Archive for April, 2010

The Texas Rangers narrowly beat the Chicago White Sox 6-5 on Wednesday, thanks in part to Hamilton’s homer in the first inning. Other notable highlights included Dr. Bill Carroll’s triumph in the Dollar Hot Dog Eating Contest, totalling out at an impressive 7 for the evening, and the free Venom “Death Adder” energy drink after the game. Joining him in the mayhem were Dr. Shelly Sanders and Nathan Sanders, MA students Grant Perkins and Todd Womble, and undergraduate majors Lydia Melby, Bethany Bradshaw and David McMichael.

Katie Condra
Todd Womble
Perry Harrison
Brittany Whitstone

Twenty-four English majors will graduate in May 2010.

Grant Boston

Erin Bracken

Brent Dill

Kasey Dobbs

Ty Elrod

Tara Elzey

Cameron Enlow

Megan Faver Hartline

Megan Hale

Erin Halstead

Mary Hardegree

Jamalin Harp

Jenna Henderson

JaneAnn Kenney

Kimberly Lewis

Thomas Madrid

Angela Maimon

Lydia Melby

Grant Perkins

Nicole Songstad

Tiffany Turner

Brittany Anderson

Kristofer Heiderich

Congratulations to six English majors who presented papers at ACU’s Undergraduate Research Festival.

Allison Fowler, “Instances of Anger: The Tool of Anger in Little Women.”  Faculty Mentor: Dr. Dana McMichael

Erin Halstead, “The Authoritarian Voice in the Speech of College-Aged Women.”  Faculty Mentor: Dr. Nancy Shankle.  Erin received a commendation for Outstanding Oral Presentation in Arts and Humanities at the awards ceremony.

Joel Dallas, “Return of the Thought Police: 1984 or 2010?” Faculty Mentor: Dr. Laura Carroll

Joshua Alkire, “‘Literally’ Speaking: Reason, Metaphor, and Exaggeration in Conflict.” Faculty Mentor: Dr. Bill Carroll

Megan Faver Hartline, “I Am Girl, Hear Me Squeak.” Faculty Mentor: Dr. Bill Carroll

Katherine Sinclair, “The Monster Within: The Role of roman Catholic Concepts of Sin in The Picture of Dorian Gray.” Faculty Mentor: Dr. Bill Carroll

The Faculty Senate selects 50 of the top academic students from across the campus and recognizes them in an award ceremony in April.  This year, the Faculty Senate selected 4 English majors for this prestigious award.

Joshua Alkire

Josh is a double major in English and Biblical text with an outstanding record of scholarship that is evidenced by his 4.0 GPA asw ell as a remarkable record of research and conference presentations.  In the Spring semester of 2010, Joshua represented ACU at two separate conferences, both of which have rigorous selection criteria.  One of his papers was accepted for the national conference of Sigma Tau Delta, the English Majors’ Honor Society.

Erin Halstead

Erin is active in the honors program and has completed two honors contracts: her first work was entitled “Gender Discourse in the ACU classroom” and the second “The Longer We Learn English, the More English We Forget: Demotivation in the ESL Classroom.”  She is now conducting research among college-aged women for her honors capstone project called “The Authoritarian Voice in the Talk of College-aged Women.”

Megan Faver Hartline

Megan’s Honors Capstone project explores the shift in the construction of feminine gender in popular children’s literature from the late 19th century to those constructed in contemporary children’s texts.  Her work demonstrates a burden for justice as she discsses how our stories define roles for our girls that often cage rather than free them.  One of her professors says: “I admire Megan’s scholarship.  Its strength distinguishes it from the work of her peers.”

Lydia Melby

According to her professors, Lydia Melby is “one of the most academically distinguished of the current English majors; and with her awards and publications she has become the English Department’s most successful creative writing student of the past ten years.”  She won awards for her short story “And We Were Gone,” at the Christianity and Literature Contest and at the Texas Association of Creative Writing Teachers Contest.  She was accepted into the prestigious CCCU program, Best Semester, and studied in Oxford.

Matt Worthington, a 2008 Abilene Christian University Graduate from San Antonio, TX, has since uprooted his life to Washington, DC where he teaches Special Education to 8th graders with Emotional Disabilities in the DC Public School System through Teach For America and is currently helping to start an Urban Church Plant in the Columbia Heights and Georgia Petworth Neighborhoods of Washington, DC where he lives and teaches. Matt, a former English Major, is also pursuing his Master’s in Education at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA where he will graduate from in May 2011. Immediately thereafter, he will be married to another wonderful ACU Alum, Jessica Reyna (08′), who is currently pursuing her MFT at Seattle Pacific University.

Technical Writing Intern
Quality Assurance Department
Milsoft Utility Solutions
Abilene, Texas

Primary Responsibilities:
The Technical Writing Intern will be expected to assist in creating new software documentation, maintaining current documentation, maintaining the internal wiki, and proofreading presentations. The intern will also be expected to test and document software functionality as a part of the writing process.

Preferred Experience and Education:
–    Experience proofreading for spelling, punctuation, grammar, and technical accuracy
–    Experience creating documents using given formatting and style guidelines
–    Experience working in a multi-disciplinary team environment
–    Coursework in English (composition), Journalism, or related areas

Terms:
The internship will run from 5/17/2010 to 8/13/2010. Compensation rate will be based on a combination of experience and performance on related tests during the interview.

Interested candidates are invited to send a resume to Chandra McFarlen at internships@milsoft.com. For more information about Milsoft Utility Solutions, visit http://www.milsoft.com.

Jessica Haseltine, a 2007 ACU graduate, went on to get a Master of Science in Environmental Management from Hardin Simmons University, graduating in 2009. She currently works as a technical writer for Milsoft Utility Solutions in Abilene. She has been accepted to Texas Tech School of Law and will be starting there this fall.