N.L. Shompole Awarded MFA's Mapmakers Teaching Assistantship
Pacific University Masters of Fine Art poetry student N.L. Shompole has been awarded the Fall 2021 Mapmakers Teaching Assistantship, a competitive opportunity co-sponsored by the MFA and the English program open to all MFA students entering their 3rd or 4th semesters who have been awarded the Mapmakers Scholarship. The Mapmakers scholarship currently offers partial tuition awards to exceptional students of color, and this teaching fellowship offers an additional stipend.
In this role, Shompole assists in the teaching of a section of ENGW 180, Writing and Research, led this term by Scott Korb, director of the MFA in Writing program, who is also offering pedagogy mentorship throughout the assistantship semester.
About this opportunity, Shompole remarked, "I have been a student most of my life, driven by my love for storytelling and a curiosity about the world and its cultures. Through the Mapmakers Teaching Assistantship, I get the chance to engage with students as a T.A. for the first time, an exciting personal milestone. I am looking forward to working with and learning from Scott Korb and his students this semester."
N.L. Shompole is a Kenyan-born multi-platform artist. Her written and photographic works have appeared in various print and online publications including the 2020 anthology Alone Together: Love, Grief, and Comfort in the Time of Covid-19, Rust + Moth, Words Dance Publication, The Rising Phoenix Review, and The Joyce Gordon Gallery. Her most recent work includes the Eugie Award nominated African sci-fi short story "Strangers Tomorrow," which was published in the 2019 anthology [DIS]Connected.