English Department

English Department

English is one of the largest and most vibrant departments at UConn, and the only undergraduate major represented at all five UConn campuses. Our talented faculty and students include scholars, writers, and poets. Together, they examine the full range of literature written in English across the globe, from c. 800 to the present, and explore the possibilities and limits of composing texts.

The Wallace Stevens Poetry Program Fund

Help us raise $2,500 in the next 48 hours!

For 59 years, the Wallace Stevens Poetry Program has brought the most important national and international poets to UConn. These include Nobel Prize winners, winners of the Pulitzer Prize, MacArthur Fellows, recipients of the National Book Award, The Griffin Prize, and numerous other accolades. The list of past poets is a truly astonishing legacy.

Guest poets stay at the UConn-Storrs campus for two days and interact with students. They give two readings of their work, one at UConn-Storrs with UConn undergraduate and Early College Experience students, one at a high school with winners of a high school poetry contest sponsored by a partner organization in Storrs-Mansfield. The Program offers a remarkable experience for students by putting them on stage with a renowned writer.

UConn’s School of Fine Arts joined the Program in the last decade, with students in the Design Program and Print Studio creating limited-edition broadsides of the guest poet’s works. The fund helps to ensure that poetry and printmaking are active and thriving at UConn, and that the UConn community, as well as surrounding communities, can celebrate the written word and the arts.

Creative Writing Program Fund:

The Creative Writing Fund is a general fund used to support the Creative Writing Program at UConn. This year, gifts made during UConn Gives will specifically contribute to: The Nelson Distinguished Writer-in-Residence Program.

This newly established program in honor of UConn Professor Emerita of English and the former Connecticut Poet Laureate Marilyn Nelson would invite a nationally or internationally known poet and/or children or young adult author to campus for a two-day residency every other fall semester in October. The guest author would give a public reading of their work and then offer up to six 45-minute one-on-one tutorials with undergraduate and graduate student poets and/or children and young adult writers.

The Nelson Distinguished Writer-in-Residence Program offers undergraduate and graduate student writers the opportunity to receive unbiased feedback on their writing and gives them the chance to ask the author questions about writing craft and style or about the publishing industry.

Goal: $5,000

Why Your Support Matters

• Helps bring nationally and internationally recognized poets and writers to UConn
• Provides students with direct access to established voices in literature
• Creates opportunities for hands-on learning, mentorship, and creative development
• Strengthens connections between UConn and surrounding communities
• Supports the continued success and growth of longstanding and emerging literary programs

Make Your Gift Today

Your support makes these experiences possible for UConn students and the broader community.

Every contribution helps sustain these programs and expand opportunities for students to engage with the literary arts.

Make your gift today and help inspire the next generation of writers, readers, and thinkers.

“The UConn Foundation (EIN 06-6070722) is an independent, not-for-profit, tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organization that exists to support the educational, scientific, cultural, research, and recreational objectives of the University of Connecticut.”