Kelly Pantoleon is a graduating creative writing major from Oak Harbor, WA. When she started college, she knew she would want to go into book editing and publishing, so she joined the English major. Kelly says that she is “like most English majors” in feeling that “books are my best friends.”
During her time at Seattle Pacific University, her favorite course has been American Ethnic Literature with Dr. Middeljans. “It made me realize that even as accepting as I am, and as much progress as we as a society have made, there’s always more to learn, more to understand about people who are are different from you, and more room to open your mind.” She added that Dr. Middeljans’s humor is also a great part of her classes.
Fitting for an English major, Kelly is “obsessed with everything about grammar [….] If I could have majored in just punctuation, I would have.”
Since her dream is one day to own an independent publishing house and make books by hand, Kelly hopes that her first post-graduate job will be in the publishing industry. Her suggestions for new English majors are to “be open-minded in the types of classes you take. Take some philosophy classes; they go very well with literature/writing. Do the reading for every class. It may be a lot, but it’s always worth it. Participate in class discussions as much as you possibly can—English majors are kind people.”