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1. Announcements

Thursday’s Notes is delighted to publish this special issue that showcases the myriad achievements of our students and alumni.  We wish them continued success in their academic, scholarly, and professional endeavors!

Kimberly and Ian Carroll celebrated the arrival of Cassandra Teaman Carroll on March 30.  Cassandra weighed in at 7 lbs 14 oz at birth.

Emily Olsen and husband Casey welcomed their new child into the world, Kiera Elizabeth, on May 10 (Mother’s Day). Kiera weighed in at 8 lbs 13 oz at birth.

Congratulations to the fortunate parents of both families!

Come and hear the creative writing students of 698D read from their final work.  The event will begin this evening at 5:45 p.m. with refreshments and conviviality in the Linda Nichols Joseph Room (JR 319).  The reading will commence at 6:00 p.m. Class books will be on display and are also available for ordering.  Please join us for a festive and enjoyable evening.

If you can’t make today’s reading, members of the class and other alumi will be reading at Stories Bookstore in Echo Park on May 24 (Memorial Day). Look for details in the coming weeks and plan now to make CSUN Creative Writing part of your Memorial Day celebration.

The English Department cordially invites you to our Student Recognition and Awards Reception on Friday, May 15, 2015, from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. in  (JR 319). Presentation of the awards starts at 4:30 p.m.  The Reception precedes the College of Humanities Graduate Graduation Ceremony at 6:00 p.m.  Hors d’oeuvres and beverages will be served. This event is sponsored by the CSUN English Department and the Associated Graduate Students of English.

Elyce Wakerman will discuss and read from her novel, A Tale of Two Citizens, Friday, May 15, as part of a fiction showcase at the Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center in Venice, CA.  The program starts at 8:00 p.m.

2. Reminders

Grades are due by Friday, May 22.  Jackie Stallcup, the English Department Chair, has requested that all instructors do their best to get grades in by 5:00 p.m. on Thursday May 21. Friday is essentially the start not only of summer, but also of the Memorial Day weekend, and it may be difficult to sort out any last minute problems that might arise.

3. Opportunities

Editing job.  A registered nurse and former CSUN graduate student, Joie Winnick, is seeking an editor to do some light editing for a book she wrote and illustrated.  If interested, please contact her at 818/783-2629 or 818/783-4684.

4. Student and Alumni Achievements

Nina Moon Ahn (M.A. 2014 in Literature) will be entering the Ph.D. program in English at Northwestern University with full funding for five years in the Fall.

Stacee Bucciarelli (née Barcelata, MA 2006) was awarded a Ph.D. in Medieval Literature from Loyola University, Chicago.

Cody Deitz  (M.A. 2015 in Creative Writing) will be entering the Ph.D. program at the University of North Dakota with full funding for six years in the Fall.

Melissa Filbeck (M.A. 2014) will be joining the English Ph.D. program at Texas A & M with full funding and a Graduate Merit Fellowship in the Fall.

Noreen Lace’s story, “The Girl I Loved in Middle School,” has been accepted for publication by Number Eleven Magazine for their seventh edition (forthcoming Spring 2015).

Yollotl Lopez (M.A. 2014 in Literature) will be attending NYU with 5 years of funding (with an option of 6 years of funding if she teaches four semesters) in the Fall. She was also awarded the McCraken fellowship with an additional summer stipend for all 5 years.

Hayarpi Movsesian (B.A. 2011 Honors English and M.A. 2014 in Literature) will be joining the Comparative Literature Ph.D. program at UC Santa Barbara with six years of full funding (including summers), multiple fellowships, and a funded opportunity to do research in St. Petersburg, Russia and Provence, France, in the Fall.

Laurisa Reyes had three novels published while a graduate student at CSUN: The Last Enchanter (Tanglewood Press), Contact (Hallowed Ink Press), and The Crystal Keeper (Skyrocket Press) as well as a poem published in Camas: The Nature of the West.  She also has two poems accepted for publication in Westwind and riverSedge. She won 2nd place in the 2014 Rosemary Young Adult Romance Writers of America Contest, and she was a finalist in the 2015 Serendipity Young Adult Discover Contest. The magazine for which she is an editor in chief, Middle Shelf Magazine, was a Maggie Award finalist.

Dana Roth has been offered a paid editorial position with Creative Age Publishing upon completion of her internship this semester.  (To date this year, three English 494 interns have moved on to paid positions with their intern organizations.)

Rosalba Ruiz (M.A. 2011 in Creative Writing) has published her first book, Mary, the Mother of Jesus–a Biography.  She wrote an initial section of the biography to fulfill the requirement of her M.A. thesis.

Miles Simon (MA 2014) will be attending the Ph.D. program at the University of Rochester (with full funding) in the Fall.

Ryan Skinnell (M.A. 2007 in Rhetoric and Composition) has accepted a tenure-track position at San Jose State University as an Assistant Professor and Assistant Writing Program Administrator starting Fall 2015.

Robin Smith (M.A 2015 in Creative Writing) has been accepted to the graduate program of the University of North Dakota with full tuition remission, a teaching assistantship, a generous stipend, and health insurance.

Jenny Troy presented three pieces of writing over the past year.  The first piece, titled “Divorce,” was presented at the SAMLA Conference held in Atlanta last November.  The second piece, titled “Dating in the Digital Age” (a fictional work based on true stories), was presented at the AGSE Conference at CSUN. The third piece, titled “Environmentalism Through the Theological Lens:  Practical Applications of Christianity and Chinese Religions, an Example of How English Studies in Critical Thinking Might Move Away From the Philosophical to the Operational in Careers Outside of Academia,” was presented at the Sigma Tau Conference this Spring.

5. Faculty Achievements

Cheryl Spector gave an invited lecture for the Virginia Yerxa Community Read program in Colusa, California, on April 25. Her talk was entitled “Out Far and In Deep: The Things They Carried.”

Thursday’s Notes is edited and compiled by Anthony Dawahare.