This page exists primarily for people who might have a professional interest in me as a teacher, but it’s also here as a resource for others who teach creative writing, literature, or composition. I’ve been delighted by the useful advice and conversations about teaching I’ve found online (via Twitter, mostly, but also through sites like ProfHacker) and I hope the teaching materials I post or link to here will be helpful for others.

Training

I chose the University of Texas at Austin’s MA creative writing program because I wanted to gain teaching experience as well as workshop instruction and time to write. I continue to be very happy with this decision. I can’t say enough good things about the professors I worked with at UT, my fellow creative writing and literature students, or the undergrads I had the privilege to teach. I didn’t teach every year; I spent two delightful years as a public services intern at the Harry Ransom Center and have had a total of two years of fellowship-funded work on my academic research and fiction writing. (For my complete CV, click here.) In my time at UT, I was also able to three courses of my own design, and have participated in two graduate pedagogy courses linked to my teaching assignments.

I thoroughly enjoy teaching both literature and creative writing.

Teaching appointments

• Visiting Assistant Professor, English Dept., the College of Wooster, beginning Fall 2011. In 2011-2012, I am teaching introductory and advanced creative writing courses, an introductory literature course, and a first-year seminar on post-apocalyptic and dystopian novels (see the course blog for this seminar).
• Assistant Instructor, English Dept., UT Austin, Summer 2010. Fiction: E 325, intermediate workshop. See the course website for this class on my official instructor page at the DWRL.
• Assistant Instructor, English Dept., UT Austin, Fall 2009. Women’s Popular Genres: E 314L. This class was held in a computer lab and made frequent use of online resources. See the course website for this class on my official instructor page at the DWRL.
• Assistant Instructor, Division of Rhetoric & Writing, UT Austin, 2006—2007. Rhetoric and Writing: RHE 306. Also took associated pedagogy course, Fall 2006.
• Teaching Assistant, English Dept., UT Austin, 2004—2005.
  • Fiction: E 318L, introductory fiction workshop, Fall 2005.
  • Masterworks of Literature: British: E 316K, literature survey class for sophomores, Fall 2004—Spring 2005. Also took associated pedagogy course, Fall 2004.

I’ve also team-taught a weeklong course for Elderhostel students and UC Santa Cruz students at Dickens Universe 2008 and have worked as a writing counselor at the UT Undergraduate Writing Center and the Smith College Jacobson Center for Teaching and Learning.

If you would like a copy of my complete teaching portfolio — which includes a statement of my teaching philosophy, more materials from courses I’ve taught, a summary of my use of eComma (the eCommentary Machine, an online collaborative textual annotation system I helped to develop) in the classroom, and course evaluations — please email me at katharinebeutner at gmail dot com.

Service and collegiality

Teaching happens in context, and I was very lucky to do my graduate teaching in UT’s English Department and Department of Rhetoric and Writing, two exceptionally supportive academic environments. The culture of teaching at UT is collaborative, open, and friendly; all grad students have access to eFiles, an online system for sharing course materials, and the graduate English listserv frequently features pedagogical questions.

Working on The eComma Project represents my main pedagogical commitment other than teaching. As one of the assistant directors of this UT digital humanities project, I helped to manage the development of a collaborative textual annotation application for classroom use and oversaw the creation of the Collaborative Rubáiyát, an eComma-driven online variorum edition of Edward FitzGerald’s five editions of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam, that accompanied the Harry Ransom Center’s exhibition “The Persian Sensation: the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam in the West.” eComma’s development was funded by the English department, UT’s Liberal Arts Instructional Technology Services, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. For more information about eComma and my involvement in The eComma Project, see the eComma blog.

As a founding member of the Feminist Solidarity Group in the English department, I was also involved with the planning and execution of a number of panels on pedagogical issues, and was a panelist for a very popular session on feminism in the classroom. I mentored several incoming graduate students in their first semester at UT (and their first semester as teaching assistants). I value the mentorship process intensely. My intellectual development has always been strongly influenced and buoyed by the support of professors and more advanced students. At Wooster, I’ve found a teaching position that allows me to offer the same sort of guidance and encouragement to my students.

Wooster rightfully prides itself on its Senior Independent Study program. I am currently advising four I.S. students. Each will produce a substantial creative work by early March, along with a critical introduction situating that work, and will then defend it by oral examination. As of this update (late October), all are on track to produce drafts of their chosen projects by the end of fall term. I’m finding the process of advising I.S. challenging and delightful and I hope to continue teaching in environments that allow for this sort of one-on-one creative direction. I’m grateful to be beginning my teaching career at Wooster, among a supportive, dedicated group of scholars and writers whose involvement with the Independent Study program means that they never lose touch with the needs of their students.

At Wooster, I also serve on the Donaldson Committee, which funds visits by writers, and the Writing Prize Committee, which judges the best work by English seniors each year.