Stephan: Whenever I decided I wanted to go off and get my MFA, uh, I was living in a small town in rural Northern California working as a bartender in a bowling alley. I still had these stories that I was writing, but I could only give them to the cook or the cocktail waitress and they would just look at me and say, "That's good, but you're weird." And uh, I needed go off somewhere and find other weird people. People who were writing stories and wanting to talk about stories. That's the one thing that an MFA program can give to anybody, no matter where they are in their career. That sense that you're joining a community. So our students, they come here and they develop life-long friendships with the 45 or 50 other people who are attending the same residencies as them. Especially with those people who are entering in that co-horde of 18 or 20 students that we bring in each summer.

That's really rewarding. To see that they're not just getting an education. They're not just learning how to find a job- (background music) ... or become more professional, but they're developing these communities that are going to stay with them for the rest of their lives.

We do have a lot of students at Augsburg who share the experience that I've had of feeling like an outsider or, or joining a new culture and wondering how to fit in. Too often I think our, our first generation students are asked to go into, uh, a major with the idea of getting a career. And, uh, I hope that I catch enough students who might be taking a creative writing class, just by chance or because they want to. It's their, their one hole in the schedule they get to do with what they wish because part of the liberal arts experience is just experiencing those things you didn't plan for or expect. Learning, um, history and sociology to broaden your mind. And, uh, whenever I do get students who I see- (background music) ... have similar experiences to mine. I, I sometimes have to alert them to the presence of great stories in their lives.

My background is very varied. I started in film school and then switched over to creative writing in part to graduate a little bit sooner than I otherwise would have done. Then I went off and did a number of odd jobs, was a bartender and a cook and a journalist and a print and a radio journalist. I did all these varied things and by the time I decided to get out of journalism and go back to grad school to eventually become a teacher, I found myself arriving at Augsburg because I could teach journalism. And I could teach screenwriting and film and fiction writing. So all of those things where I, I thought for a while, "Oh, I'm going down a new path." Nope, that's a dead end. Let's go to another road. "Oh, I'm going down a new path. This is going to lead somewhere." Nope, it's a dead end. I'm going to go somewhere else. All of those dead ends ended up forming a very long road to Augsburg. And I was able to use all of my experiences in the classroom.

That's incredibly rewarding, knowing that I can call back on my past and, and share it with my students. And also share that experience with my students. So that they know, you might not get exactly where you want to be, primarily because you might not know where you want to be, but by going through all of these, uh, starts and stops, you're going to become who you are and eventually all of that's going to combine for a very rewarding experience and, uh, an experience that you can hopefully utilize and. and share as I've done. Nothing was a throw away. Uh, Augsburg has allowed me to call back on all that experience and use it all in the classroom. That's something that I couldn't have expected to do at a, another college or institution. So, if you have that background, you can go out and fail and fail again and fail better. And that's what I want my students to be able to do. (background music) Life is tough and uh, an education should prepare you to push through that toughness and to find new avenues when you think you're only seeing a dead end.

Paul: That was Associate Professor Stephan Clark. Thanks for listening to the Augsburg podcast. I'm President Paul Pribbenow. For more information please visit Augsburg.edu.