The winner of this year’s English Merit Award, which recognizes a graduating senior English major with a distinguished record in academics and campus service, is Skylar Daley. In addition to excelling in the English major, Skylar has earned two minors, in Creative Writing and Psychology; is a member of Sigma Tau Delta; and is a campus correspondent for and the president of Monmouth’s chapter of HerCampus, an online college-woman’s magazine. She has also served as a tutor in Writing Services and has worked for two years with Professor George Germek in the Monmouth University Library’s Rare Books room.
Despite her being involved in all these varied organizations and activities, Skylar has somehow found the time to research and write two honors theses. For her English departmental honors research project, Skylar has worked with Dr. Courtney Werner to develop a project which examines the integration of service-learning into college English courses. And in her second thesis for the Honors School, Skylar has worked with Drs. Jeffrey Jackson and Sue Starke to develop a project that argues for the necessity of studying Victorian “penny dreadfuls” to fully appreciate the historical context that produced the anonymously authored nineteenth-century serial domestic romance, The String of Pearls (a.k.a., Sweeney Todd). Following graduation, Skylar plans on applying to graduate school to pursue an M.A. and an eventual doctorate in English with a concentration on nineteenth-century British literature, which she hopes will position her advantageously to attain her ultimate career goal of researching Victorian serial novels, British gothic fiction, and Victorian crime fiction through Marxist, Psychoanalytical, and historical lenses.

Every year, the English Department recognizes and provides some support for a graduating senior English major who will be commencing graduate studies by the fall of the current academic year. This year’s winner is Judith Shingledecker, who is graduating this spring and will be beginning Monmouth’s M.A. in English this summer. Judith is presently serving as Secretary of the Sigma Tau Delta English honorary society, and she has been working, this semester, as a Teaching Assistant for Dr. James Cody’s Shakespeare class at Brookdale Community College. Citing Shakespeare and British literature in general as among her scholarly passions and aspiring to someday teach English literature at the college level, Judith has greatly enjoyed and appreciated the opportunity to assist Dr. Cody and the students in his Shakespeare course by researching all of the assigned plays, including Twelfth Night, Richard III, Hamlet, and Measure for Measure; providing students with an annotated bibliography for use in developing of their papers; and facilitating online discussion via a page where she is able to post video clips and share her reactions and commentary. She has called the experience “a dream come true,” one that will undoubtedly prove valuable as she transitions into her graduate studies, continues to pursue her scholarly passions, and eventually has the opportunity to design and teach courses of her own.