Good afternoon, everyone!
First, we’d like to remind everyone that our next Visiting Author event, with Nico Lang, will be held tonight from 6:00 to 7:30 PM in SAC 154. (This reading is open to the public; snacks will also be provided!) Nico will give a reading and talk on their recent book, American Teenager. In addition to being an award-winning author, reporter, and editor, Nico is also one of our DePaul alumni! (Click here for the flier with full details.)
And speaking of alumni—we’re excited to announce our alumni panelists for the department’s Spring Conference & Celebration on May 16! While our Literary Studies and Creative Writing panels will highlight work from current DePaul English students [for those of you who submitted, we’ll be releasing our decisions soon!], our alumni panel will feature several DePaul English alumni, who will discuss compelling career paths with students and offer valuable insights based on their own experiences in the fields of writing, teaching, and publishing. This will also be a fantastic networking opportunity for current students and alumni visiting the conference. Scroll down to view the list!
Spring Conference & Celebration 2025 Alumni Panelists
Tim Hillegonds (MAWP ’14) is CEO and Principal Consultant of Thrive Creative, a Chicago-based strategic brand, marketing, and AI consultancy, along with the author The Distance Between (Nebraska, 2019), a finalist for the 2020 Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year Award. A Pushcart Prize nominee, Tim’s work has appeared in The Guardian, the Chicago Tribune, Salon, The Daily Beast, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The Rumpus, Assay, Fourth Genre: Explorations in Nonfiction, River Teeth, Baltimore Review, Brevity, Under the Gum Tree, Hippocampus Magazine, The Fourth River, Midway Journal, RHINO, Bluestem Magazine, r.k.v.r.y. quarterly, and others.
In 2019, Tim was named by the Guild Literary Complex as one of their thirty “Writers to Watch.” He also serves as a contributing editor for Slag Glass City, a digital journal of the urban essay arts.
Kaitlin Lounsberry (MAWP ’19) graduated magna cum laude from Columbia College Chicago with a BA in Journalism and a minor in Fiction Writing. She also earned her MA in Writing and Publishing from DePaul University with distinction. While working towards her master’s, Kaitlin was a managing editor for The Garica Boy, published through Big Shoulders Books. She has bylines in The State Journal-Register, The Columbia Chronicle, Pop’Stache, and Chicago Talks. Kaitlin is currently working on revising her first novel, watching as many new (and old) movies as she can, trying out new recipes, thinking about her next trip to New Orleans, and rewatching RuPaul’s Drag Race.
At Brink and F(r)iction, Kaitlin leads the Publishing Internship Program and celebrity author outreach, manages frictionlit.org, serves as a senior editor, and copyedits/proofreads upcoming F(r)iction issues. She is also the Senior Digital Copy Editor at Medline Industries.
Margo Arruda (MALP ’20) graduated from DePaul University with a MA in English. She is currently a doctoral candidate in English and Tech Ethics at the University of Illinois Chicago as well as a tutor and adjunct for Chicago City Colleges. Her research focuses on the intersection between literature, AI ethics, and marxist-feminist theory. She is currently working on her dissertation tentatively titled “Robots of the World, Unite: Labor, Capital, and Tales of the Robot Revolution”. When she is not writing or teaching, she can be found union-organizing, baking, or playing Dungeons and Dragons with her wife and their two cats.
Jess Macy (MFA ’22) is Literary Associate at Folio Literary Management. After interning with Folio and agent Marcy Posner through DePaul’s internship program, Jess stayed on with Marcy and several other agents as Literary Assistant, promoted to Literary Associate this year, now representing her own clients. A graduate of Pittsburgh State University, she has also been a substitute teacher and the marketing & events intern at StoryStudio Chicago.