Master of Arts in English, University of Alaska Anchorage, 2011

William Rannals graduated from the UAA English MA program in the Spring of 2011. The title of his thesis is “Narrative Voice and Authorial Intention in The Catcher in the Rye.” Currently he is employed at CH2M, an engineering services company, where he does internal and external sales management in business development. He is also pursuing a MS in Project Management at UAA to further his career. When he is not working at CH2M he, you can find him teaching as an adjunct professor at UAA. William says the Masters program helped him in his career because he was originally hired as a technical writer at the recommendation of Dr. Morris. He was employed at two Alaska Native regional corporations until he got his first “real job” working 40 hours a week as a technical writer.

William credits the MA program for helping him in his ability to think and write. It also helped develop his comprehensive reading and writing skills which prepared him for real life experiences in the workplace. The required course taught by Dr. Kline called “Contemporary Critical Thinking” made him think more critically and more differently than ever before. Dr. Cason’s “Deliberation, Democracy, and the Public Sphere” course helped prepare him for life in business development and technical writing.

William acknowledges Dr. Morris, Dr. Stone, Dr. Cason, and Dr. Kline for always being available for advice. He also expressed how the introductory teaching class has helped shaped him to be a better teacher. The one piece of advice he would give to a prospective English MA student is to, “make a lot of contacts. There are jobs openings out there and I got my first job by word of mouth.”