Sandy Longhorn, MFA

Degree :
MFA, Creative Writing, University of Arkansas
B.A., College of St. Benedict

Teaching Specialties :
Creative Writing – introduction to prose and poetry, advanced courses in poetry, place-based poetry, persona poetry, political poetry, and illustrated narrative (writing for comics/graphic novels, writing for video games, and hybrid writing-art projects)

Biography :
Sandy Longhorn grew up in the upper Midwest. She graduated summa cum laude with divisional honors from the College of St. Benedict in St. Joseph, MN, where she studied English and Creative Writing. After college, she moved around the country, working in bookstores and for small, independent publishers. Eventually, she returned to graduate school and earned an MFA in poetry at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville.

After earning her advanced degree, Longhorn worked briefly as a composition instructor at the University of Arkansas Monticello before spending ten years teaching composition at Pulaski Technical College in North Little Rock, AR. During her time at PTC, she published her first three books. Blood Almanac, a collection of poems based on Longhorn’s MFA thesis, won the 2005 Anhinga Prize for Poetry (Anhinga Press 2006). Longhorn’s second collection, The Girlhood Book of Prairie Myths, won the 2013 Jacar Press Full Length Book contest (Jacar 2013). The Alchemy of My Mortal Form won the 2014 Louise Bogan Award (Trio House Press 2015). In fall of 2016, Longhorn received the Porter Fund Literary Prize.