To Whom it May Concern: Professor Lana Povitz embodies the promises that Middlebury makes to it’s students in her contributions to academic content that emphasizes diverse perspectives, her commitment to soliciting feedback from students to ensure that her teaching methods meet their needs and her engagement with the Middlebury community. To this first point, Prof. Povitz teaches courses on radical social movements, Jewish life, mental health, food studies, and queerness as well as historical methods. Middlebury has made numerous promises over the years to improve curricula to better represent scholarship and experiences from minoritized groups, a task that has often fallen to the labor of professors of color. Prof. Povitz does this work already. She also teaches cross-listed courses in two departments on campus that are increasingly popular, but sorely lacking in faculty: Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies and Food Studies. Losing Professor Povitz would not just be to the detriment of the History department, but to these departments as well. Finally, Prof. Povitz teaches history courses that are exciting and engaging to students who are not history majors, often will long waitlists for her classes. Study across disciplines is one of the tenets of a liberal arts education and losing a professor who builds bridges for students would be deeply counterproductive. Secondly, Professor Povitz takes not just the subject of her work seriously, but her teaching style is of great importance to her too. In all of the classes I have taken with Professor Povitz, she has genuinely wanted to know how students responded to her pedagogical choices and would make adjustments based on feedback. In my experience at Midd, this is a rarity, with most professors waiting for feedback until course response forms, at which point it is too late to change the learning experience of the current class. She has an uncanny ability to facilitate a unified classroom culture, with students connecting with each other across class years and personal backgrounds to learn together. Even when I was not Prof. Povitz’s student but would spend time with her as a mentor, she would talk to me about the classes that she was planning and ask for my opinion about what my peers would be most likely to respond to. In this way, Lana Povitz is not just a brilliant historian, but a dedicated professor. Finally, it is likely that if Middlebury does not keep Professor Povitz, they will also lose her partner, Professor Dima Ayoub. In addition to the knowledge that Middlebury will forfeiting if these two beloved professors leave, it will also miss the ways that they contribute to culture and student life outside of the classroom. Unlike some of their colleagues, these are two professors who deeply want to be at Middlebury and show their commitment through engagement: hosting events for students, attending events with Middlebury Hillel and hosting a Torah study, engaging in academic projects with students, and truly getting to know us as people by making time to have meaningful conversations during office hours and over coffee. Personally, I feel like knowing and learning from Professor Povitz has significantly shaped my experience at Middlebury. It saddens me deeply to think that future Middlebury students will not have the chance to grow as scholars and people from her support. Losing both Professor Ayoub and Professor Povitz would leave a consequential hole in the Middlebury community. Sincerely, Grace Weissman