Join the English Department as we celebrate recently published creative writing (and recently completed MFA and PhD degrees in creative writing) by GRCC English Department Faculty.
We are a department that writes!
Event details
Thursday, March 26 2026 – 6:30-8 p.m. – GRCC ATC Piazza
- 6:15 p.m. - Time to mingle and visit the buffet table.
- 6:30 p.m. - Readings begin, featuring five GRCC faculty writers, listed below.
- 7:30 p.m. - Q & A with Authors: On Writing and a Writer’s Education.
After sharing their work, faculty readers will discuss their writing as well as the education and life of a writer.
A buffet of snacks and beverages will be served.
The 2026 reading features poetry and prose by:
- Andrew Collard (Poetry)
- Roel Garcia (Creative Nonfiction)
- Katie Kalisz (Poetry)
- Grey LaJoie (Hybrid)
- Rachel Lutwick-Deaner (Fiction)
- Nick Mourning (Poetry)
The event will also feature guitar accompaniment by Music Professor, Jonathan Marshall.
This event is sponsored by the GRCC English Department and Transfer Bridges to the Humanities, U-M.
Author information
Andrew Collard
Andrew Collard is the author of Lo-Fi Citadels (Wayne State University Press 2026) and Sprawl (Ohio University Press 2023), winner of the Hollis Summers Poetry Prize and a gold medal in the 2024 Midwest Book Awards. His poems have appeared in Ploughshares, AGNI, Kenyon Review, and many more journals and magazines. He received a PhD from Western Michigan University and has served as a poetry editor for Witness, Third Coast Magazine, and New Issues Press. He lives with his son in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Roel Garcia
Roel Garcia is an assistant professor of English at Grand Rapids Community College, where he has taught since 2009. Roel teaches composition and poetry classes. Roel grew up in South Texas, where many of his short stories take place. His short story "Seventy-five Pebbles" was accepted by the Ball State University publication The Broken Plate.
Katie Kalisz
Katie Kalisz is the author of Quiet Woman, a finalist for the 2018 Main Street Rag Poetry Book Award, and Flu Season, published in 2025 by Cornerstone Press. She is the recipient of a 2023 Elizabeth George Foundation Grant, and her poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. She teaches composition and creative writing here at GRCC.
Grey Wolfe LaJoie
Originally from Western North Carolina, Grey Wolfe LaJoie teaches English composition at GRCC. Previously, they worked with the Alabama Prison Arts & Education Program. Their writing has appeared in The Threepenny Review, Shenandoah, Copper Nickel, swamp pink (fka Crazyhorse), and Bellevue Literary Review, and selections from their debut fiction collection, Little Ones (Hub City Press, 2024), have been awarded the Pushcart Prize and the O. Henry Prize, selected by Lauren Groff.
Rachel Lutwick-Deaner
Rachel Lutwick-Deaner enjoys a bookish life. She has earned degrees from Colgate University, North Carolina State University, and Queens University of Charlotte. Currently, Rachel teaches writing and literature at Grand Rapids Community College. Rachel’s recent publications can be found at Streetlight Magazine and Harpy Hybrid Review. Rachel’s essay “Nursing Mother” was selected for the 2024 Story Sanctum Editors' Choice Award for Best Nonfiction. You can find her on Instagram @professor.ld.
Nick Mourning
Nick Mourning’s background includes teaching English, poetry, and performance studies in several Michigan secondary public schools, a two-year position as the Editor-in-Chief of the national undergraduate journal, The Albion Review, and curating the Ypsi performance series, Electric Ocean Strip Search. Nick received his MA in Creative Writing at Eastern Michigan University and has spent his most recent years in higher education as a success coach and academic advisor. Past work is published in Cellar Roots, The Garfield Lake Review, NEAT magazine, and Grand Rapids’ Dyer-Ives Poetry Competition.
