Greek Australian academic James Arvanitakis has been shortlisted in the top five University of Western Sydney (UWS) lecturers for UniJobs’ national Lecturer of the Year.
Dr Arvanitakis, who lectures in cultural studies and philosophy, said enthusiasm is essential to being a good teacher.
“It’s like meeting someone for a date – they know if you don’t want to be there,” he told Neos Kosmos.
Last month, Dr Arvanitakis was also crowned UWS ‘Lecturer of the Year’, in an inaugural competition run by the UWS student union.
At the awards ceremony in the student hub, the verbose academic said he was unusually silent.
“I was all blushy and lost for words,” he says.
“I did a bit of a Toyota ‘oh, what a feeling’ jump.”
Dr Arvanitakis said “a few thousand” students voted in the competition, where he was also awarded the Most Approachable Academic.
“They got us a little trophy and a certificate, so it was very nice,” he said.
Luckily for his students, Dr Arvanitakis, who is also a political activist, has no plans to give up teaching.
“There are academics who say they’d rather just research, but I find my students really inspire my research,” he said. “My teaching, my research and my activism line up together, and they feed into each other.”
For lecturers hoping to improve their standing for next year’s competition, Dr Arvanitakis said teaching has three important elements.
“It’s about preparation, enthusiasm and making it applicable to people’s lives,” he said.
“You’ve got to make it applicable to people’s lives – it doesn’t matter if you’re teaching philosophy, cultural studies or food technology.”