Successfully created a new Micro-Certificate in Technical Writing for fall 2024 implementation (7-9 hours, with e-badge and internship option).
Created a new course, WRIT 365: Proposal and Grant Writing, and updated several other technical writing courses to support our new Micro-Certificate in Technical Writing.
Revitalized and updated our Department of English Internship Program.
Achieved a 100% pass rate on our English Secondary Education majors’ EdTPA exams.
Engaged in a complete renovation of our Writing Center, an important retention resource for our students.
Took five Secondary Education students to the 2024 National Council of Teachers of English Convention in Boston.
Took 18 student participants to the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, VA for a weekend of plays, workshops, and tours.
Hosted two Lena-Miles Wever Todd Writers’ Residency Readings (Daisuke Shen and Téa Franco), a Creative Writing Student Showcase, a Graduate Scholars’ Forum, an Anthology Publication Reading event, a Women’s Poetry Reading event, an Undergraduate & Graduate Student Research Conference, a Banned Books event, a Bancroft Trick-or-Treating event, and a Welcome Back Department Social.
English major Emmalynne Eshleman won the prestigious College of Arts & Sciences Inez Bell Caskey Award for Research in the Humanities and Arts.
Eleven students presented their scholarly work at the 2025 Department of English Undergraduate & Graduate Student Research Conference (March 29, 2025).
Nine students were inducted into Sigma Tau Delta in the Spring 2025 Sigma Tau Delta Induction Ceremony: Jzurnee Myers, Davyn Osborne, Ethan Brown, Jill Melander, Sophia Moore, Cody Byrdic, Cile Rothwell, Zach Bell, and Wren Miller.
Current MA in English student Cheyenne Helfrich presented a paper titled “The Leisure of Labor: Gamification of the working Class through Occupational Simulators” at the 2025 Southern Humanities Conference in Greenville, SC and won the Bennie D. Ussery Memorial Graduate Student Award for the best proposed paper from a graduate student.
Graduate students Elizabeth Talbert, Jzurnee Myers, and Wren Miller presented papers at the History Department’s third annual Graduate Conference.
Winthrop English majors Paige Abercrombie, Emmalynne Eshleman, and Sophia Moore gave research presentations at the 2025 SOURCE conference.
Winthrop English major Zachary Bell won the 1970 Johnsonian Endowed Scholarship.
Graduate Students Elizabeth Talbert and Jaden Lemmonds passed their MA Oral Comprehensive Exams with Distinction.
English MA student Maddie Neff was the featured keynote speaker at the fall 2024 Winthrop Department of English Banned Books event.
Jordan Kindig, one of our English MA students, published her debut epic fantasy book, The Nightmare Novellas, in November of 2024 with Notched Briar Press: “The Nightmare Novellas is an epic fantasy novella collection that follows two hunters with a divine mission to cleanse their realm of dangerous spirits. As one realizes there’s more to life than his lonely hunt, another uncovers an ancient evil that threatens to destroy all she knows. Through complex characters, a richly developed world, and a compelling, high-stakes plot, The Nightmare Novellas explores themes of power and knowledge and examines how faith and familial loyalty shape who we are.”
English major Gwen Pregnall and English alumni Paige Abercrombie and Maddison Bosch are releasing their second issue of the literary magazine they created and edit, Patchwork Soup.
Paige Abercrombie had a short story accepted at the Oakland Arts Review.
English alum Will Folden was promoted to Vice President of Marketing and Communications for Concourse Syllabus company.
Dr. Casey Cothran won the 2025 Department of English Faculty Teaching Award.
Dr. Matthew Fike had an academic article published in the Journal of Jungian Scholarly Studies; presented papers at the 2024 Jungian Society for Scholarly Studies Conference and the 2024 CEA Conference; copy-edited five articles, one “Conversations” piece, one book review, and the editor’s introduction for the 2024 volume of JJSS; and won the 2025 Distinguished Professor Award.
Dr. Devon Fitzgerald served as the invited speaker at our 2025 Department of English Undergraduate & Graduate Research Conference and won the 2025 Department of English Faculty Scholarship Award.
Dr. Dustin M. Hoffman’s short story collection Such a Good Man was published in March of 2025 by the University of Wisconsin Press. Additionally, Bluestem Magazine (hosted by Eastern Illinois University since 1966) published his short story “Ecdysis,” Oxford Magazine (hosted by Miami University since 1984) published his short story “The Disappearing Goat,” Fractured Lit published his story “The Scarecrow Takes a Series of IQ Tests,” Alaska Quarterly Review published his story “The Tree Cutters Ride,” and Electric Literature published his essay/reading list “12 Books that Center Work and Working-Class Lives.” He also served as the keynote speaker at the Zone 3 Press Writing Festival at Austin Peay State University and was the speaker for the Carlson-Stauffer Visiting Writers Series at Franklin College.
Dr. Amanda Hiner’s book British Women Satirists in the Long Eighteenth Century (co-edited with Elizabeth Tasker Davis, Cambridge UP) was featured for its “ground-breaking critical research” in Oxford University Press’s The Year’s Work in English Studies (2024). In addition, she gave a presentation titled “Satirizing Masculine Education in the Eighteenth Century: Mary Alcock’s and Alicia D’Anvers’ University Poems” at The Southeastern American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies’ 2025 Conference in Savannah, GA.
Dr. Jo Koster published “Nuns and Nun-Sense: Recreating Medieval Spirituality in the Dame Frevisse Novels of Margaret Frazer” as a chapter in Authentically Medieval: Authors and Scholars on Depicting the Middle Ages in Fiction as well as a review of Piers Plowman and the Reinvention of Church Law in the Middle Ages by Arvind Thomas in Sixteenth Century Journal.
Dr. Heather Listhartke presented at the Carolina Writing Program Administration Meeting in the Middle Conference, the 2025 Conference on College Composition and Communication, and the 2025 LIFT Conference and published three entries in Keywords in Making: A Rhetorical Primer. She was one of two primary contributors, along with Dr. Amanda Hiner, to the development of the new English Department Micro-Certificate in Technical Writing. In addition, she won the 2024 Professor for Affordable Learning Award and the 2025 Department of English Faculty Service Award.
Ms. Amy Bagwell, Dr. Jo Koster, Dr. Mary E. Martin, and Dr. Jane Smith presented original poetry at the 2025 Writing Our Lives: Women’s Poetry Reading Event.
At the 2025 Faculty, Staff, and Retirees Awards Ceremony, Dr. Matthew Fike received the Distinguished Professor Award, Dr. Heather Listhartke received the Flight Ready Impact Award, Dr. Jo Koster was recognized for achieving 30 years of service, and Dr. Dustin M. Hoffman was recognized for achieving 10 years of service.
In spring 2025, Kara Beasley, AJ Campbell, Amanda Covington, and Bryan Ghent were promoted to Senior Instructor.
