Dr. Tina Iraca (’16) has been promoted to Associate Professor at the State University of New York Dutchess in Poughkeepsie, NY, where she teaches writing and literature.

Congratulations to Laura Godfrey, who  has accepted a position as an Academic Success Coach at Georgia Military College in Augusta, GA. Laura  received her Ph.D. this past spring,

Crystal Maldonado, who graduated in 2010 with degrees in English and Journalism, wrote to us to share her good news: her debut young adult novel FAT CHANCE, CHARLIE VEGA, will be released on Feb. 2, 2021 from Penguin Random House. 

Congratulations, Crystal!

Congratulations to Matthew Jones (PhD ’20), who has accepted a one-year postdoctoral position at Northeastern University in Boston.

Two of our grads, Emily Cormier and Alex Gatten, have accepted one-year renewable positions at Storrs as Visiting Assistant Professors.

We also welcome Kyle Booten as Assistant Professor at Storrs and Paige Walker as Assistant Professor in Residence at Stamford.

Kaylee Mootz will be working for the Office of Diversity and Inclusion this year as the Supervisor of NACP (Native American Cultural Programs). She has been volunteering with ODI for four years but will now join them in an official capacity.

Two of our graduate students, Arpita Mandal and Patrick Russell, have been offered graduate assistantships with UConn’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion, in which they will assist in the development of inclusion programs and initiatives.

Pam Bedore ran a workshop for English faculty of all types and graduate students entitled “Using Discussion Boards with Online Teaching. This informal workshop, scheduled for Wednesday, August 19, from 1-1:45 was open to everyone and  covered the following topics:

1. Designing engaging discussion boards
2. Grading discussion boards quickly (with rubrics)
3. Following up on discussion boards to introduce future materials

View meeting content.

 

Congratulations to Katie Nunnery and Hayley Stefan on their new jobs!

Katie has accepted a one-year position as Visiting Assistant Professor in the Freshman Writing Program at Tulane University, and Hayley has accepted a one-year position as Visiting Assistant Professor in the English Department at Holy Cross.

 

 

How Studying Racism Helped Us Become Anti-Racist Activists.

Earlier this summer, as the US saw the beginning of the largest protest movement in its history, English PhD candidate Anna Ziering organized a collaboration with former students on an activist writing project in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. The process built on coursework from Ziering’s FA 19 course “American Literature Since 1880” (ENGL 2203), which closed with Angie Thomas’s YA novel “The Hate U Give.” Using Zoom and GoogleDocs, a team of twelve students worked together, building on their experience in two different sections of the class and, says Ziering, “organically sharing their diverse perspectives, experiences, and histories of activism.” Their article was published in UConn Today on July 30.