Dr. Lark serves as a professor in both the Department of Engineering Systems and Environment and the Applied Mathematics Program of the Department of Engineering and Society at the University of Virginia. He is an affiliated faculty member of the Department of Statistics at the University of Virginia. He was a visiting scholar at the Center for the Study of Public Choice at Virginia Tech. He was an Earhart Foundation Visiting Fellow at the Center for Research in Government Policy and Business at the University of Rochester. He is the author of publications in mathematics, operations research, and artificial intelligence. His solution procedure for partially observed Markov decision processes is known in the research literature as the “Lark algorithm” (or “Lark filtering algorithm”).
He serves as the Region 5 representative on the Libertarian National Committee. He is a member of the LNC’s Executive Committee and the LNC’s representative to the International Alliance of Libertarian Parties. He served as chairman of the Libertarian Party during the 2000-2002 term. He is a member of the Libertarian Party’s Hall of Liberty, the Party’s highest honor (for lifetime achievement). He is also the recipient of the 2004 Samuel Adams Award (outstanding activism), the 2008 Thomas Jefferson Award (outstanding leadership, high character, and dedication to the principles and goals of the Party), and the 2012 Thomas Paine Award (outstanding communication of Libertarian ideas). He is the only person to win each of these awards.
He is the secretary of the Board of Directors of Liberty International, and serves as a member of the Board of Advisors of Students For Liberty. He served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Advocates for Self-Government from 2003 until 2016; he served as the chairman of the Board from 2009 until 2016. He is a member of the Foundation for Economic Education Faculty Network. He is the recipient of the Foundation’s 2017 Leonard E. Read Distinguished Alumni Award for Leadership.