Three English majors win President's Student Leadership Awards
The Department of English is pleased and proud that three of our outstanding English majors received University-wide recognition: Valerie Paul (left), Marley Richmond (center), and Ethan Voss (right) won 2022 President's Student Leadership and Service Awards. The award recognizes students for their exceptional leadership and service to the University of Minnesota and the surrounding community.
Valerie Paul is enrolled in the U’s Community Engaged Scholars Program, completing 400 hours of community service before graduation. Two years ago, as part of an English community engagement class, Paul began volunteering for 826 MSP, which offers diverse Twin Cities youth free writing and tutoring help. The class ended; Paul stayed on. At the U, Paul serves as an MSA Sexual Assault Task Force member, where they acted as project lead for the initiative to extend the S/N deadline for all students. Paul also was development director for the 2022 Tower undergraduate literary magazine. “Valerie is a detail-oriented perfectionist,” says magazine advisor James Cihlar, “who has worked without the usual supervision from me to knock out one successful grant proposal after the other, breaking records and bringing in thousands of dollars to support our outreach to diverse communities.”
Marley Richmond has served as editor in chief of two major literary arts publications at the U. In 2020-2021, Richmond led the University’s Tower staff to produce an edition honored with a national 2022 Crown Award for college literary magazine from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association. Says Dr. Cihlar, "Marley encouraged each staff member to discover their own strengths and apply them to our work.” In 2021-2022, Richmond has been the editor in chief of the student-run magazine The Wake. In addition, for two years Richmond has consulted at the Student Writing Center, where, says Center for Writing Director Kirsten Jamsen, “She brings a stance of curiosity and compassion to her work supporting student writers.”
Ethan Voss is a graduating English major with minors in Technical Writing and Communication (TWC) and Linguistics. Throughout this academic year, Ethan has worked in the Writing Center as a writing consultant, advised majors and minors in the Department of Writing Studies, directed and developed curriculum for the First-Year Experience Program, taught CLA 1007 in the Office of Student Experience, led (as President) the Fellowship of Undergraduate Students in English (FUSE), served on the editorial board of the Minnesota Undergraduate Research and Academic Journal (MURAJ), and participated on the Senate Committee on Educational Policy (SCEP) and the Executive Vice President and Provost's Core Curriculum 2025 Committee.
