Portland State Magazine Spring 2019

30 ALUMNI AT FIRST , Chelsea Bieker MFA ’12 thought the email was spam. It said she’d been nominated to receive a 2018 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award, an honor that supports women writers whose work contributes to culture and society with a $30,000 gift. She got over her initial suspicion and submitted additional writing as requested. Months later came the call: She was one of only six national recipients to win the prestigious award. To this day, she does not know who nominated her for the prize. “It’s really amazing,” she says. “It makes me feel like all of the time and sacrifice I’ve put into my passion was worth it.” Even though it is early in her career, which is a criteria of the Jaffe award, Bieker had numerous published writings for the judges to consider. Her work has appeared in Granta, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, The Cincinnati Review and many other publications. Her nonfiction essay Why We Must Believe Women: My Family’s Legacy of Violence and Murder , published by Catapult, made the New York Times’ What We’re Reading list. THE PASSION to become a writer started for Bieker in high school with a teacher’s encouragement. She went on to earn a bachelor’s in journalism from California Polytechnic State University, and there she discovered her passion for creative writing. Another teacher suggested she pursue a Master of Fine Arts and advised her to follow the writers she loved. “I was a real fan of Charles D’Ambrosio’s work and he taught at PSU, so I was drawn to the program,” Bieker recalls. D’Ambrosio was her thesis advisor and two other highly respected authors—Leni Zumas and Tom Bissell—formed her thesis committee. “It was a magical time,” she says. NOW , Bieker is the one influencing students. She works part-time as an online adjunct writing instructor for Pennsylvania’s Harrisburg Area Community College. She also takes on freelance projects and writes online dating profiles, which expose her to “a lot of interesting ways of being and looking at the world,” she says. “I pick up writing inspiration all the time, but the seeds of the fictional world that I designed in graduate school carry through my creative work today.” Bieker’s first novel, Godshot , is slated for AWARD-WINNING WORDS