With the Northwest Undergraduate Conference on Literature submission season fast approaching, professors and students offer advice on how to succeed
(-- The Beacon)
By Will Lyons Staff Writer lyons14@up.edu
Next semester marks the 9th annual Northwest Undergraduate Conference on Literature (NUCL) at UP.
The submission season is just beginning, according to conference co-chairs and English professors Sarah Weiger and Cara Hersh, even though the conference isn't until March 3.
The daylong conference invites undergraduates and advanced placement high school students from across the U.S. to read their work in front of a live audience and a panel of students to discuss their work. At the end of the conference monetary prizes and the grand prize, the "Brass NUCL award," for the hardest hitting paper are bestowed upon the best papers and poems.
"NUCL allows students to gain the help of others to take their work to the next level," Weiger said. "Our profession is about presenting work to others and that can get lost at the undergraduate level."
According to Hersh, students can participate as paper presenters, panel respondents, interns who help facilitate the conference or by attending the conference by registering for the entire conference online or dropping in on the day of the conference.
Students can begin to submit their analytical essays, personal essays or a suite of poems starting Dec. 1.
Lara Bovilsky, published author and associate professor at the University of Oregon will present this year's keynote address.
"(Bovilsky) is a professor of Renaissance literature and she is currently working on a book titled ‘Almost Human: The Limits of Personhood in Early Modern England,'" Hersh said.
Sophomore Caroline Lai was a panel respondent for last year's conference.
"I like the topics," Lai said. "They're thought provoking and everyone has a new take on them. Panelists are on the same level, so don't be afraid to be passionate."
Junior Ian Clark has participated as a presenter at NUCL three times, once as a senior in high school and then again his freshman and sophomore years.
"I always hear great interpretations of literature at NUCL," Clark said. "It's an important part of UP. It's an effort to get out of the Portland bubble and it's up to UP students to represent our school."
