Beeman respected as an administrator and teacher

"Beeman's out! He's history!"

Before starting his "U.S. History to 1865" lecture yesterday morning, History Professor Richard Beeman shared a laugh with his students as he read and expanded on a Daily Pennsylvanian headline announcing the end of his tenure as dean of Penn's College of Arts and Sciences.

After a five-year stint in his current office, Beeman will shed his administrative mantle and, starting next fall, leave Penn to spend a year serving as Harold Vyvyan Harmsworth Distinguished Professor of American History at Oxford University.

As they watch him both step out of his administrative shoes and walk out of West Philadelphia, Beeman's History 020 students and colleagues have mixed emotions.

Though happy to see him honored, many said they were sorry to see Beeman leave the campus where he has had a deep impact as an administrator and professor.

"Everyone will certainly be happy when he comes back,"

History graduate student and teaching assistant Katherine Paugh said. "We'll miss Tom Paine and Davy Crockett."

Known for the energy he puts into his lectures, Beeman has reportedly doffed his bow-ties and button-downs for period costumes and coon-skin caps.

"He dressed up like Davy Crockett," College junior Andy Bollhoefer said, adding that the "fabulous" professor's style and enthusiasm made him "one of the best, if not the best professor I've had. He's definitely an asset to the school and to the History Department."

David Glassman, who is unaffiliated with the University but audits Beeman's course, concurred that the dean puts on a show. "He puts his head into it.... He's like an actor," Glassman said.

Entertainment value aside, students appreciated the academic effectiveness of Beeman's lectures.

"I've been through a lot of schools," College of General Studies student Patrick Flack said, "and if you can't learn from him, you can't learn from anyone. It's as if he took a time machine.... He teaches history like he was actually there." Flack concluded by naming Beeman "one of the best professors who has ever graced UPenn."

Interestingly, despite Beeman's high profile administrative position and what he himself has called "16 years of pretty much nonstop administration," his students were largely unaware of their professor's work at the helm of the College. They expressed far more regret over his year-long absence as a professor than concern or even opinions on Beeman's leaving office.

His students' praise for his teaching and relative ignorance of the other demands on Beeman's time showed -- along with his 3.6 out of four points in the Penn Course Review rankings -- what one student termed the "Batman and Bruce Wayne" balancing act the dean has so successfully maintained.

Ana Montoya, a College sophomore and one of Beeman's history advisees, said that despite the dean's busy schedule, "he was always available... just a really great advisor."

Joking that "he does talk about his dog a little too much," Montoya offered nothing but praise, tinged with some regret.

"It's a great opportunity for him, so I'm glad he got it...," she said of his upcoming term at Oxford, "but I will be sorry to see him go."

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