The Volunteer State Community College student literary arts magazine, Pioneer Pen, recently won a first place national award from the American Scholastic Press Association for the 2017 edition.
“Pioneer Pen is an opportunity for students to have their work published and viewed by a large audience. It is a bragging right to say that your work is published in the college’s literary magazine. We received many submissions and only the best are published,” said Laura McClister, faculty advisor.
The Pioneer Pen may be taken as an English practicum at Vol State. It is designed to provide students with hands-on experience in all aspects of publishing a literary arts magazine. Student editor, Kaily Farrell, shared her experience: “I wanted to join Pioneer Pen partly because I’m a writer, but I want to do some work as an editor in journalism, and I thought it would give me some legit experience … my favorite part is putting it all together and seeing which pieces actually complement each other, even though they may be from two different people. It reminds me there’s a sort of universality among all artists whether they’re painters, writers, or photographers.”
Faculty advisors Emily Andrews and Laura McClister were recently invited to speak at the AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) conference because of their experience with Pioneer Pen.
“It’s the largest literary conference in North America. They asked us to speak on reinventing a literary arts magazine at a two year college … we met a lot of people from across the country who are looking to add a literary arts magazine to their program, or had a magazine, but were looking to add the practicum in,” explained Emily Andrews, faculty advisor.
For more information about the Pioneer Pen and other Vol State publications, please visit: www.volstate.edu/humanities/english/publications
Pictured: Student editor Kaily Farrell in the Vol State media lab.
