Student: Angelina Vita

Professor: Ms. Mimi Schlein

When I received the invite to participate in Greenville Technical College’s Creative Inquiry project, I was over the moon excited! Several of my friends had participated and while I thought it was a lovely thing to participate in, I never expected to have the opportunity myself. After several brainstorming sessions with GTC faculty, I decided to prepare, publish, and present a book of original poetry and correlating photos. I saw this as an opportunity to delve deep into the world of publishing as well as a chance to truly fine tune my writing and photography skills. Beyond this, I also couldn’t help but remember myself as a ten-year-old, scratching out little poems. While these poems were admittedly horrible in content and style, my mother always lovingly hung them on the refrigerator. They were the true beginnings of a little girl dreaming of becoming a published author. Now, with the help the GTC, I am able to make those dreams become a reality.

After going through my most recent poems and photos, I decided to focus this book on the overarching topic of my everyday life experiences. I then focused on creating more poems along with a couple extra photos to fill in some of the gaps and add extra color to the story of the poetry itself. While writing creatively beneath the looming shadow of a deadline has never been my strong point, having to produce creative work with a strong end goal in mind truly honed my creative skills and helped me learn how to produce quality work. I also enjoyed studying my past work and focusing on the changes in my life journey. The changes in my style of writing and in my expression of my thoughts are truly eye opening, especially as I travel the varied road of college life.

While I am still in the beginning stages of publishing this book, I can not wait to have the realization of a dream become paper and ink in my hand. As I come closer and closer to this reality, I am at a loss to explain how exciting this is for me. I will always be grateful to Greenville Technical College for giving me this amazing opportunity and I know my mother will be proud to have my real-life book of true poetry on her shelves, if only to honor the ragged pieces she once lovingly hung on her refrigerator.

 

Student: Joshua Neff

Professor: Ms. Lori Grabiec

My name is Joshua Neff. I chose to participate in the Creative Inquiry program because I wanted to take the leap from someone who enjoys the idea of being a writer to being a writer. The program, to me, is a chance at metamorphosis. I am studying Cybersecurity, so the credits earned are unnecessary. I wanted to learn what it takes to be a capable author in my downtime since that is how I wish to spend my downtime once I have a career in the Cybersecurity field. My desire to write is born from my love for video games. At a young age, they instilled in me a passion for a good story, and I wanted to be a video game programmer. As time passed, I became less and less interested in the programming aspects and more so in the art of storytelling itself. My topic is what makes an author “Timeless,” learning how to publish, and my favorite part putting together a modest collection of short stories. My genre of choice is gothic and or Lovecraftian horror. This project is to force growth and that it does in spades.