"Dear Prospective Student,

I have been fortunate to combine my love of teaching with my innate love of writing. After receiving my Bachelor's Degree in French and English in Secondary Education at Auburn University (Phi Beta Kappa), I taught English Composition, French I-IV, and European History for three years before I gave birth to my daughter. Once she began school, I taught poetry-writing in elementary and middle schools in Alabama as a poet certified by the Alabama State Council on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. Following this refreshing and delightful time of teaching children the meaning and importance of the imagination and the creative, Lee High School in Huntsville, Alabama, hired me as "Head of the Creative Writing Magnet Program." In addition to the two-hour block of Creative Writing, I also taught Advanced English 11, Regular English 9, Technical Writing (as part of the Technical Writing Magnet Program), and Literary Magazine. During my time at Lee, I took summer courses at the University of Alabama, Huntsville; and in 1994, received my Masters in English Literature, with an emphasis on the Romantics and Irish writers (4.0 average). Shortly afterwards, I began teaching night classes at Calhoun State University. At Calhoun, I taught all levels of English - 98 and 99 (remedial grammar and writing); 101 and 102 (writing and literature); and Part I and Part II of English Literature. In 2003, 2005, and 2008, I taught graduate poetry-writing as a honorary Ph.D. at the University of Alabama, Huntsville. Starting in 2004, I directed the Limestone Dust Poetry Festival, a one-of-a-kind celebration of poetry and poets in the Southeast. From the time I left the Festival in 2011, I have continued my writing career, and also my teaching career, through poetry readings/workshops/lectures and through private tutoring and mentoring for college students and for poets, of all ages, just beginning their writing journeys.

My writing career, as both a poet and columnist, has fulfilled my need" less...