Awards & Prizes

2020s

• Poem, “Poem Ending with a Line By Deborah Digges” nominated for ” the Best of the Net by Tahoma Literary Review, 2026.
• Vermont Arts Council Creation Grant Award, 2026-2027.
• Residency Fellowship at Moulin à Nef (Virginia Center for Creative Arts in France), Auvillar, France, September 2026.
• Residency Fellowship at Vermont Studio Center for Vermont Week, Johnson, VT, May 2026.
• 2026 The Earth Clock, my fourth full-length collection of poetry, was selected for the From the Wetlands Series and scheduled to be published by Anhinga Press in 2027.
• Poem, “Poem Ending with a Line By Deborah Digges” nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Tahoma Literary Review, 2025.
• International Artist-in-Residence Fellowship at Oberpfälzer Küntstlerhaus, Schwandorf, Germany, August-September 2025.
• Residency Fellowship at Moulin à Nef (Virginia Center for Creative Arts in France), Auvillar, France, April-May 2025.
• “Animate Objects.” Selected for Verse Daily, October 5, 2024, https://www.versedaily.org/2024/animateobjects.shtml.
• 2024 Post-tenure Merit Award for Excellence in Teaching and Scholarship, Central Washington University.
• 2024 Habitats, my third full-length collection of poetry, was selected for the Possession Sound Series and published by Poetry NW Editions.
• 2023 Resident Artist Fellowship at The Marble House Project in Dorset, VT, May 2023.
• 2023 Residency in The Eulalie & Carlo Scandiuzzi Writer’s Room, Seattle Public Library, Seattle, WA.
• 2023 Fellowship Award at Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, in Amherst, VA, January-February 2023.
• 2022 Writer’s residency at La Muse Artists and Writers Retreat in Labastide Esparbairenque, France, October-November 2022.
• 2022 Pettway Scholarship for Outstanding Work in Poetry and Resident Artist Award, Chulitna Lodge, Lake Clark, AK, June 2022.
• AY 2022-2023 awarded Research Leave from Central Washington University.

2010s

• 2019 Post-tenure Merit Award for Excellence in Teaching and Scholarship, Central Washington University.
• 2016 University Distinguished Professor in Teaching, Central Washington University.
• 2016 & 2017 Writer’s residencies at La Muse Artists and Writers Retreat in Labastide Esparbairenque, France, August 2017 and February – March 2016.
• 2015 President’s Faculty Award for excellence in leadership and service to Central Washington University. Presented by CWU President James L. Gaudino.
• 2014 Backwaters Prize, awarded by judge Patricia Smith.
• 2013 Residency at Whiteley Center, Friday Harbor Labs, University of Washington, 12/19/13 – 1/2/2014.
• 2013 Outstanding Teaching Award, Central Washington University, College of Arts and Humanities, May 2013.
• 2012 Residency at Whiteley Center, Friday Harbor Labs, University of Washington, 12/17- 12/24/2012.
• Exceptional Performance Adjustment Award, Central Washington University, College of Arts and Humanities, May 2012.
• 2011 Jack Straw Productions Writing Program Fellow, Seattle, WA.
• Writer’s residency at La Muse Artists and Writers Retreat in Labastide Esparbairenque, France, September 2010 – October 2010.
• Poetry manuscript, Summer, Posthumous chosen as a finalist for the 2009 and 2010 Robert Dana Anhinga Prize for Poetry, finalist for the 2010 Green Rose Prize from New Issues Press and finalist for the 2010 Brittingham/Pollak Prizes from University of Wisconsin Press, and the sole finalist for the AWP Awards Series Prize in Poetry 2012.

2000s

• 2009 Floating Bridge Press Chapbook Award for Lamp of Letters, September, 2009.
• Poetry nominated for reprint in Pushcart Prize XXXIV: Best of the Small Presses by the Board of Contributing Editors, February, 2009.
• “When Traveling On Airplanes I Always Think of God” selected for Verse Daily, www.versedaily.com, September 1, 2008.
• Tom Pier Poetry Prize in Allied Arts of Yakima Valley 14th Annual Juried Poetry Reading for “Animal Heaven,” “Curriculum Vitae” and “How Flatterers Must Be Shunned,” April 13, 2008.
• “Write Your Own Myth: World Culture and Imaginative Narrative Writing.” selected by the AWP Pedagogy Team to be published in Best of the 2007 Pedagogy Papers online, Associated Writers and Writing Programs, March 2007.
• 2006 CWU College of Arts and Humanities Interdisciplinary Teaching Project Award for course to be taught in Spring 2006 with Art Professor Brian Goeltzenleuchter, “Hybrids and Collaborations.”
• 2006 National Poetry Series Open Competition Finalist for poetry manuscript, Lamp of Letters.
• 2006 Summer Literary Seminars-Kenya Fellowship Award, October 2006.
• 2005 Judge, State of Washington, Artist Trust Literary Fellowship Panel, Seattle, WA.
• 2001-2002 Emerging Writer Lectureship, Gettysburg College; Gettysburg, PA.
• Residency Fellowship, Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, NY, July-August 2001.
• 2000 Bluestem Poetry Award, selected by Lucia Perillo, Bluestem Press (Emporia State University, KS).
• Writer’s Fellowship, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA, Oct. 2000-May 2001.

1990s

• Poems “Heartland Cafe” and “Plato Drives His Mercury North from Omaha” each nominated for a Pushcart Prize, January 2000.
• Residency Fellowship, The MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH, Dec. 1999-Jan. 2000.
• The Nebraska Review Award in Poetry, 1999.
• AWP Poetry Fellowship, Prague Summer Seminars, Charles University, Prague, 1999.
• Jay C. and Ruth Halls Poetry Fellowship, Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, English Department, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1998-99.
• Wallace Stegner Fellowship in Poetry, Stanford University, 1996-1998.
• Loft-McKnight Award in Poetry, 1995-1996.
• Grolier Poetry Prize, 1995.