Elizabethtown College Director of Prestigious Scholarships and Public Heritage Studies, Jean-Paul Benowitz was recently awarded the Historic Preservation Trust of Lancaster County’s (HPTLC) Smedley Award.
“Since 1966 the Historic Preservation Trust of Lancaster County has been a nationally recognized leader in historic preservation and heritage conservation and so it is indeed an honor to be recognized by HPTLC with the Smedley Award,” Benowitz said. “The Public Heritage Studies program at Elizabethtown College, with its emphasis on community engagement and service, is contributing to the work of HPTLC and I am grateful for this collaboration and humbled by this award.”
The Smedley Award is presented yearly to a journalist or educator who has shown extraordinary support for historic preservation in Lancaster County. As the Director of Public Heritage Studies, Benowitz teaches courses about local and regional history. Each course has a community-based learning component that involves students conducting research and historic preservation fieldwork in the local community. The scholarship produced by the students is used by local borough leaders for securing county, state, and federal grants for economic development, environmental/ecological stewardship, and historic preservation.
The research conducted by students in Benowitz’s Public Heritage Studies courses employs the National Collegiate Honors Council’s (NCHC) City As Text™ pedagogy, an active learning approach to Honors courses requiring civically engaged research. Benowitz serves on the NCHC Place As Text Committee and teaches national honors faculty master classes and institutes about how to incorporate City As Text™ into Honors education.
Benowitz was presented with the Smedley Award at the C. Emlen Urban Awards Dinner on June 20 at the Lancaster Country Club, where he gave a speech discussing the importance of historic preservation, local economic development, and civic engagement. Benowitz provided examples of how the research conducted by Honors Public Heritage Studies students at Etown led to historic conservation efforts across the region, including contributing to the prevention of a building in Elizabethtown, designed by C. E. Urban, from being destroyed. He also discussed a current project of his students, the launching of a “This Place Matters” campaign to celebrate and recognize the 125th anniversary of Elizabethtown College.
About the Historic Preservation Trust of Lancaster County
The Historic Preservation Trust of Lancaster County is a nonprofit membership corporation founded in 1966 working to preserve Lancaster County’s historic sites and architecture. They collaborate with individuals, businesses, municipalities, government agencies, and other not-for-profit organizations. The trust also delivers preservation education and advocates for the preservation of historic architecture and sites, and it’s been directly involved in preserving more than three dozen important Lancaster County landmarks.
