Student Work Magazine
Undergraduate students
All work is © the student unless otherwise indicated.
2011 Virginia Burke Contest award winners
The Virginia Burke Writing Contest honors outstanding achievement of UWM's first-year writing students whose essays are judged the best of the year. It is named in honor of the late Professor Virginia Burke, an outstanding professor of English composition and language, who possessed a national reputation and was extremely devoted to undergraduate writing instruction at UWM for over thirty years.
Finding My Voice
Elyssa Lockington
This 2011 Virginia Burke Award-winning essay is a critical literacy biography for English 201, taught by John Raucci.
How Do We Develop Our Ethical Positions on Eugenic Action?
Alexander Washburn
This 2011 Virginia Burke Award-winning essay is a research project for English 102, taught by Diane Unterweger.
From Solar Eclipse to Total Eclipse of the Mind and Back
Tom Mitchell
This 2011 Virginia Burke Award-winning essay is an interpretive essay for English 101, taught by Joan Ruffino.
Only A Matter of Time
Ryan Peyer
This 2011 Virginia Burke Award-winning essay is an interpretive essay for English 095, taught by Chris Lyons.
Spring 2011 Student Work Magazine
The works included here were nominated by faculty and instructors for outstanding student work from Spring and Fall 2010.
Magic in the Air
Jody Bauer
This creative nonfiction memoir about another person was written for English 430: Advanced Writing Workshop, taught by Carol Ross.
A Better Deathtrap
Dan Berte
This video was made for for English 414: Special Topics in Creative Writing – Image and Text, taught by Lane Hall.
How To Drive With Your Eyes Closed
Dan Berte
This video was made for for English 414: Special Topics in Creative Writing – Image and Text, taught by Lane Hall.
Be Reflective
Joshua Boeck
This 2010 Virginia Burke Award-winning essay was a reflective essay for English 101, taught by Meredith Kruse.
Cursive Catalyst
Lindsay Rose DeTienne
This video was made for for English 414: Special Topics in Creative Writing – Image and Text, taught by Lane Hall. Using techniques and exercises by Hazel Smith I generated "Cursive Catalyst" exclusively as a sound piece.
Blue Brush
Lindsay Rose DeTienne
"Blue Brush" was created using "Cursive Catalyst" as the constraint. I reworked a text into fresh narrative that focused on sound but still told a story. In order to enhance how the mind naturally develops and seeks patterns between image and sound (text) I chose to focus images on the mouth, the center of sound.
Beyond Duality
Katrina "Moondancer" Drake
This 2010 Virginia Burke Award-winning essay was a research project for English 102, taught by Cara Ogburn.
Reagan Revisited
Dan Gross
This creative nonfiction piece exploring a cultural subject was written for English 430: Advanced Writing Workshop, taught by Carol Ross.
Fault Line
Jeffrey Henze
This nonfiction narrative about another person was written for English 430: Advanced Writing Workshop, taught by Carol Ross.
Mistah Kurtz Abridged
Shawn Matson
This poem was completed as a visual art project in English 233: Introduction to Creative Writing, taught by Trent Hergenrader. I defaced Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness in an attempt to deconstruct a book I was forced to read in high school, and moreover, to apply a sort of postmodern adaptation of Conrad's text in a way that highlights the indelible recursion of words and ideas as fluid and living bodies that can be contorted and made novel again. That, in my opinion, is the ultimate allegory. (Also of note that in the hard copy, the blue sharpie obscures the crossed out portions of the text much better.)
lost / found
Ashleigh Momberg
This poem is a result of several revisions of part of a zine I originally did for an English 414 workshop: Zine and Screen, taught by Lane Hall. The poem was first generated through word association and language games, which I often like to use when I'm not really sure what to write about, and then kind of took on a life of its own.
Roughly
Ashleigh Momberg
This poem was written for English 416: Poetry Workshop, taught by Brenda Cardenas. It's a modified sonnet in which I concentrated on working with sound within the line.
Take Time to Read
Albulena Shabani
This video was made for English 414: Special Topics in Creative Writing – Image and Text, taught by Lane Hall.
Asthmatic Response
Nicole Wallschlaeger
This visual poem addresses the progressing crisis of environmental damage on our planet. It was written for English 416: Poetry Workshop, taught by Brenda Cardenas.
First Steps
Nicole Wallschlaeger
This young poem about vision, the body, and development was written for English 416: Poetry Workshop, taught by Brenda Cardenas.
Rebellion in Black
Aaron Yoder
This nonfiction narrative about another person was written for English 430: Advanced Writing Workshop, taught by Carol Ross.