Two Baker seniors came back with honors after placing at the Sigma Tau Delta International 2009 literary conference.
The conference took place March 25-28 in Minneapolis. The conference is for members of the national English honor society.
Manuscripts are submitted to judges from universities across the U.S. If a student’s piece is chosen, he or she is invited to attend the conference.
With more than 800 students participating from 167 universities, six Baker students were chosen to attend the conference. In the end, only three prizes are awarded in each category.
Two of the three poetry awards went to Baker students.
Senior Ashley Sims was astounded when she won second place for her poetry collection, “Beneath the Floorboards.”
“It was really shocking, and I was surprised when I found out,” Sims said. “Everything was very high quality this year.”
Senior Brianna Lichtenauer won third for her poetry collection entitled “This Is How It Goes.”
“I can’t even explain how happy I am…,” Adjunct Instructor of English Marti Mihalyi said.
“They are two of the hardest working creative writing students I have worked with over a long, long university teaching career. Their fellow students have been important in helping them get this far, too because the level of challenge in the upper division writing workshops is very high right now.”