In 1995 I arrived at University of Montana (UM) Wildlife Biology Program as a newbie assistant professor fresh out of professional preparation including real-world applied field research projects, an MS in Wildlife Biology and a PhD with Michael Soulé , the visionary founder of the discipline of Conservation Biology. The first class I was asked to teach at UM was a senior-level course called “Conservation of Wildlife Populations,” which up to that point was mostly a collectio