Dorothy Smiljanich is fond of the English program at UF for many reasons. For one, she met her husband, Terry, while both were undergrad English majors – and they’ve now been married for forty years. Gainesville is also where she began her successful career in journalism. After graduating with an MA in English, Dorothy got […]
There was a time – not-so-long-ago – when pediatrician, novelist, and theologian, Chris Adrian roamed the halls of Turlington. As an undergraduate, Chris was already tending to his gift for storytelling, penning fiction in creative writing classes with Padgett Powell, whom he unhesitatingly declares “the best teacher I ever had in my life.” Chris received […]
Dr. Marlene Tromp, now a member of the faculty at Denison University, remembers the English Department at UF as the “place where I learned what it was to be a professional in my field.” Originally from Wyoming, Marlene attended Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska and initially planned to apply to medical school. Instead, she decided […]
Capers Jones is the current President and CEO of Capers Jones & Associates and Chief Scientist Emeritus of Software Productivity Research (SPR), the company he founded in 1984. Born in St. Petersburg and educated at UF, he has maintained his ties to Florida. During his school days in Gainesville, he enjoyed trekking through the woods […]
C. Herbert Gilliland, now a Professor of English at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, spent much of his youth in Gainesville living less than a mile from the University of Florida campus where he would eventually study. He says he has many affectionate memories of his years at UF, but one in particular […]
Originally from Illinois, Bob Bowser came to the University of Florida in 1952. Now retired after a lengthy career as an educator and founder of a transformative dropout recovery program in California, Bob remembers UF as the place where it all began. Reflecting back on his life and career, he describes his classes in the […]
As Vice President of Gaming Operations for Turner Broadcasting’s Cartoon Network, Chris Waldron oversees the network’s digital game development studio, game production, and overall games strategy. He is the executive producer of Cartoon Network’s enormously popular “massively multi-player online game,” FusionFall, the network’s largest gaming project to date. The game has over 8 million registered users around the […]
Brian Rhinehart is not exaggerating when he says that he owes his entire career to the first course he took at UF, Dr. Sidney Homan’s graduate Shakespeare class. Of Dr. Homan’s class he describes that what he loved about it was that “it was not a conventional course; it was performative rather than strictly academic. […]
Gaspar González is a documentary filmmaker and journalist. His first film, Muhammad Ali: Made in Miami, chronicled the years that Cassius Clay spent in Miami in the early 1960s, essentially transforming himself into Muhammad Ali. Deemed “a surprisingly fresh take on an early chapter of the Ali saga” by Sports Illustrated, the film aired nationally on PBS […]
Of her experience in the English Department at UF, Dr. Sarika Chandraenthusiastically notes that the “interdisciplinary nature of the department and the flexibility of study” were crucial to the trajectory of her research and growth and to the completion of her dissertation. Sarika completed her PhD in 2003 after studying at Bentley College and earning a Master’s at Northeastern […]