Sustaining the Teacher-Scholar Model

Dean Fleck (left), who also holds the rank of Professor of Biology, advises Biology major Philip S. Carson ’08 on his spring schedule. Carson plans to attend the George Washington University School of Medicine, having been accepted at the end of his sophomore year under the Early Selection Program.

HAMPDEN-SYDNEY COLLEGE VALUES dedicated teachers and active scholars who work to engage our students in the process of creating “good men and good citizens in an atmosphere of sound learning.” That we value teaching and the enrichment which flows from faculty members’ engagement in scholarly activity is evident from the ways we support the professional development of our professors, the opportunities we provide our students to work side-by-side with their mentors, and the honors we bestow.

A strong case can be made that teaching excellence arises from a commitment of the faculty to student learning as well as faculty dedication to enhancing their own knowledge of their fields. In many professions, such as law or medicine, expertise flows from a continuing pattern of self-improvement. Professors are no different from other professionals—they must sustain their expertise in the face of a changing knowledge base. Faculty members engage in reading, research, publication, and consulting as an integral part of their profession. A faculty member’s expertise in a discipline is honed by testing his or her scholarship in the crucible of public presentation. A close connection between what scholars teach and what they study sustains the teacher-scholar model.

Hampden-Sydney College supports faculty scholarship with generous faculty development funds. We earmark monies to support faculty members attending professional meetings or workshops, pay for journal page charges, and purchase equipment or supplies. We support faculty summer scholarship with a generous program of summer salary support. More than sixty percent of the full-time faculty receives summer support funds. We provide paid sabbaticals and support recipients of prestigious scholarly awards, like Fulbright awards.

Knowing that a close working relationship with a scholarly mentor is often the spur that leads to advanced study, the College fosters collaborative research projects with a joint student-faculty summer research program that provides stipends, as well as research supplies and travel support, to faculty members and students. Students completing summer research, as well as academic year honor studies, present their findings to their student colleagues and the faculty at a local honors symposium. Further, we provide funds to send many of these students—and their mentors—to regional and national meetings, where they also make formal presentations.

Students and faculty members receive awards for their scholarly achievements. For example, the Phi Beta Kappa Samuel S. Jones Award goes to one or two students who have completed outstanding pieces of scholarly research. Each year we honor our faculty with a research award, the John Peter Mettauer Award, for outstanding scholarship achievement.

In the pages that follow you will see the extent of the scholarly achievement of our faculty and the level of student scholarly engagement at Hampden-Sydney College. We are proud of our faculty and the mentoring they provide our students.

-Earl W. Fleck
Provost and Dean of the Faculty

BEYOND THE Classroom FOR THE Classroom
Hampden-Sydney College Faculty Scholarship 2005-2008
A report by the Office of the Dean of the Faculty