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Important Dates
Spring 2027 Courses Viewable on Course Explorer: Monday, Oct. 5
Deadline to drop a full semester course: Friday, Oct. 16
POT B (Second 8-weeks) courses begin: Monday, Oct. 19
Deadline to add a POT B course: Friday, Oct. 23
Registration Time Tickets available to view: Monday, Oct. 26
Advising Office Open House: Thursday, Oct. 29
Resource of the Week: The Jeffries Center
The Michael L. Jeffries, Sr. Center for Access and Academic Success is a part of Student Affairs at the University of Illinois. The mission of the Jeffries Center is to provide programs and support services promoting the academic achievement, personal development, and graduation rates of all students at the University of Illinois. Services are open to all eligible persons regardless of race, color or national origin. Reasonable accommodations are available upon request, please contact jeffriescenter@illinois.edu.
Advising and Mentoring: New, current, or returning students are welcome to use the Jeffries Center Advising & Mentoring services. When students need to discuss their personal, educational, and career goals they meet with our Student Success Advisors (SSA’s) for support. These staff members are not academic advisors but work with academic advisors to ensure student success. You are encouraged to meet with a Jeffries Center Advisor on a biweekly or monthly basis to monitor your academic progress. While working together, the SSA will advocate and guide you to critically think and make informed decisions as they define and achieve academic success.
Visit during the daily Drop-In Advising & Mentoring hours at the Academic Service Programs building (ASP) located at 1103 W. Oregon Street, Suite E, Urbana, IL, and various campus locations. Even when you are excelling academically, we are there to help you reach beyond your coursework to experience all the University has to offer. Students have the option of scheduling a virtual appointment (via Zoom or Teams) or an in-person appointment with a Student Success Advisor. View the full Drop-In Advising Schedule
Tutoring and Academic Services: The Center provides well-trained, resourceful tutors that provide a comfortable and welcoming environment to assist you with all your academic needs. In-person tutoring, online tutoring, and workshops are available.
Book Recommendation of the Week: Slade House by David Mitchell
Recommended by Anna Ivy
A book recommendation to start off the spooky season!
Down the road from a working-class British pub, along the brick wall of a narrow alley, if the conditions are exactly right, you’ll find the entrance to Slade House. A stranger will greet you by name and invite you inside. At first, you won’t want to leave. Later, you’ll find that you can’t. Every nine years, the house’s residents—an odd brother and sister—extend a unique invitation to someone who’s different or lonely: a precocious teenager, a recently divorced policeman, a shy college student. But what really goes on inside Slade House? For those who find out, it’s already too late. (https://davidmitchellbooks.com/books/)
Do you have any books that you would like to recommend? Share your book recommendations here and we will try to get your recommendation in the Round-Up!
New! Free MLA Undergraduate Affiliate Membership
Thanks to support from the college, the University of Illinois is now a member of the MLA’s Strategic Partnership Network, which means undergraduates have access to a free MLA Undergraduate Affiliate Membership. When you start or renew membership, you should see the discount pop up after you enter your institutional affiliation.
Undergraduate affiliate membership gives you a range of benefits, including
- networking and professional development opportunities aimed at students
- eligibility to present at and discounted registration for the MLA Annual Convention
- eligibility to submit essays for consideration for MLA publication
- eligibility to compete for $2,500 to $5,000 Guiliano Global Fellowships for research travel
- five issues of PMLA: four containing essays on literature and the September issue, which presents the program of the annual convention
- electronic access to the full archive of PMLA going back to 1884
- significant discounts on more than 300 books published by the MLA
- a 30% discount on books published by Cambridge University Press
- a 35% discount on higher education books published by Johns Hopkins University Press
Upcoming AACC Book Club Meeting
Apply to the Writing Fellowship Offered by the Sesame Workshop
Sesame Workshop Writers’ Room is a writing fellowship from the creators of Sesame Street.
Emerging storytellers who are selected to join the Writers’ Room will receive hands-on writing experience guided by Sesame Street veterans and other children’s entertainment and media industry leaders. Each participant will develop and write a pilot script for their own original kids’ concept. Past fellows have gone on to develop their own original content with Sesame Workshop, as well as write for Sesame Street and various programs at Nickelodeon, Disney, DreamWorks, and more!
Application window closes October 5th, 2026.
Submit Your Work
The Green Observer is a student-run publication of Students for Environmental Concerns (SECS). We publish prose, poetry, visual art, and musical compositions that engage with environmentalism and nature. Oue Fall 2026 edition is currently accepting submissions!
