Annual LAHP Excellence in Teaching Award 2024
Andrew Fleck, Department of English
The Liberal Arts Honors Program is pleased to recognize Dr. Andrew Fleck with its annual Excellence in Teaching Award for 2024. Students who graduated in 2023-24 were asked to nominate the professor who had the greatest impact on their experience as undergraduate honors students and they selected Dr. Fleck for his “tireless commitment to student success.”
In addition to convening the Honors Colloquium (LHON 4000) each semester, in which honors students working with their disciplinary mentors on an honor capstone experience make regular reports on their progress ahead of the annual LAHP Symposium, Dr. Fleck stepped in to teach an Honors Seminar based on English 3329, “Renaissance Drama,” in the fall of 2022. That seminar focused on Early Modern Revenge Tragedies (like The Spanish Tragedy and Antonio’s Revenge), pairing them with cinematic Westerns (like For a Few Dollars More and Django Unchained), and discussions of modern systematic injustice (the death of Mahsa Amini in Iran, the death of Michael Brown and other unarmed African Americans at the hands of police) in order to explore the concepts of “Justice, Mercy, and Revenge in the Renaissance and Today.” Many of the students who took that seminar remembered it fondly as they graduated from UTEP and the LAHP. Students recalled that the course was “challenging but exciting and relevant” and that Dr. Fleck “expected a lot” but “provided encouragement, guidance, and support” in helping them to reach his high standards. One student remarked that thinking about systemic injustice today helped her to see “the importance of studying classic texts going back to Seneca,” while another appreciated “his efforts to use a lens in his wheelhouse for viewing modern problems.” The comments in these nominations align with the positive comments students make about Dr. Fleck’s teaching in other courses.
The LAHP is pleased to give this recognition to Dr. Fleck, who upholds the high standards of our academic program and the minor we offer. Excellent teachers who care about their students’ success are one of the hallmarks of the Liberal Arts Honors Program and we hope new cohorts of excellent Miners will apply to work with the outstanding professors in the College of Liberal Arts!