Dean's Circle Mid Year

Fall Semester ’14

Dean’s Circle As a part of the Dean’s Circle, you are making a huge impact on the College of Liberal Arts. Thank you for helping us change the world.

Elizabeth Richmond-Garza Her office is painted purple, a startlingly dark shade of color. Oscar Wilde memorabilia sit atop bookshelves housing the works of renowned 19th century writers; Marcel Proust, Anton Chekhov, Rainer Maria Wilker.

Rather gothic, a bit dark, and teaching a graduate seminar focused on vampires, Professor Elizabeth Richmond-Garza has built a reputation of intensity, but her pedagogy, while rigorous, is far from grim.

“I make them do so much writing and work so hard the least I can do is make it about something fun,” she quips.

In her classroom, Richmond-Garza aims

“Without these generous donors who have a passion for international studies or humanities, we would really not be able to do the kind of things we are.”

Liberal Arts Development Office Kathleen Aronson, Assistant Dean 512-475-9763 transforminglives@austin.utexas.edu

to help her students “grasp the variety and complexity of human expression over time and across cultures,” putting an emphasis on internationalism, diversity, and expanding a student’s worldview and understanding of themselves.

“Literary text allows you to pretend and practice how you would negotiate difficult choices and problematic circumstances,” explains Richmond- Garza. “The world is incredibly diverse and literature is a very, very safe and very beautiful place to experiment with figuring out who you are and what you do without having to pay the price… at least not the full price—you might get a B+.”

As a Fellow of the Stiles Professorship in Humanities and Comparative Literature, Richmond-Garza emphasizes the importance that private support has on that goal.

“Without these generous donors who have a passion for international studies or humanities, we would really not be able to do the kind of things we are. I wouldn’t and my students wouldn’t, Richmond- Garza says. “They really are transforming people’s lives professionally and personally.”

Fall Semester ’14

Dean’s Circle As a part of the Dean’s Circle, you are making a huge impact on the College of Liberal Arts. Thank you for helping us change the world.

Jeff Denning Economics graduate student Jeff Denning was recently featured in The Washington Post for his work on the affordability of community college. “I initially thought that I wanted to be a business major and the prerequisites included introductory economics. I realized economics provided a unique way of thinking,” says Denning. “I chose to study higher education because of the wide-ranging consequences of higher education decisions, as well as opportunities I had to work with high quality data.”

Braydon Jones Many of our undergraduates participate in valuable research experiences. One student, Braydon Jones, was a 2013-14 J.J. Pickle Research Fellow. Says Braydon, “Under the guidance of Professor Sean Theriault, I gathered data on more than 23,000 fundraisers that occurred in Washington DC over the past two years.

My individual project focused on how certain characteristics (such as population, incumbency, election cycle) of a Senate campaign affect the total amount of money being spent.” View more about Braydon’s work here: http://bit.ly/1CKBvLe.

Liberal Arts Development Office Kathleen Aronson, Assistant Dean 512-475-9763 transforminglives@austin.utexas.edu

Total Liberal Arts students in Fall 2014:

9,317 18.16% of the university’s total enrollment

Three most popular countries for study abroad:

France Spain England Total Liberal Arts students who received financial aid:

5,110 55% of Liberal Arts Students