Say hi to our department mascot, Virginia Woof. We’re #bsuenglish, a community of staff, students, teachers, writers, linguists, scholars, and all-around lovers of English (and dogs!). We make things, analyze things, do things, all with critical and imaginative minds.
We cover a lot of ground here in the English Department, from literary festivals to career readiness to hosting graduate student conferences to working with community schools to tutoring BSU students in writing--on and on! With major concentrations in creative writing, literature, teaching, linguistics, and professional writing, and graduate programs in most of these areas, we’re sort of like our own little college over here:
· Applied Linguistics and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages
· Creative Writing
· Teaching major in English/Language Arts
· Literature
· Professional Writing
At BSU English, we are proud of all we do, but especially when it impacts the Muncie community in a positive way. One example (of many!) is English 409, Creative Writing in the Community. This course is an immersive, service-learning opportunity. Ball State students meet with young writers in the community—Boys & Girls Club, Motivate our Minds, and local schools, for example—to teach creative writing techniques and to write a text collaboratively. This class concludes with a print anthology of community member writing, and a public reading and celebration! Please help support our efforts to link the classroom with the community to create poetry, stories, and kinship.
Dedicated teacher and accomplished scholar Dr. Elizabeth Riddle retired last year from Ball State after 40 years. In that time, Dr. Riddle worked with hundreds of students, taught dozens of classes, and guided more research projects than we can count. Her passion for her field inspires her students and colleagues alike. She truly cares about her students, supporting their research, expanding their knowledge, and following their careers. If you worked with her, you know that she always put her students first, and you know how much she loved her work. This scholarship will support promising undergraduate and graduate scholars in Linguistics.
Dr. Frances Mayhew Rippy was a professor of English at Ball State from 1955 to 2001 and specialized in eighteenth-century British poetry. She was a tireless advocate for her students and an energetic member of the department community. Soon after her retirement, her family set up this scholarship fund in her name, which continues to provide a generous funding resource for graduate students. Just as Dr. Rippy eschewed the spotlight, graduate students are also reluctant to seek recognition for their accomplishments. The Frances Mayhew Rippy Scholarship, then, allows graduate faculty at Ball State University to celebrate graduate student accomplishment.
So that’s it. That’s us. Help us keep making cool things happen for our students, our community, our Ball State. Whether you donate $10 or $1000, know that it’ll go to support the people and projects that make Ball State English such a great place!
Thanks!
