Among his peers, Newman is known for how deeply he thinks about pedagogical issues and how seamlessly he works his own research interests into his classroom teaching.


“I have written many letters about strong teachers in my department, of which there are many," said Shannon Miller, associate professor and chair of the English Department. "But I don’t think I’ve ever been taught as much by a colleague’s teaching materials or from the teaching testimonials sent in by students as I have from those of Professor Newman.”


For Newman, teaching is something of a family business. His father, Ronald, retired a couple of years ago as an English professor at the University of Miami.


“Even as a young child, I remember how happy he would be if he came across an 'A' paper, particularly if the student had improved significantly over the course of the semester,” said Newman. And, he has also learned much from another English professor dear to his heart — his wife, Keely McCarthy, herself the daughter of an English professor.


In addition to directing his department’s undergraduate program, Newman developed an innovative service learning course, the only such course in the English Department, which combines close readings of texts about the city with volunteer work in the community.


Newman has been recognized by the College of Liberal Arts with a Distinguished Teaching Award and, outside the university, by the American Society of Eighteenth-Century Studies, which awarded him the Innovative Course Design Award for his class, “The Textual City: London and Philadelphia from the Great Fire to the Present.” He received his bachelor’s degree in English from Duke University and his master’s and doctoral degrees from The Johns Hopkins University.


“I am proud to be a member of a department in which internationally known scholars still demonstrate a strong commitment to teaching,” said Newman. “Teaching really matters here.”