In Support of the Purdue MFA and Sycamore Review

At Purdue University, the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts has withdrawn funding completely for all graduate student admissions to the Department of English for the next academic year. This moratorium on graduate student admissions, as well as the Dean’s plans to severely reduce admissions in following years, threatens the existence of the MFA program in creative writing and Purdue’s student-run literary journal, Sycamore Review.

What Purdue’s administration doesn’t seem to understand is the immense value of MFA students, not only on-campus (as instructors, editors, mentors, tutors) but off-campus, nationally and internationally, as poets and fiction writers who contribute to their fields in ways made possible by the mentorship of the MFA.

When my fellow editors John A. Nieves and Caroline Chavatel and I released our first issue of The Shore in March of 2019, I had applied to several MFA programs (and had not yet received an acceptance.) A few waitlists and offers later, I was on the phone with Professor Donald Platt, creative writing faculty at Purdue. It was several talks over the phone with Don, now my MFA thesis advisor, it was his persistence and attention and lengthy descriptions of the Celery Bog near campus, that made me feel like Purdue could be home without ever having traveled to the Midwest.

Purdue is home to creative writing faculty who are incomparable in their fields.

Professor Kaveh Akbar describes the MFA program as his “education,” stating, “I’ve been faculty here for nearly a half-decade, and each student who has passed through my classroom has expanded for me the aesthetic and moral possibilities of our field.”

Purdue is home to my program-mates whose creative work, intellect and compassion continue to astound me.

Just these past couple months in the program, I listened to Paul Riker read one of his short stories, forthcoming in Salt Hill, while creative writing students and faculty raised money for our local foodbank; I read a poem written by Aiya Sakr published in Palette Poetry that I had first read and admired in workshop; I attended Zoom readings that featured Purdue MFA alumni who have gone on to publish award-winning books; I deliberated with my poetry co-editors at Sycamore Review to accept the highest caliber of work from emerging voices.

The actions of the Dean not only threaten the existence of an incredibly successful program but the existence of a vibrant and diverse community.

Kaveh describes this community as such: “The sincere rigor, curiosity, and collective spirt upon which this program has been built are rare in the literary world. It’s an oasis, a miracle. It should be celebrated, cherished, exalted. Our program is the exact antithesis of the malignant machinations of bureaucrats whose confusion at the sight of real beauty and community provokes them to threaten it.”

The Purdue MFA community extends beyond our program and into the lives of the undergraduate students that MFA candidates teach every semester.

Creative writing courses teach students how to question and pay close attention to the world around them. The Dean is misguided to believe English and creative writing instruction aren’t essential to students at large. Attention to the intricacies and possibilities of written language is useful to us all.

Creative writing graduate and undergraduate students understand what Purdue’s administration fails to: the exciting possibilities that occur when both the arts and sciences are respected and allowed to flourish.

A recent poem I wrote, forthcoming in Salt Hill, was inspired by reading a Purdue email about an engineering professor who invented an ultra-white paint that can cool surfaces below air temperature, leading to my meditation on what it means to live in the current climate crisis.

Undergraduate student Isabella Escamilla, who has poems published or forthcoming in esteemed national journals like Passages North, Adroit Journal, PANK Magazine and others, studies crop and soil management AND poetry at Purdue.

The College of Liberal Arts is doing a severe disservice to its students by defunding English graduate programs and Sycamore Review. A decision, that if allowed, Purdue will pay for with a lessening of innovative thought, communication skills, community and conscientiousness on campus.

As a fellow literary journal, The Shore stands with Sycamore Review and the Purdue MFA. We hope you will too. Please send an email to the administration. Retweet. Sign and share the program’s petition. Talk to your friends and colleagues. We won’t get another chance to be loud enough.

With love,
-Emma with the support of the Shore Crew

As direct evidence of the program’s excellence, please enjoy the incredible work of Purdue Creative Writing faculty and students past and present published in The Shore:

Donald Platt
XV. Album of Figure Studies
XVI. Male Model Resting
XVIII. Figure and Pool

Emily Rosko
First Lesson
Shard & Smoke

Jennifer Loyd
Rachel Carson: Juvenalia
Rachel Carson: Genealogy
Rachel Carson Leaves Springdale, PA for The Sea
Some Mothers Are As Lighthouse to Ship
The Shore Interview #16: Jennifer Loyd

JK Anowe
An Outpatient’s Night at the Psyche Ward
A Road’s Guide to Kill

Katie McMorris
Allowing Your House Ghosts to Steal Your Loafers
cannibal ant from special object 3003

Kelsey Carmody Wort
Our Three-Quarters Phase
I Watch My Girlfriend Put Poetry Under Her Microscope
O
Gemini Drunkenly Scrolling through Her Twitter Feed in the Bar Bathroom
The Shore Interview #17: Kelsey Carmody Wort

Lauren Mallett
Porfa