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Faculty

Program Assistant:

Kimberly Garrett

Full-Time Faculty


Laleh Khadivi

Full-Time Faculty, Academic Director
(415) 422-6066

Laleh Khadivi is the author of The Kurdish Trilogy which includes The Age of Orphans (2009), The Walking (2013), and A Good Country (2017). Her...

Education:

MFA Mills College

Micah Ballard

Administrative Director

Author of three full-length collections of poetry, Afterlives (Bootstrap Press, 2016), Waifs and Strays (City Lights Books, 2011), which was...

Education:

MA in Poetics, New College of California | MFA in Poetics, New College of California

Dave Madden

Associate Professor
(415) 422-6915

Dave Madden is the author of the story collection If You Need Me I'll Be Over There and The Authentic Animal: Inside the Odd and Obsessive World of...

Education:

PhD (Creative Writing), University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Courses:

Special Topics in Writing, Advanced Workshop in Creative Writing: Nonfiction, Writing Workshop II, Writing Workshop III, Writing Workshop IV, Truth, Ethics, and Memory, Thesis I/II, Nonfiction Theory & Technique, Special Topics

D.A. Powell

Professor
(415) 422-6076

D. A. Powell's books include Cocktails (Graywolf, 2004) and Chronic (Graywolf, 2009), both finalists for the National Book Critics Circle Award in...

Education:

MA, Sonoma State University | MFA, Iowa Writers' Workshop

Courses:

Directed Study, Special Topics in Writing, Writing Workshop II, Writing Workshop IV, Contemporary American Poetry, Poetry International, Thesis I/II, Poetics, Special Topics

Bruce Snider

Associate Professor
(415) 422-4748

Bruce Snider is the recipient of Wallace Stegner, James A. Michener, and Jenny McKean Moore Fellowships. He is also the author of the poetry...

Education:

MFA, University of Texas at Austin

Courses:

Ignatian Literary Magazine, Creative Writing for Non-English Majors, Intro to Writing Poetry, Directed Study, Special Topics in Writing, Advanced Workshop in Creative Writing: Poetry, Internships in Writing, Senior Seminar in Writing, Writing Workshop II, Writing Workshop IV, Thesis I/II

Susan Steinberg

Professor
(415) 422-5106

Susan Steinberg is the author of the story collections Spectacle (Graywolf), Hydroplane (FC2), and The End of Free Love (FC2). Her new book of...

Education:

BFA, Maryland Institute College of Art | MFA, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Courses:

Fiction Workshop, Senior Seminar in Writing, Writing Workshop I, Thesis I/II

Ryan Van Meter

Associate Professor
(415) 422-4298

Ryan Van Meter is the author of the essay collection, If You Knew Then What I Know Now (2011). His work has appeared in The Gettysburg Review, Iowa...

Education:

MA, DePaul University | MFA, University of Iowa

Courses:

Intro to Writing Non-Fiction, Directed Study, Special Topics in Writing, Advanced Workshop in Creative Writing: Nonfiction, Senior Seminar in Writing, Thesis I/II

Part-Time Faculty


Christopher Arnold

Adjunct Professor

Chris Feliciano Arnold is the author of The Third Bank of the River: Power and Survival in the Twenty-First Century Amazon, a work of narrative...

Education:

MFA, Creative Writing, Purdue University | BA, Journalism and Communication, University of Oregon

Ari Banias

Adjunct Professor

Ari Banias is the author of Anybody (2016), a finalist for the PEN USA Literary award in poetry. His work has appeared in American Poetry Review,...

Education:

MFA, Hunter College | BA, Sarah Lawrence College

Courses:

Prosody: The Meaning of Poetic Form, Thesis I/II

Stephen Beachy

Adjunct Professor
(415) 422-6066

Stephen Beachy is a past winner of the Michener Award in fiction. He is the author of several novels and two novellas, including The Whistling Song,...

Education:

MFA in Creative Writing, Iowa Writers' Workshop

Courses:

Writing Workshop I, Writing Workshop II, Contemporary Experiments in Fiction, Thesis I/II, Contemporary Global Fiction

Lewis Buzbee

Adjunct Professor
(415) 422-6066

Author of novels Bridge of Time (2012), The Haunting of Charles Dickens (2010), winner of the Northern California Book Award, an Edgar Award nominee...

Education:

MFA in Fiction, Warren Wilson College.

Courses:

Writing Workshop I, Writing Workshop II, Writing Workshop IV, Thesis I/II, Blurred Boundaries: Writing Beyond Genre, The History of Nonfiction

Kirstin Chen

Adjunct Professor

Kirstin Chen is the author of the novels, Bury What We Cannot Take and Soy Sauce for Beginners. She was the fall 2017 NTU-NAC National Writer in...