We strive to include the voices of all students on campus within our magazine and would love to feature those of the English Department. This edition’s theme is Migrations, and submissions should be loosely related to the theme. Rough drafts are due October 2nd, by email to samholt2@illinois.edu
Virtual Session with W. W. Norton & Company on Careers in College Publishing
Are you looking to pursue a career in publishing? Join members of the Norton Literature team over Zoom this Friday, October 2 at 2PM CT for a “Careers in College Publishing” talk. Learn how a degree in English can help you achieve an exciting career in college publishing. Register here: https://lnkd.in/eaJphAWq
Penguin Random House Internships are Open!
Interested in interning for Penguin Random House? Check out their list of 2027 Summer Internships here.
Illinois Graduate and Professional School Fair
The Career Center invites you to the Illinois Graduate and Professional School Fair on October 7, 2026 from 12 – 3:30 p.m. at the Illini Union. Reasonable accommodations are available upon request, please contact careercenter@illinois.edu. Come explore the possibilities of pursuing a Master’s, Ph.D., or professional degree. All majors and class-levels welcomed! Come meet and network with admission representatives from over 125+ schools and programs to learn about advanced degrees in health, business, engineering, communications, education, STEM, and more.
Registration is encouraged but not required. To learn more and to register, visit Handshake. Click here to view the list of participating schools and programs.
Poetry Reading: Philip Metres
Poet and scholar Philip Metres will be reading on Th. Oct. 8 at 4:30 in Illini Union 407.
Metres’ work has garnered fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Ohio Arts Council, and has been awarded the William Carlos Williams Award, the Adrienne Rich Award, and three Arab American Book Awards.
Up Against Erasure | Panel Discussion
The Ends of Percival Everett’s Erasure
Oct 9, 2026 3:00 pm
Levis Faculty Center 300
Join the Humanities Research Institute for a panel discussion with artists and scholars on Everett’s Erasure. Each panelist will provide a different window into what’s beyond Erasure or what reading Erasure inspires (broadly conceived).
Featuring: Lauren Jackson (English, Northwestern University), Candice Jenkins (African American Studies/English), and Stacey Robinson (Art and Design). Moderator: Robert Dale Parker (Emeritus, English).
Organized by 2025-26 HRI Director’s Fellow Christopher Freeburg (English) and affiliated with the Black Letters Collective.
Kevin T. Early Memorial Scholarship
Submissions are open for the 2026-2027 academic year’s Kevin T. Early Memorial Scholarship. This scholarship is made possible from an endowment by William and Donna Early in memory of their son, a poet, Kevin T. Early. It awards a $2000 scholarship (which is applied directly to the student account) to a student with freshman standing at UIUC for the 2026-2027 school year. The deadline for application is Thursday, October 29, 2026.
For consideration, students must submit 5 poems via email at: Jdudek4@illinois.edu. The complete submission should not exceed 5 pages (so 1 poem to a page). Submissions should be attached to the email as .docx (Word) or PDF files. The subject line of the email should read: “EARLY PRIZE SUBMISSION: Last name.”
The body of the email should include the your name, address, phone number, e-mail, UIN, and the titles of the poems. The name should not appear on the entry file itself. If you have any questions, please email me at Jdudek4@illinois.edu.
Submit Your Creative Writing to be Nominated to the AWP Intro Journals Project
The AWP Intro Journals Project is a literary competition for the discovery and publication of the best new works by students currently enrolled in AWP member academic programs. Program directors are invited to nominate student work, and winners are selected for publication in participating literary journals.
Sneak Peek at Upcoming Classes!
Take a look at some of the classes offered in the upcoming Spring 2027 Semester!
BTW 263 Effective Grant Writing
In this class, students will write in teams, coordinate with local non-profits, and research and respond to pressing community issues. Students will write a grant that their community non-profit partner will submit after the class ends. Students who want to work for social justice and community health, gain leadership and negotiation skills, learn to write crisply and persuasively, research and solve real local problems, serve communities in need, gain experience working with nonprofits, practice writing the kind of grants they’ll need as part of their work in education or social services will gain the most from this course. BTW 263—Effective Grant Writing satisfies the Advanced Composition requirement. Please email Andrew Moss at apmoss@illinois.edu with questions about this course.
BTW 263 Intro to Literary Publishing SP27
Have you always wondered how a manuscript becomes a book? How do publishers decide what other people want to read? What is it like to work for a literary magazine? Learn the ropes of the publishing world in Intro to Literary Publishing! In this course, you will gain hands-on experience in publishing with our award-winning literary arts journal, Ninth Letter. While participating in the publishing process, you will learn the basics of contemporary literary magazine and book production. Counts as an Advanced Writing Gen Ed requirement.
BTW 490 Professional Writing: Copyediting
In this course, you will learn the behind-the-scenes process of manuscript preparation with a focus on web publication. If you want to gain hands-on experience in copyediting, line editing, and proofreading, this course is for you! Students will work collaboratively on the digital content for our award-winning literary arts journal, Ninth Letter. By the end of the semester, you will have gained skills you need to succeed in the publishing industry. Counts as an Advanced Writing Gen Ed requirement.
