Bethel College honored Mark Jantzen, professor of history, for teaching excellence at the 131st commencement on May 12.
The Ralph P. Schrag Distinguished Teaching Award is presented at commencement most years to recognize a Bethel faculty member who has made an outstanding contribution to teaching.
Robert Milliman, Bethel vice president for academic affairs and dean of faculty, presented the award.
In his citation, Milliman said, “Mark is an excellent and challenging teacher, who pushes his students to higher levels of intellectual achievement. Whether the size of his class is small or large, his instruction is consistently delivered at an exemplary level.
“It is evident that Dr. Jantzen enjoys teaching and is gifted in that area. His commitment to Mennonite higher education and the church is unquestioned.”
The Schrag Award takes into consideration course evaluations written by students.
According to one student, “Mark has extremely diverse and intelligent perspectives on all issues in faith. He is able to articulately and effectively communicate not only the content itself, but significant historical and contextual supporting information that makes learning his content significantly easier.”
“This is my third class with Mark,” another student wrote, “and I have thoroughly enjoyed every single one. By far one of the best professors I’ve ever had.”
Jantzen began teaching European and Mennonite history at Bethel in 2001 and was promoted to full professor in 2012.
Jantzen earned his doctorate in modern European history from the University of Notre Dame in 2002. He also has a master’s degree in church history from Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary in church history and a B.A. in German and math from Bethel College, and studied Protestant theology at Humboldt University in Berlin.
Following graduation from Bethel in 1985, Jantzen worked for three years as a computer programmer before taking a volunteer assignment with Mennonite Central Committee in what was then East Germany.
His primary responsibility was to study Protestant theology at Humboldt University, in what was then East Berlin, while also being involved in the youth and visitation ministries of the Mennonite Church in East Germany.
Jantzen lived in Germany from 1988-91, meaning he was there when the Berlin Wall came down on Nov. 9, 1989, resulting in a unified Germany for the first time since 1961.
From 1993-96, Jantzen and his wife, Alice Jantzen, served with MCC in the former Yugoslavia.
Jantzen is the author of numerous articles and book chapters. Among his book-length publications are: European Mennonites and the Holocaust, co-edited with John Thiesen and published by the University of Toronto Press in association with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2020; Mennonite German Soldiers: Nation, Religion and Family in the Prussian East, 1772-1880 (University of Notre Dame Press, 2010); and The Wrong Side of the Wall: An American in East Berlin during the Peaceful Revolution, 1993.
Bethel is a four-year liberal arts college founded in 1887 and is the oldest Mennonite college in North America. Bethel ranks at #23 in the U.S. News & World Report rankings of “Best Regional Colleges Midwest” for 2023-24. Bethel was the first Kansas college or university to be named a Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Center, in 2021. For more information, see http://www.bethelks.edu
