“At 19 years old I dropped out of school in order to write. I had a teacher say, “if you really want to write, focus on writing and nothing else," so I took her quite literally. Over the next six or seven years, I wrote three books. But, I started feeling a particular calling to teach. I signed up for classes at a two-year technical school and enjoyed it because it provided an easy means for me to get back into the swing of things.

Within a year and a half I had already made the goal to go to grad school. I wanted to transfer to a school that had a good grad school program and that was located in the Southeast – and Furman definitely fell into that category. I called up Furman and started talking to Allyson Brown. It was so pleasant that I made a decision on the phone that Furman was where I was going to go to.

Since enrolling at Furman, I have succeeded. One of the most important things for me, of course, is the writing and Furman’s English department has some incredible creative writing people on staff: Dr. Tevis and Dr. Morris, as well as other teachers who have promoted some of my conceptual knowledge of literature like Dr. Pate. I plan on attending grad school immediately after graduation to get my master of fine arts in creative writing and my PhD in literature, specified in creative writing.

I meet with different writing groups and friends to critique our work. Because of my age, I’ve been writing for 10 years, and that gives me a particular voice in their lives. I get a lot of joy in seeing that progression. And I’ve taken in a lot of joy at Furman."