“In any artist’s life, the impulse to make is one that you have your whole life; that impulse cannot be taken away from you, but the impulse to share what you make can be squished out of you, and you kind of have to be more reliant than that.”
Sarah Blackman is the creative writing instructor and the department chair for creative writing at the Fine Arts Center in Greenville, South Carolina.
About
Sarah Blackman always had a special connection to her love of writing. “Telling stories, thinking about stories, and looking at the world and trying to figure out how I see it through language has been something I’ve done since before I could write,” said Blackman, originally from Bethesda, Maryland.
Blackman’s career path, in many ways, began unexpectedly. “I had ended up in teaching high school by accident,” said Blackman. When she first started, Blackman had always known that she wanted to have a career in writing, so she completed her college undergrad with a degree in English and a minor in creative writing before attending the University of Alabama to obtain her masters. In the process, Blackman gathered experience teaching different courses as part of the university’s full tuition remission program.
“I realized even though I never intended to teach, and it didn’t cross my radar until it was something I had to do to get my tuition covered. I realized that I liked it,” said Blackman. Blackman mentions that she didn’t think about teaching high school but decided to do college teaching. While in the market for college teaching positions, Blackman became a full-time instructor at the University of Alabama until she found a job opening at the Fine Arts Center. At the time, Blackman was residing in Mississippi and took the job with the Center as a placeholder until something else opened in the academic field. But then things took an unexpected turn. “I realized I love teaching high school, like, I loved it. And I did not anticipate that at all,” said Blackman.
As a creative writing instructor, Blackman’s typical workday begins early and often changes from day to day. Beginning at 8:30 in the morning, Blackmans prepares for her day by catching up on grading and reading over the curriculum she’ll teach that day. From 9:15 a.m. to 11:15 a.m. Blackman teaches a class of first-year students, introducing new concepts, reviewing the readings and class discussions, and, on occasion, has a writing day just for students and herself to write. In the afternoons, Blackman teaches a class of upperclassmen who follow a similar schedule as the first-year students. While loving to teach, Blackman says that one of the biggest challenges was adjusting her teaching approach from college to high school.
From Blackman’s experience as a creative writing teacher and being the department chair of creative writing at the Fine Arts Center, she gives advice to upcoming creatives interested in teaching creative writing and other up-and-coming creatives. “You’re going to get told ‘no’ a lot, and you have to be able to hear that. You have to be able to hear No and not feel like every time you hear it, you’re being rejected,” said Blackman.
Media
Sarah Blackman Interview