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English 110 Publication Celebration from 2023. MANHATTAN COLLEGE/COURTESY

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By Lauren Raziano, Multimedia Editor

The English Department has announced its first concentration within the department. The English major degree with a creative writing concentration provides students an opportunity to earn a 33-credit English Bachelor of Arts degree with a writing focus on creativity.

Chair of the English Department, Dr. Adam Kohler, worked with other faculty members to establish the first English concentration to give students opportunities to produce writing in new genres. Kohler spoke with The Quadrangle about the process.

“I worked with a committee of faculty from the English Department last academic year to put together a concentration for English majors that focused on creative writing,” Kohler said. “So, students who are interested in writing poetry, creative nonfiction and fiction would have a robust, sustained opportunity to produce in those genres, practice in those genres and all the while, coupling it with intensity. Hopefully it gears students up for not just careers in the arts, but I think any career that is least arts adjacent.”

The English department offers students the opportunity to have a distributed course load, allowing them to build their interests.

“The program builds on the English department’s literary offerings,” the English creative writing page wrote on manhattan.edu. “It also provides a structure for creative work in a supportive community. With the creative writing major, students experience the powerful ways literary reading and writing inter-animate each other and set students up for success as writers, editors, agents and vital members of publishing and writing communities.”

Sophomore English major Aaron Schoepf wrote to The Quadrangle about why this concentration aligns with his goals.

“I chose to participate because I’ve wanted to be a writer for as long as I can remember,” Schoepf wrote. “Creative writing, specifically in fiction, is why I wanted to go to college. With this concentration, I can really hone in on the skills needed to write creatively.”

Two required courses are Introduction to Creative Writing and Introduction to Literary Studies. 

“I have only been able to take one so far: Introduction to Creative Writing with Dr. Wrozynski.” Schoepf wrote. “The readings and writing exercises we do make it really fun and easy to get started with writing!”

Nine credits must be taken in a major creative writing coursework including; studies in creative writing poetry, fiction, non-fiction and a course called ‘The Little Magazine: Contemporary Literary Publishing.’

Additionally, there are nine credits that are taken in literature at the major level. Options for these courses can be Pre-18th Century Literature, a writing and editorial course and others 300-level English elective classes.

“Within the English distribution model, we are offering so many creative writing courses, so it made sense for us to kind of package them all up so that students could take the majority of their English credits through creative writing courses,” Kohler said. “And then by the time they graduate, they have a portfolio of materials that they will send to graduate school if they want to pursue an MFA. They could send out to employers who wanted to go into publishing agenting fires lots of sort of ways in which that portfolio kind of positions them on the marketplace.”

Additionally, the English department has the major author reading series, which encourages students to ask questions to established authors, such as Pulitzer Prize winners and National Book Award winners.

“One other cool thing about the concentration is the major author reading series where we bring award winning writers to campus to do public readings with the campus community,” Kohler said. “And one of the things that I think is very exciting is figuring out what that relationship is going to be like between the writers that come on campus you know, these are Pulitzer Prize winners, National Book Award winners. And if we have creative writing concentrators in the department, it would make sense for us to give them the opportunity to ask questions from these writers to see what the profession looks like and talk to them about craft.” 

Kohler is excited to see how the creative writing concentration is going to develop to support students to produce creative pieces.

“I think the next step for the creativity concentration is to figure out how best to organize this relationship to the major author reading series to Manhattan magazine, because there’s a lot of pieces kind of floating around and once you put them all together, it’s gonna make for I think, a really great creative community on campus.”