Education:

MFA Emerson College | BA Stanford University

Courses:

Intro to Writing Fiction, Writing Workshop II, Thesis I

Jennifer Cheng

Adjunct Professor

Jennifer S. Cheng is the author of MOON: Letters, Maps, Poems (2018), selected by Bhanu Kapil for the Tarpaulin Sky Book Award and named a Publishers...

Education:

MFA, Poetry, San Francisco State University | MFA, Nonfiction, University of Iowa | BA, Brown University

Courses:

Writing Workshop II

Soma Mei Sheng Frazier

Adjunct Professor

Soma Mei Sheng Frazier is the author of Salve (Nomadic Press) and Collateral Damage: A Triptych (RopeWalk Press), which have earned praise from Nikki...

Courses:

Special Topics

R.O. Kwon

Adjunct Professor

R.O. Kwon's first novel, The Incendiaries, is forthcoming in 2018 from Riverhead. She is a National Endowment for the Arts Fellow, and her writing...

Education:

MFA, Brooklyn College | BA, Yale University

Courses:

Intro to Writing Fiction, Thesis II

Michael Lukas

Adjunct Professor

Michael David Lukas is the author of the bestselling novel The Oracle of Stamboul, which was a finalist for the California Book Award, the NCIBA Book...

Courses:

Writing Workshop I, Developments in the Novel

Barbara Reyes

Adjunct Professor

Barbara Jane Reyes was born in Manila, the Philippines, and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. She received her BA in Ethnic Studies from UC...

Education:

BA in Ethnic Studies, UC Berkeley | MFA, San Francisco State University

Courses:

Writing Workshop II, Contemporary American Poetry, Thesis I, Filipina Literature, Global Filipino Literature

Rachel Richardson

Adjunct Professor

Rachel Richardson is the author of two books of poems, Hundred-Year Wave and Copperhead. She has received Stegner and NEA Fellowships, and her poems...

Education:

MFA in Creative Writing, University of Michigan | MA in American Studies, University of North Carolina | Wallace Stegner Fellowship, Stanford University

Courses:

Writing Workshop III, Thesis II

Brynn Saito

Adjunct Professor

Brynn Saito is the author of two books of poetry, Power Made Us Swoon and The Palace of Contemplating Departure, which won the Benjamin Saltman...

Education:

MFA, Creative Writing (Poetry), Sarah Lawrence College | MA, Religious Studies, New York University | BA, Philosophy, University of California at Berkeley

Courses:

Writing Workshop IV, Poetry International, Poetics

Nina Schuyler

Adjunct Professor
(415) 422-6066

Nina Schuyler is the author of The Translator, winner of the 2014 Next Generation Indie Book Award and short-listed for the 2014 William Sarayon...

Education:

MFA in Creative Writing, San Francisco State University | JD, Hastings College of the Law | BA in Economics, Stanford University

Courses:

Writing Workshop II, Writing Workshop III, Word for Word: The Texture of Language, The Architecture of Prose, Thesis I/II, Style in Fiction, Thesis I, Thesis II

K. M. Soehnlein

Adjunct Professor
(415) 422-6066

Karl Soehnlein is the recipient of a Lambda Literary Award (novel); the Henfield Prize (short fiction); and the SFFILM/Rainin Filmmaking Grant (...

Education:

MFA in Creative Writing, San Francisco State University

Courses:

Writing Workshop I, Writing Workshop II, Writing Workshop III, Writing Workshop IV, Evolution of the Short Story, Techniques of Long Fiction, The Craft of Short Fiction, Thesis I/II, Point of View and Characterization, Finding Form: Novellas and Story Cycles

Arisa White

Adjunct Professor

Arisa White is the author of the poetry collections Hurrah’s Nest, finalist for the 2013 Wheatley Book Award, 82nd California Book Award, and...

Education:

MFA, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Courses:

Writing Workshop IV, Thesis I/II

Emerti Faculty


Catherine Brady

Professor
(415) 422-5109

Former president, AWP. The Brenda Ueland Prose Prize and the Zoetrope: All Story Short Fiction Prize. Author of three short story collections: The...

Education:

MFA in Creative Writing, University of Massachusetts

Courses:

Teaching Writing

Aaron Shurin

Professor
(415) 422-6066

The author of eleven books of poetry and prose, Aaron Shurin is a recipient of California Arts Council Literary Fellowships in poetry (1989, 2002),...

Education:

MA in Poetics, New College of California