Awards & Prizes

2020s

  • 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 Awarrd 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.
  • 2020, 2021, & 2022 Book Manuscripts Habitats and Hotel Poem finalists for Brittingham and Pollak publication awards at University of Wisconsin Press.

2010s

  • 2019 Post-tenure Merit Award for Excellence in Teaching and Scholarship, Central Wshington Univeristy.
  • 2018 Invited Keynote Speaker 2nd Annual Women's Leadership Institute , CLCE, 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.