Perry C. Lentz, Senior Trustee Teaching Excellence Award

Perry Lentz, you are hailed by students and faculty alike as an exemplar of the Kenyon professor. Your students find in your classes revelations and discoveries, about literature and about themselves. They credit you with honing their ability to write through your extensive and incisive comments on their papers. They extol your ability to craft fascinating and compelling lectures and to lead rich, deep, and revealing discussions of texts, saying, "that was the magic; just when I thought a word or passage was exhausted, he would open it up like a fortune cookie." Your colleagues expand on these observations, highlighting your talent for keeping your lectures fresh and spontaneous, and faculty members across the College flock to hear you speak, whether in a Common Hour presentation on effective lecturing or a reading from your most recent novel, Perish from the Earth. You have served Kenyon with generosity and distinction for four decades, including signal service on the Tenure and Promotion Committee and the Academic Infractions Board. Your value to this community is captured by this sentence from a recent review of your work: "You hold a singular place in the hearts and imaginations of the members of this college, past and present, who admire you equally for the intelligence of your teaching and the depth of your character, both of which you present in terms that are disarmingly humble." In recognition of and deep appreciation for your devotion to the Kenyon ideal of teaching excellence, we honor you today.

- Citation by Paula C. Turner, Associate Provost and Associate Professor of Physics