English prof receives graduate studies advising award

Charles Robinson

2:57 p.m., June 23, 2005--Charles Robinson, professor of English, was awarded the Outstanding Advising and Mentoring Award from the Office of Graduate Studies at the spring Doctoral Dinner and Hooding Ceremony on May 27. He received a plaque and $2,500.

The award recognizes faculty members whose dedication to graduate students and commitment to excellence in graduate training have made a significant contribution to the quality of life and professional development of graduate students at UD.

Each candidate must receive up to three letters of support from current students and alumni and a letter from the department chairperson or dean. The selection committee is composed of previous winners, two graduate students and the assistant provost for graduate studies.

Serving as director of graduate studies in the English department from 1981-93, Robinson continues to work closely with current director Matthew Kinservik, associate professor of English, and Mary Martin, assistant provost for graduate studies, to help graduate students in the department find academic positions. Robinson informs students about job opportunities, helps critique their resumés and cover letters, get letters of recommendation and gives them advice on interviewing, including holding mock interviews where the students get tips on how to dress, how to act and present themselves.

He said he is upfront in his critiques of grad students’ job-hunting skills. “I’m a combination of fun and mean,” he said.

Robinson said he was enormously pleased to receive the award in recognition of his 30 years of advising hundreds of graduate students in the English department.

Robinson’s field of expertise is English Romanticism. He is the author of Byron and Shelley: The Snake and Eagle Wreathed in Flight and the editor of Mary Shelley: Collected Tales and Stories; Lord Byron and His Contemporaries: Essays from the Sixth International Byron Seminar; William Hazlitt to his Publishers, Friends and Creditors: 27 New Holograph Letters; Mary Shelley’s Proserpine and Midas and coeditor of The Mary Shelley Reader. He also has published the manuscripts of The Frankenstein Notebooks and is working on an edition of the letters of Charles Ollier, who was the publisher of the Keats, Hazlitt, Lamb, the Shelleys and other Romantic and Victorian writers.

A graduate of Mount Saint Mary’s College, Robinson received his Ph.D. from Temple University. He serves as the executive director of the Byron Society of America and cochairs the Byron Society Collection housed at UD.

Past winners of the award for advising doctoral students include Lynn Snyder-Mackler, professor of physical therapy, in 2004; James Oliver, Emma Smith Morris Professor Emeritus of Political Science and International Relations, in 2003; and Donald Sparks, S. Hallock du Pont Chair and chairperson of plant and soil sciences, in 2002.

Past winners for advising master’s degree students include Judith Hough-Goldstein, professor of entomology and applied ecology, in 2004; Limin Kung, professor and interim chairperson of animal and food sciences, in 2003; and Charles Epifanio, professor of marine studies, in 2002. No award was given this year for advisement of master’s degree students.

Article by Sue Moncure
Photo by Kathy F. Atkinson

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