – teaching, working with executives, doing administrative work, conducting research – is special,” he said. “Those activities gave me the chance to meet and work with so many talented and often fun people. I cherish those memories.”

Robert Carraway

Professor Robert Carraway says a few words at his retirement celebration at Darden.

Yiorgos Allayannis Distinguished Associate Professor of Business Administration Robert Carraway thought he was only interviewing as a favor to a friend when he arrived on Darden’s Grounds in 1984, but that day changed the course of his life. “By the evening of my first day visiting, I knew it was where I wanted to be,” he said. He was especially impressed by the School’s care and attention to the educational experience of its students. “Because of the case-method approach, the learnings were heavily embedded in the world of practice, not theory,” he said. He came to Darden after receiving his B.S. and M.B.A. from East Carolina University and his Ph.D. from Purdue University, and soon after co-authored the successful case and textbook Quantitative Analysis for Business.

Carraway taught MBA classes in the area of data analytics, decision sciences and the intersection of the two disciplines, and he also taught Executive Education classes to practicing managers and executives around the world. He served as senior associate dean for the MBA program from 2006 to 2011 under dean Bob Bruner. “Countless students have benefitted from his wisdom, and he’s been an incredible mentor of so many,” said dean Scott Beardsley at the recent State of the School address.

Carraway’s experience in the classroom has been “everything I imagined,” he said. “The students are so highly motivated.” Carraway has won several teaching honors along the way, and says that former students sharing the pivotal role Darden played in their career successes are a primary highlight of his. Not to mention “to have been a part of what is widely acknowledged to be the best MBA teaching faculty in the world,” he said. Looking forward, Carraway is optimistic about the future of the school and up-and-coming faculty, who “are not only excellent researchers, but who share my enthusiasm for delivering high-impact educational experiences to our students…Time to pass the mantle!”

Marc Modica

Marc Modica taught at Darden for 27 years.

Senior Lecturer in Business Administration Marc Modica joined the Darden community in 1998, bringing broad international experience to his negotiation, communications, and conflict management teaching and consulting. Before coming to the University of Virginia, Modica taught for 10 years at the International University of Japan, where he also served as associate dean of the degree program in international management, director of international exchange programs and co-director of the school’s intensive international executive program. He had occasion to meet visiting Darden professors there, and when he moved back to the United States Darden seemed like an interesting option. “Once I saw it and met the people, I was convinced it was where I wanted to be,” he said.

At Darden, Modica has been “a cornerstone of our communications faculty” according to dean Beardsley at the recent State of the School address, where he acknowledged Modica’s significant contributions to the School’s global programs. Modica’s interest in international business, economics and politics dovetailed with the courses he led through Darden’s Center for Global Initiatives and Global Executive MBA programs, which he considers some of the most fulfilling experiences of his career. “It is incredibly satisfying to spend time with the students in exploring and creating a community of inquiry,” he said. Global course locations included UAE, Mexico, Vietnam, Denmark, Sweden, Brazil, China, India, Singapore, Sri Lanka, South Korea, Latvia and Japan.

Modica noted being a co-director of the LEAD program, which served rising seniors in high school, as another highlight of his time at Darden. “They were just brilliant kids,” he said. Designing and delivering programs in Darden Executive Education and Lifelong Learning programs “opened up many new opportunities for me to learn about the world,” he said.  “The Darden community is all it’s cracked up to be.”

Andy Wicks

As a graduate student in religious studies, Andy Wicks was headed toward medical ethics or applied religious or philosophical ethics. But along the way, he met Darden Professor Ed Freeman, who opened his eyes to what business ethics was all about. Wicks joined Darden in 2002 and over the years his leadership roles expanded to include director of the Olsson Center for Applied Ethics, academic director of the Institute for Business in Society, academic adviser for the Business Roundtable Institute for Corporate Ethics and director of Darden’s Doctoral Program.

Wicks, the Ruffin Professor of Business Administration and Richard M. Waitzer Bicentennial Professor of Ethics, stepped down from teaching this past academic year to focus on significant health challenges.

He and his wife, Cathy, are focused on completing his book, Ultimate Questions: A Stakeholder Guide to the Business of Your Life, which will be published by Darden Business Books this summer.

Asked what he hopes readers will take away from the book, Wicks offers a simple phrase: “Pay attention to your life.”

“It’s an invocation for the reader,” he said in an interview in February. “It’s not ‘here’s the answer.’ It is really an invitation to wake up, to pay attention, and to be willing to ask those hard questions about your life, not because there’s some external critic you’ve got to satisfy, but because it helps you have the kind of life that you would like to have.”