English professor candidate has passion for writing

link Staff photos: Anna George

Above: Jessica Karbowiak, a native New Yorker, teaches a creative writing class at Eastern New Mexico University on Thursday so the faculty can review her teaching style, relationship with students, and work-place attitude.

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From New York to Texas, Jessica Karbowiak, 36, has taught English and writing and on Thursday, she taught for the first time at Eastern New Mexico University.

Karbowiak is going through the third stage of interviewing for a English professor position at ENMU.

Carol Erwin, chair for the ENMU department of literature and languages, said she first had to turn in an application and interview over Skype before actually coming to New Mexico.

“We want to see our candidates interact with students, which we can’t really get over Skype,” Erwin said.

Interaction with students is her favorite part of the school year, Karbowiak said.

She said she wants her classroom to be an open place for students where they can be who they are and feel that they can trust her fully.

During Karbowiak’s creative writing class Thursday, she continuously interacted with her students and included her quirky sense of humor in how she praised her students and explained her lesson.

“You always remember the professor that changed your life and I want to be that professor,” she said.

Karbowiak said her friends call her a “traveling teaching circus” because she scours the nation, with three dogs and two cats, teaching her passion, creative writing.

“If I didn’t have passion for my writing I couldn’t convey it to my students and vice versa,” Karbowiak said.

Karbowiak was teaching at Stony Brook University, New York. While the time there is treasured, much like her time in other states, she misses student interaction, Karbowiak said.

“I miss having students lined up at my door to tell me about their days,” she said.

She said that she is interested in ENMU because of its “small, liberal arts college-feel.” She said this part of the interview can be as much for the interviewee as the interviewer.

“You want to find a job that gels with who you are,” she said.

Karbowiak first decided to be a teacher when she was in graduate school at Pennsylvania State University and was forced to teach for her stipend. She attended Penn State for a master’s in fine arts. She said she had not given the teaching profession any thought until she fell into it.

“I think I have had a lot of luck and now I can’t imagine doing anything else,” she said.

Erwin will pass on her recommendation to the dean of the department and vice president, who will then decide who gets hired.

Erwin said that she looks for a person who collaborates well with not only students but other faculty.

“We want people who enjoy the relationships of teaching,” Erwin said.

Karbowiak said she wants a trusting, open relationship with her students that is still collegiate and academic.

“I want them to pick things they thought they could never do and do it,” Karbowiak said.