2007 Virginia OFA Recipient

Dr. Tracey Teets Schwarze is an Associate Professor of English, Chair of the English Department, and President of the Faculty Senate at Christopher Newport University, where she has worked since 1999. A versatile teacher who puts students at the center of her intellectual work, Dr. Schwarze is an internationally recognized scholar specializing in James Joyce.

Dr. Schwarze has taught over 1,000 students and designed 17 different courses since her arrival at Christopher Newport, from freshman composition to public relations writing to seminars in James Joyce. Dr. Schwarze’s students have gone on to graduate programs at the University of California, Irvine; the University of Virginia; Emory University; and the University of Illinois. They are elementary and high school teachers, public relations directors, journalists, speechwriters, and college professors. Dr. Schwarze has coordinated service-learning opportunities for more than forty students, with organizations from the American Red Cross to Habitat for Humanity to the Peninsula Fine Arts Center.

Dr. Schwarze published her first book, Joyce and the Victorians, in 2002. Her articles on Joyce and nineteenth century British and Irish culture, have appeared (often by invitation) in peer-reviewed journals, including Joyce Studies Annual, European Joyce Studies, Joyce Studies in Italy, Twentieth Century Literature, and a special volume commemorating the James Joyce Centenary. She has presented her scholarship at national and international venues, and lectured, by invitation, at the prestigious 2005 International James Joyce Summer School at University College, Dublin.

Dr. Schwarze’s leadership has had university-wide impact as Christopher Newport has metamorphosed into a vibrant, residential, liberal arts university. She has served on every major task force created since her arrival, helping to design and implement a new curriculum, plan a new library, and address retention issues. As director of the Writing Center until 2005, Dr. Schwarze recognized a need to extend peer mentoring services into upper division, writing-intensive courses, and founded the Writing Associates program, which pairs strong upperclassmen writers with students taking writing intensive courses. For the last several years, she also has designed and led a faculty workshop on teaching writing intensive courses.

The true significance of Dr. Schwarze’s contribution to higher education in Virginia, however, is nowhere greater than in her ability to challenge her students, as they themselves testify: “She called me out in class. She pushed me to present my findings at conference; to try work toward the less common questions in my own writing; to be a student leader despite what I once thought of as my soft-spoken personality; to apply to graduate programs I never thought I’d be accepted to. . . She taught me to ask for more from myself, to take my work further than what was simply required—and even to enjoy doing so.”

 Dr. Schwarze holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Riverside.

Nomination Package