EAPSU Conference: A Reflection

The English Association of Pennsylvania State Universities (EAPSU) is a statewide organization with members from the 14 state universities of Pennsylvania. Since 1980, they have been dedicated to showcasing English excellence. Every year they host two conferences - one in the fall for English faculty, and one in the spring for undergraduate English students.  This year, the annual Fall Conference was held at Shippensburg University on October 4-6, which several Bloomsburg students got to visit and participate in!

EAPSU hosts an annual poetry competition for undergraduate students at any of the PA state universities.  This year, we are proud to announce that the first place winner went to Sarah M. Goulet for her poem "For you, my bones."  Adelina Sacouto and Daniel Pintos both received honorable mentions for their poems "Manitas" and "Dream Eaters," respectively.

All three of our students had the opportunity to travel to this conference, along with Professor Wemple, who participated in a panel called "Readings from Central Pennsylvania Poets.”

Our poets read their poems during the Thursday Night Open Mic hosted by Patricia Smith, the Keynote Speaker for the conference.  Patricia Smith, according to the conference guidebook, "is the award-winning author of eight critically-acclaimed books of poetry, including Incendiary Art (Triquarterly Books, 2017), winner of the 2018 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, the 2018 NAACP Image Award, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, as well as a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; Shoulda Been Jimi Savannah (Coffee House Press, 2012), winner of the Lenore Marshall Prize from the Academy of American Poets; Blood Dazzler (Coffee House Press, 2008), a National Book Award finalist; and Gotta Go, Gotta Flow (CityFiles Press, 2015), a collaboration with award-winning Chicago photographer Michael Abramson."

Congratulations to our poetry finalists!

From left to right:  Kaitlynn Keiper, Sarah M. Goulet, and Patricia Smith

Daniel Pintos 

Adelina Sacouto

Congrats!