Honorary Honors College Graduate
The Honors College Honorary Graduate Award is given annually to an individual who has demonstrated sustained commitment to the College of Charleston Honors College and to its students. Recipients are selected for the ways in which they exemplify the mission, goals, values and ideals of the Honors College.
2022 RECIPIENT
Dr. John Newell
John H. Newell Jr., Faculty Emeritus, joined the College’s history department in 1978 after completing his Ph.D. at Duke University with a major in Medieval History and a Minor in Medieval and Renaissance Studies.
He served as Director of the Honors Program from 1999 to 2005 and as the first dean of the Honors College from 2005 to 2012. In addition to general history surveys and Honors Western Civilization, he has taught special topics courses: Women and Love in the Middle Ages; Witches, Saints and Heretics in Medieval and Early Modern Europe; and In Search of King Arthur and the Holy Grail.
He graduated cum laude in 1968 from the University of Georgia’s honors program, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi and selected as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow. After that, he served in the Air Force until 1972. While pursuing graduate work at Duke, he was a Fulbright scholar, studying medieval manuscripts in Munich, Germany, from 1975-1976.
In addition to his work with History and Honors at the College of Charleston, he served as co-director of the Studia Humanities Program, co-director of the Center for Effective Teaching and Learning, and Director of the Governor's School. He served on the editorial board of Medieval Perspectives for many years and on the executive boards of the College of Charleston's Phi Kappa Phi chapter and the Lowcountry Phi Beta Kappa Association. In 2011, he worked with LCWA Dean David Cohen and others to launch the International Scholars Program. He has served on the Honors College Advisory Board since 2016.
PREVIOUS RECIPIENTS
2021 - Reba Huge