Education is Dying

Our education system is failing. There. I said it.

A few months ago, my nephew informed me that his school is no longer teaching cursive as part of its curriculum. I was baffled. How are children supposed to sign their names when they become adults? A squiggly line? Flowery initials? 

When he then shared that they are contemplating not teaching the Holocaust, I just about screamed. I took a course in undergraduate university on the Holocaust, specifically literature of the Holocaust, and it was by far the most valuable, life-changing course I have ever taken. To think that students won't even learn about the Holocaust, the genocide of SIX MILLION Jews, is disturbing.

More recently, I've read comments from Facebook friends and articles posted by major publications that believe college professors are under-worked and over-paid. In my state, Governor Walker has proposed a THREE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLAR cut to the University system. You read that correctly: 300 MILLION.

Stonecoast Graduation and Washington DC Trip

On Saturday, January 17, 2015, I graduated with my Master of Fine Arts in creative writing. That was three days ago, and it's still bittersweet. I wanted to reminisce, to reflect on my time at Stonecoast. To do that, I needed to go back to the beginning, to a time when I wasn't the confident writer...

I started writing my novel in 2009. While each new year brought the same resolution—finish your novel!—I still felt as though something was missing.

I found that something at Stonecoast.

In December 2012, I graduated from the University of Wisconsin—Parkside with a Bachelor of Arts in English, and in January 2013, I began my journey at the University of Southern Maine’sStonecoast program. Before I graduated from UW-Parkside and before I applied at Stonecoast, I searched high and low for the perfect graduate school. I knew it existed somewhere. I just had to find it. And I refused to settle.

I was looking for a school that would let me work one on one with my professors, a school that would let me focus on my writing rather than taking more courses that taught me how to write. After four years of undergraduate English courses, I was ready to step out of the classroom and into the writing world. I had also always wanted to study abroad, something that so few schools offered. But most importantly, I wanted to work with professors who were writers I grew up reading (or, at the very least, had heard of). I wanted to work with writers who were currently in the industry, who were prolific in their own way. I wanted to work with writers who truly knew the young adult market and who also wrote their fair share of vampire novels.

It’s fair to say my Buffy-obsessed self wanted to work with Joss Whedon.