Undergraduate Majors & Minors

What does an English major do after graduation? Almost anything you can imagine. Here is a sampling of currently successful careers of recent OSU English graduates in a wide variety of fields, from education and business to pre-professional and graduate programs.

  • Matthew Shenoda (1999): Author, Somewhere Else, poetry collection
  • Katie Pesznecker (2000): Education reporter, Anchorage Daily News
  • Mark Gardner (2001): Ninth grade language arts teacher, Federal Way, Washington
  • Angie Merrill Michaelis (2003): Assistant Editor in the Humanities, Stanford University Press
  • Caitlin Wilson (2004): University of Washington law school student.
  • Dan Kammerzelt (2004): English teacher, Corvallis High School
  • Eric Roe (2006): Graduate MFA writing program (fiction), North Carolina State
  • Carly Scheick (2009): MA in Cultural Studies at the University of Washington
  • Jamee Asher (2010): Honors BA in English, Willamette Law School student
  • Mary Toll (2011): Graduate School in Student Services

Each year, exit surveys of graduating seniors in English give students the opportunity to tell us what it's like to be an English major at OSU. Routinely, students praise the high quality of instruction, the excitement and depth of scholarship that faculty bring to the study of literature and writing, and the mentorship and sense of community provided by faculty and student associations. In addition to studying with first-rate faculty in the classroom, students have abundant opportunities to discover and build community--whether through participating in the many activities sponsored by the English Student Association, attending the readings sponsored by the Visiting Writers' Series, or becoming a writing assistant at the Center for Writing and Learning.