Honorable Dickensians:
I've just returned from the Dickens Project's graduate
student conference at UC Davis and want to thank all
those who contributed to making it a success, including
our hosts, Kathleen Fredrickson and Liz Miller, and
especially the graduate student organizer at Davis,
Michael Martel, who did a splendid job of planning and
coordinating the event.
18 papers of consistently high quality were presented by
students from 13 different consortium schools. In addition
to myself, faculty attending included LIz, Kathleen, and
Parama Roy (all from Davis), Summer Star (SF State), Renee
Fox (UCSC), and Carol Mackay (UT Austin).
Each student paper was reviewed in advance of the conference
by a Dickens Project faculty member not from that student's
campus, so eighteen different reviewers in all. Nearly every
presenter mentioned how helpful the response was that she
received from her Project reviewer. Clearly the system we
have developed for reviewing papers is working. So I want to
thank all the faculty who read and sent comments to the
students. Although not always able to attend in person,
these colleagues performed a valuable role in support of the
Project's goal of graduate student development and
professionalization.