31
October
2011
|
13:18 PM
America/Chicago

Macedonian Writing Camp Named for Merrilee Cunningham

Merilee Cunningham, UHD associate professor, is an award winning teacher and poet and recently received another great honor, having a writing camp in Macedonia named after her by the U.S. Department of State.

Cunningham has worked for the DoS for about five years setting up Creative Writing Camps in Serbia and Macedonia. She worked particularly in Bitola, the location of her namesake camp, to create a creative writing camp and a drama camp.

"The Bitola Creative Writing Camp teachers were kind enough to name their camp after me. I was, to say the least, honored. It was a great kindness, something that I have always been shown in the cities that I have worked in during the summers for seven weeks each year," Cunningham said.

The staff members that teach in the camp are librarians and teachers from the Macedonian American Corners libraries, which are small, American-style libraries located in partner organizations. The writing program is a partnership of the DoS and Writers in the Schools and was founded by Robin Reagler from Houston Writers in the Schools and Amy Storrows from the DoS.

Merrilee Cunningham holds a bachelor's degree in creative writing from Northwestern University and a doctorate in Renaissance literature from Vanderbilt University. At UHD, Cunningham teaches Composition, Survey of World Literature I and II, Studies in Poetry and more.