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Hauna Zaich was the Creative Writing Program/ Literature Department
Coordinator for the 2006-07 school year through the Chancellor’s
Undergraduate Internship Program. Excited about the change from
two years of retail work, where she was a key holder, Hauna was
especially dedicated to her role as coordinator because she was
a creative writing major. She knew most of her work would benefit
people she knew well, and felt a deep importance to providing them
with access to information that could benefit their writing careers.
Much of what Hauna did this year was about visibility and opportunity.
One of the main tasks she accomplished this year was the annual
Living Writers Series. The Creative Writing Program and Literature
Department sponsors the Living Writers Series. Hauna helped secure
funding from the Asian American/ Pacific Islander Resource Center,
El Centro, Chicano/ Latino Resource Center, Merrill College, Kresge
College, Feminist Studies, and Jewish Studies Program. She also
helped the series receive grants for several writers from Poets
and Writers Magazine. This enabled her mentors to bring authors
from the east coast and create a comfortable trip once they arrived
in Santa Cruz.
With the transition of the series to the new Humanities Lecture
Hall in the winter and spring, Hauna took on a more visible role
as ‘master of ceremonies’ for the readings. She made
announcements about possible publishing opportunities, advertised
readings on campus and off, and offered information on other literary
and creative events being put on by either her or other students.
At each reading, a PowerPoint presentation was made visible, so
that all attending could see what literary events and opportunities
were going on at UCSC and in the community. Hauna was also responsible
for introducing certain authors, such as Alfred Arteaga and Prof.
Charles Atkinson. Throughout the course of her new role as the face
of the Living Writers Series, she has been consistently complimented
on her professionalism and organization skills. These were especially
apparent and integral to the multiple student readings she has helped
to put on this year. Not only did Hauna organize three student readings
through the Living Writers Series, but she also coordinated readings
for Chinquapin and Red Wheelbarrow, and for the Cowell Press. Hauna
also assisted fellow CUIP Christy Bors in gaining readers for a
poetry reading at the Sessnon Gallery. This was something both interns
would have liked to do more of.
Hauna is most happy about how her role as a creative writing student
made her internship more successful. She felt that students felt
more informed and actually knew that they could question her in
class or felt comfortable with emailing her if they had questions
or concerns about what was going on. Her increase in emails with
interesting publishing and reading opportunities seemed to strike
a positive chord with the creative writing student body. This also
helped Hauna with her other role this year as co-editor of Chinquapin,
the longest running literary arts magazine on campus. Her job helped
gain the magazine more publicity and submissions to choose from.
Students felt a personal connection between the editor and the author,
which they might not have felt in previous years.
The biggest accomplishment for Hauna this year was the reconstruction
of the Creative Writing Program website, which previously was extremely
out of date. With a little networking and lots of help from Literature
Undergraduate Advisor Emily Gregg, Hauna helped to create a viable
and extremely important tool for the program. Now, the face of one
of UCSC’s most popular and desirable majors has accurate,
helpful, and interesting information for prospective students, visiting
authors who are checking out the program, and already enrolled students.
Many instructors and even the Literature Department direct students
to this website to acquire more information about the program.
Being apart of the CUIP program and course has given Hauna the chance
to refine her leadership skills, and become a better version of
herself. She became more organized and learned to love communicating
with a vast array of people. The most important lesson she learned
through the CUIP experience was to be positive and always be yourself,
because those qualities go a long way with people. This type of
attitude gets the job done and makes for a positive business relationship
with anyone you’re working with. Hauna felt the best part
of her internship was all the amazing people she was able to work
with: from nationally recognized authors, to UCSC staff and faculty,
to other student leaders. Hauna credits her mentors, Karen Yamashita
and Micah Perks, with setting great examples in professionalism
and having taught her the most about herself and capabilities as
an event planner and coordinator this year.
Next year Hauna will be staying for a fifth year at UCSC to complete
her Masters in Education and receive her teaching credential in
single subject English. Her experience with faculty and staff at
UCSC was important in making her choice to stay here another year.
She couldn’t have had the chance to be apart of the UCSC community
for one more year without being the Creative Writing Coordinator.
She plans to still stay involved with the Creative Writing Program,
even possibly becoming a student publications advisor at Kresge
College. Hauna knows that her experiences and skills she takes away
from this experience will enable her to do anything she wants in
the future. She feels fully prepared to take on any task, job, or
hardship that comes her way, because the CUIP program has prepared
her well.
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