Apply to the Humanities in Action Program
Organized by the Humanities Research Institute (HRI), with the support of We CU and the Community Learning Lab (CLL), Humanities in Action is intended to help remove some of the financial barriers that prevent humanities students from taking advantage of community engagement opportunities. During the spring semester, participants will work with a local community partner to apply their humanities training in new ways toward a service project. Each student will receive $1000 to support their participation in the program. All undergraduate humanities majors and minors are eligible to apply. Please contact Lázaro García-Angulo (log3@illinois.edu) with any questions you may have.
Applications are now open and due by October 16 at 11:59 p.m.
If you are interested in the HIA program, you can attend an information session to learn more about the program, get advice on preparing a strong application, and hear from past HIA Scholars about their experience. The information session will be held Thursday, October 1st at 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 pm at Room 422, Levis Faculty Center. Register now!
Getty Post-Baccalaureate Conservation Internships
The Getty Post-Baccalaureate Conservation Internships aim to increase the number of students from underrepresented backgrounds preparing to enroll in graduate degree programs related to museum conservation.
Getty encourages eligible candidates from all backgrounds to apply for consideration. Candidates will have the opportunity to demonstrate their interest in museum conservation and how they might add new and underrepresented perspectives, which can include – among other things – socio-economic status, cultural background, physical or other disability, geographical origin, and/or any other life experiences. Candidates must:
- Be a United States citizen or permanent resident eligible to work in the United States (permanent residents are non-citizens authorized to live and work in the United States on a permanent basis, also known as “green card” holders). Those with DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival) status valid through the internship period are also eligible.
- Be committed to a career in conservation and possess a strong desire to attend graduate school to further that goal.
- Be able to demonstrate previous experience in conservation
The application deadline for 2027-28 Post-Baccalaureate Conservation Internships is November 3, 2026. Click here to learn more.
Summer Internship at Boeing for English Majors
Apply for a paid internship in corporate communications. The positions allows you the opportunity to:
-Gain the skills and knowledge to become a future leader in the aerospace industry.
-Work directly with a mentor in your field of study while finding solutions to real-world problems.
-Experience our products up close by touring manufacturing, engineering, and research facilities.
-Interact with company leaders to learn about strategy and the future of aerospace
-Build a lasting professional network through social events and engaging activities.
The position responsibilities may require you to:
-Research, write, edit, and publish internal or external communications
-Support digital, social, multimedia, and employee-engagement content
-Assist with events, executive communications, and media/community activities
-Track communication metrics and help improve audience reach and effectiveness
For information on eligibility, role responsibilities, and pay, see the position announcement on LinkedIn.
Study Abroad with LAS
Discover the benefits of studying abroad in the College of LAS! Learn about program types, lengths, locations, scholarships, and the application process. This reoccurring workshop is the first steps for those considering getting started on a study abroad application. Please sign up with this form.
Illinois Club Scholarships
The Illinois Club Scholarships online application is open through 5PM on Saturday, October 10, 2026. The 2027-2028 scholarships will support junior and senior students at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who have a minimum GPA of 3.0. Recipients are selected based on academic achievement, financial need, and participation in activities that enhance academic and professional development. Additional information can be found on the club’s website. Scholarship amounts vary from year to year. Any interested students can apply here.
Scholarships that will be of particular interest to English and/or creative writing students include:
Humanities and Social Sciences Scholarship
Open to students majoring or minoring in the Humanities or Social Sciences. Applicants should demonstrate the benefits that studying the Humanities or Social Sciences provides to themselves and their community. Majors/minors that may apply for the Humanities and Social Sciences Award include English; Philosophy; Religion; Comparative Literature; Cinema Studies; History; Classics; Art History; Communication; Anthropology; Psychology; Musicology; Agricultural Leadership, Education, and Communication; Human Development and Family Studies; Agriculture and Consumer Economics; all foreign languages; all ethnic studies; all Business majors and minors; and undergraduates in the I-School.
Isabelle Purnell Education Scholarship
Open to students earning a Secondary Education Certificate or College of Education majors. Applicants should indicate how they hope to make a difference in the classroom and in students’ lives.
Judith Life Ikenberry Scholarship
Open to students majoring in the creative arts including all majors within the College of Fine & Applied Arts and Creative Writing. Applicants should demonstrate how their art impacts their lives and the world and what they hope to accomplish with their art. This scholarship is generally given to a student who plans to make a living as a working artist, performer, or writer (e.g., painter, sculptor, musician, composer, dancer, actor, novelist, playwright, poet, screenwriter, essayist, or other creative professions)
Montage Arts Journal: Call for Submissions 2026-2027
Internship Opportunities with the Migration Policy Institute (MPI)
The Demetrios G. Papademetriou Young Scholars Program, named in honor of MPI’s founding president, has two goals: harnessing the valuable contributions of interns for MPI’s work and training the next generation of migration and communications leaders. Internships are available both in person and remotely, as well as to those residing outside the United States.
