Five students attend Sigma Tau Delta's international convention

They are Shaniya DeNaeyer of Valentine, Neb., Stephanie Gardener of Chadron, Kaitlin Macke of Lead, S.D., Lydia Privett of Wahoo, Neb.,and Nalani Stewart of Colorado Springs, Colo. Dr. Kimberly Cox, assistant professor of English and Humanities, accompanied the students.

Gardener and DeNaeyer, Student Representative and Assistant Student Representative for the High Plains Region, respectively, helped oversee a number of discussion sessions and panels, including one with guest speaker Mary Norris, a former copy editor for “The New Yorker.”

Gardener also presented on the panel “Dealing with Loss in Original Fiction,” and wrote a post Don’t Fear the ‘No’: Applying for Scholarships for the international chapter of Sigma Tau Delta’s blog, “WORDY by Nature.” 

DeNaeyer also worked with Gardener to plan an escape room with a “Jane Eyre” theme that took a lot of time and effort.

“It taught me a lot about professionalism and time management,” DeNaeyer said.

Additionally, DeNaeyer and Gardener led a student leadership workshop.

“Students put together a story using pictures from the book ‘Zoom’ by István Bányai. But they couldn’t look at each other’s picture. They had to put it together by talking to each other and describing the pictures or acting it out. This helped with learning communication and teamwork,” DeNaeyer said.

Cox said Gardener and DeNaeyer are great examples of what Literature majors at CSC can accomplish.

“Not only has Stephanie won a significant scholarship, but she and Shaniya both have made names for themselves within the conference circuit, which will only help them in their future careers or as they apply to graduate school,” Cox said.

Privett said the panels she attendedranged from disability studies in literature, gender and sexuality, ecocriticism and nature studies, to a workshop about teaching English abroad.

“These topics really interested me and are things that will impact my future career,” Privett said.

Stewart said she felt the most useful part of the convention was networking and meeting other students. Her favorite panel was about publishing fiction, nonfiction and poetry.

DeNaeyer, editor for CSC’s “10^th Street Miscellany,” said a workshop with peer editors was helpful.

“It was an open discussion where students from all over United States asked questions and shared their stories and struggles with publishing, editing, and deadlines. It helps to know you are not alone, and it gave me ideas I could bring back to campus and to our journal to help us keep improving,” she said.