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An adjunct is an alumna who has entered the The Writer’s Studio for a second go-round. My year as an adjunct with Rachel Rose in poetry has been part Freaky Friday, part grad school. It’s rare to have the chance to revisit a transformative experience such as the Writer’s Studio. In 2006 I studied creative non fiction with Wayde Compton and devoured every class, meeting and conversation. This time around, it all feels familiar, yet challenging, because I switched disciplines. I float among the students and mentors; I
have not taken many courses but have booked monthly meetings with Rachel todiscuss my work. In our workshop I weigh in from both sides, clarifying the process and offering a perspective that I hope is helpful. I’m a part of the emerge anthology, the student readings - all the benefits of the program that include bonding with the current students. The main difference from my first year is that I am solely focussed on my writing, not distracted by learning about the multiple layers of the writing life. The plum in this process has been developing a true mentoring relationship with Rachel, who can place my writing in a wider context. The beauty of the adjunct position is that you and your mentor can make of it what you will. Each adjunct will have a unique experience, due to the alchemy of the workshop group, or where one is with a manuscript, or if, like me, you are testing new genres.
Elee Kraljii Gardiner
TWS Creative Non Fiction, 2006
TWS Poetry Adjunct, 2008
During my time as an adjunct student in The Writers Studio 2008, I have often thought I should look up the word adjunct. I had a vague idea of the definition, but I’m in the poetry mentor group, where every word should gleam, sting and do double, even triple duty. Vague doesn’t cut it. Today I cracked open the big Webster’s. Adjunct means “something joined or added to another thing but not essentially a part of it…”
I agree and disagree with this view of the word. Because adjunct students are alumni of the program, we’ve already taken the classes required in addition to our mentor groups and participated in publishing and publicizing the emerge collection and in the readings to launch it. We are different—joined or added to another thing, and because I wasn’t meeting as frequently with the entire TWS group as the regular students in my mentor group, it did take longer for me to feel “essentially a part of it.”
However, by the time the spring student readings ended, I was as excited and proud of my fellow students as if this were my first experience in the program. Having a wider-angle view of TWS across genres and years means that I can reassure or help my fellow students if they feel swamped or uncertain. I’ve been there. However, I have just as much need for the mentors as the other students, and my work has grown in focus and strength and commitment.
I’ve also had the opportunity to co-facilitate a writing group at Carnegie Centre with another TWS alumna, as part of the Memory Wall Project,. This has been a wonderful community-building experience. There’s that essential word again—community: a quality that makes Simon Fraser University’s Writing Studio something I’m privileged to be part of.
ElJean Dodge Wilson
TWS 2004 Fiction
TWS 2008 Adjunct writer in Poetry & Lyric Prose
Being an adjunct writer in TWS is much different than when I attended as a student in 2003. Although the program has changed in significant ways – new mentors, an alumni association, public readings – much remains the same: the workshops and professional guidance. And the deadlines.
The biggest change has been in my own expectations. In 2003, I expected to be taught about craft and style and technique, but instead discovered how difficult conveying thoughts onto paper really is. I learned to read differently, how to trust where my writing wants to lead me, and how revision makes words come alive.
This year I’ve returned with a clear objective – to complete a memoir I began in 2003. I’m delighted to work once more with writers who struggle, as I do, to get the words right, but now I’m less afraid when challenged to say what I mean and mean what I say.
I see the results of my first year in my recent writing, and finally know the story I want to tell. Being back in TWS has given me renewed incentive to finish. And, of course, new deadlines.
Pat Buckna
TWS 2002 Creative Non-fiction
TWS 2008, Narrative & Non-fiction, Adjunct Writer