Professor Akhil Amar ’84 Honored For Outstanding Teaching

Southmayd Professor of Law Akhil Reed Amar ’84 has been honored with the 2008 William Clyde DeVane Award, the oldest and highest-ranking award for excellence in scholarship and undergraduate teaching at Yale. The award is given annually by the Yale Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. Yale College seniors who are members of Phi Beta Kappa choose an honoree from among active faculty members who have been teaching at Yale for at least five years. Professor Amar, a member of the Yale faculty since 1985, accepted his award at the chapter’s annual banquet on Feb. 25.

In presenting the award, Jessica Bialecki ’08, treasurer of the chapter, said, “Professor Amar has risen to celebrity status among undergrads here at Yale, and for good reason. His brilliance and mastery of constitutional law alone are staggering, but what really makes Professor Amar stand out from the crowd of outstanding professors here at Yale is his genuine commitment to undergraduate education. His enthusiasm is palpable each time he takes the stage of the Law School lecture hall, and his passion is contagious, even continuing over to the weekly lunches he holds in the Law School cafeteria with interested students."

Professor Amar is the Southmayd Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University, teaching constitutional law at both Yale College and Yale Law School. He received his B.A, summa cum laude, from Yale College, and his J.D. from Yale Law School, where he served as an editor of The Yale Law Journal. He is the author of several books, including, most recently, America’s Constitution:  A Biography.