Graduate Fellows
The English Department awards three outstanding fellowships to support qualified MFA graduate students.
Hemingway Fellowship — Awarded to an outstanding third-year fiction writer from our program, this fellowship provides substantial time to support writing a book-length work of fiction. Additional benefits include a two-course excusal, a private office, and an optional one-week retreat at PCEI’s Artist’s Cabin.
Centrum Fellowship — Selected fellows attend the Port Townsend Writers’ Conference each summer. Fellows have no responsibilities other than to attend one of the conference faculty’s workshops and whatever other events they may choose. The cost of the conference, which includes tuition, lodging and meals, is covered by the scholarship.
Writing in the Wild Fellowship — This fellowship gives MFA students the opportunity to work in Idaho’s famous wilderness areas. The fellowship fully supports a week at the Taylor Wilderness Research Station, which lays in the heart of the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness. This retreat allows fellows to concentrate solely on their fiction, nonfiction or poetry. As this location houses researchers, writers will also have the opportunity to collaborate with foresters, geologists, biologists and other scientists. Among the rivers, lakes and forest of this area, visitors are inevitably inspired by their visit to Taylor Ranch.
Hemingway Fellow
Caitlin Palmer is a writer from the Midwest who writes about wanderlust, malaise, and small beauty. She has attended the prestigious University of Missouri School of Journalism and the Hellenic International Studies in the Arts Program in Greece. She has work published or forthcoming in DIAGRAM, Under the Gum Tree, Midwestern Gothic, and museum of americana, where she was nominated for the 2017 Best of the Net Award. She will be published in the 2018 Idaho anthology "Writers in the Attic," and is the fiction editor for Fugue.
The Centrum Fellows
Stephanie Hamilton is a second-year M.F.A. candidate in fiction.
Steven Pfau is a first-year M.F.A. candidate in nonfiction. He is also the Managing editor of Fugue and a coordinator of the POP-UP PROSE reading series in Moscow. He grew up in and around Boston, studied English and comparative literature at Columbia University, and worked for several years at Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Ryan Downum is a second-year M.F.A. candidate in poetry. Poems of his have appeared in jubilat, Reality Beach, Bear Review, and elsewhere. He has been awarded a scholarship from the Juniper Summer Writing Institute and currently serves as the Poetry Editor for Fugue.
The Writing in the Wild Fellows
Jacob Wilson is a third-year M.F.A. candidate in fiction. He has a sense of adventure and a passion for climbing.
Keene Short is a second-year M.F.A. candidate in creative nonfiction, and is the nonfiction Editor for Fugue. His work has appeared in Atticus Review, Split Lip Magazine, Waxwing, and elsewhere. Find out more at keeneshort.com. In addition to his personal media presence, he is our M.F.A. blog master.
Ben Shane is a second-year M.F.A candidate in fiction. He enjoys an adventurous life and meditation.