MPI is committed to recruiting and supporting interns who reflect the breadth of experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives in the countries where it works. As such, the Institute is committed to making sure that interns and staff members of all backgrounds work in an inclusive environment with equity and access for all.
General Internship Application Deadlines
- October 15 – Spring Semester (January – April)
- February 15 – Summer Semester (May – August)
- June 15 – Fall Semester (September – December)
Check out their webpage to find more information about their research and communications internships and how to apply!
iHelp 2026: Volunteering Opportunity
Interested in volunteering in the local community? Participate in iHelp 2026 on October 10th from 10am – 4pm!
Presented by Student Alumni Ambassadors, iHelp is the signature campus-wide day of service in the fall that brings together students, their surrounding community, and university alumni in an organized effort to create a culture of giving at the University of Illinois. Each year, over a thousand students come together to assist dozens of agencies across the Champaign-Urbana area in a display of gratitude to the community we call home. The Student Alumni Ambassadors (SAA) handle the logistics of the event, advertise the availability of volunteers to service agencies, and recruit students to participate. We strive to encourage students to realize the effect they have on the community via service in order to better not just the city, but also themselves.
Register now! Whether you want to get your RSO involved or just yourself, we would love to have you! All registration forms and other event info can be found at https://www.illinisaa.com/ihelp . Please reach out to us with any questions at illinivpoutreach@gmail.com .
Institute for Higher Education Policy
HEP is seeking a communications intern to join their team for the fall term (October – December, 2026). The communications and government affairs team amplifies the impact of their research and policy work by creating strategic communications to reach key audiences. This is a paid internship. Primary responsibilities include:
–Social Media Management: Assist in developing and implementing social media strategies to amplify IHEP research, drive engagement, and engage with our target audiences.
–Media Relations: Support media outreach efforts by tracking news coverage of state and federal higher education issues and policies, drafting talking points, pitching stories that highlight IHEP’s research and expertise, and supporting relationships with journalists.
–Data Analysis: Analyze social media performance, email marketing metrics, and website traffic to measure the effectiveness of communication campaigns and identify areas for improvement.
–Content Creation: As opportunities arise, develop creative and engaging content for various communications channels, including social media, website, newsletters, and/or blog posts.
–Event Support: Assist with promoting and supporting external presentations, events, and convenings by creating materials and managing logistics (as needed).
For more information please visit https://ihep.hiringthing.com/job/1055558/communications-intern-october-december-2026
Don’t Forget These!
The Truman Scholarship
The Truman Scholarship awards $30,000 for use toward a graduate degree in public service fields. Public service includes government, uniformed services, public interest organizations, non-governmental research or educational organizations, public and private schools, and other non-profit organizations. As a non-negotiable condition of receiving funding, recipients are required to work in public service for three of the seven years following completion of their graduate degree program.
The Jeffries Center Tutoring & Academic Services
Skeuomorph Press
Skeuomorph Press and Undead Media Lab offers hands-on experiences with historical book and information technologies from the 18th to the 20th centuries—including letterpress, book binding, typewriters, risography, and vintage computing—and sponsors creative activities such as poster or zine making.
Check out their photo gallery to see more!
ESA Welcomes You!
Open Houses for the Fall 2026 Semester – Mark Your Calendar!
Fall 2026 Proud to Be A First-Gen Series
How to Connect with LAS Career Services
- Mondays- 1-3 pm 105 Greg Hall (short chats)
- Tuesdays- 10-3 pm LAS Hub (Lincoln Hall) with peer mentors
- Wednesdays- 10-3 pm LAS Hub (Lincoln Hall) with peer mentors
- Thursdays- 10-3 pm LAS Hub (Lincoln Hall) with peer mentors
- Thursdays- 1-3 pm 105 Greg Hall (short chats)
- Handshake Appointments (in-person or virtual) are 30 minutes during available staff times. We have an energetic team to help you. Reach out to connect. Having trouble? Reach out to us at las-careerservices@illinois.edu.
Free Little Library
Check out the ESA Free Little Library outside EB 200. We have a rotating stock of donated books (thanks to all our anonymous donors) and you’re always welcome to stop by and pick something up. If you want to leave a book as well of course you can, but it’s not expected. If you feel like it, you can sign the sheet on the top shelf and tell us what you picked and why!
Share Your News!
As a reminder, if you have an award, a publication, or some other form of success (as defined by you!) to report please send news to engl-news@illinois.edu so the social media interns can celebrate you and your accomplishment. Also, if you are a member of a student group affiliated with the English department and you would like an upcoming event posted on our undergraduate calendar (now available at the bottom of the advising page) please send that info to the same address. Thanks!
