Biography

A winner of the William T. Kemper Award, a Purple Chalk Award and a WI Excellence Award for Undergraduate Teaching, Rachel Harper is the associate dean of the Honors College and the coordinator of the Honors Humanities Sequence. She is also an associate teaching professor in the Department of English. She has taught at Mizzou since 1996 and in the Humanities Sequence since 1998.

Originally from Champaign, Illinois, Harper holds a Ph.D. in American Literature from the University of Missouri and a B.A. in English and Spanish from Illinois Wesleyan University. Before becoming the associate director of the Honors College, she was the director of Mizzou’s Writing Center for 10 years. Currently, she is working on a critical edition of Jean Kenyon Mackenzie’s 1928 novella The Trader’s Wife and various articles related to tutoring writing and teaching, including several inspired by her teaching in the Humanities Sequence. Harper also does curriculum for the college and helps coordinate the Missouri Scholars Academy

When she’s not doing all of the above or serving on a million committees, she’s chasing her three boys and drinking coffee. Lots and lots of coffee.