FSU's Sigma Tau Delta-International English Honor Society meet in St. Louis for convention to present research, creative works
By Miranda Daubar
Florida State University English major Kennedy Lora is nearing the end of her role as president of Sigma Tau Delta, the International English Honor Society. 
As she looks back on her achievements with the organization, Lora is proud of what she and the other members have built since the fall of 2022.
Lora and other IEHS members have at least one more exceptional experience to add to their list of accomplishments. The annual Centennial Convention for Sigma Tau Delta chapters around the country takes place April 3-5 in St. Louis, Missouri. Eleven IEHS members—eight undergraduate students and three graduate—students are attending the event. (See the full list at the end of the article.) Just one person went to the IEHS convention in the fall of 2023.
"We wanted to double our numbers,” Lora says. “We were telling people to apply all the time, and then I remember the day we all got our acceptances, and it was message after message after message.”
She adds that those who are presenting their research or creative work, like Lora, have worked almost a year toward this weekend. One IEHS member going to the convention, Nyaysia Robinson, is looking forward to the upcoming event.
“I’m excited to meet some more fellow Sigma Tau Delta members and see how they run their chapter,” Robinson says. “I’m also expecting to be met with some amazing stories, that hopefully I can learn from.”
Robinson is presenting her short story Killing Boys, which she did not think would be chosen by the reviewers.
“Being picked to go to this conference is an absolute dream,” she says. “One of my biggest fears is having others read my work, which is weird because I want to be a writer at some point.
“This makes it very validating to be able to attend such an honorable program.”
Lora is excited as well to go to the convention, but she admits to being nervous about presenting her work.
“The Centennial Convention is very nerve wracking, especially going to a different state,” she says, adding with a laugh, “Then, have to bare your soul.”
Preparation for the conference has kept Lora focused since April of 2023, when she began her research. The topic is “speculative fiction of rural towns and toxic relationships dynamics” and how the two ideas are interwoven.
“I’m also going to a panel about rural towns, so I’m definitely happy to be doing that,” she says, expressing excitement about going to St. Louis as well. “To be honest, even if I wasn’t accepted, I’d still go there.”
This is Lora’s first time attending the annual convention, and she expects her visit will include sitting in on many panels, ranging from discussions about linguistics and British literature to modern literature and American literature. In addition, one member from each university could receive a scholarship at the convention.
Looking forward, once she returns from St. Louis, Lora will work on her plans for the future of Sigma Tau Delta and IEHS.
“My short-term goal is to keep the momentum going; I don’t want to go back where we had a meeting once a month,” she says.
One of her primary goals is funding for IEHS.
“I would love to be able to have funding for our members,” she says. “I don’t doubt that we’ll be able to get bigger as time goes on.”
As she sits at Calvin’s Coffee House, which she frequently visits, Lora reflects on IEHS and its members. She points out how the people in the group are diverse and that not just English majors participate in the organization’s activities.
The most popular event is Book Club. In Lora’s words, “there are always fights in book club,” as she jokingly adds, “yelling, but playfully.”
She further explains that IEHS is a Registered Student Organization, run by undergraduate members. Gwen Niekamp, an FSU doctoral candidate in English-Creative Writing is the graduate student advisor to the group. FSU has administered the Rho Epsilon chapter of Sigma Tau Delta for over 50 years.
Anyone can attend the meetings even if they’re not members.
“That was one of the things we were pushing for when starting the RSO, just trying to get an open forum for everybody to hang out,” Lora says.
With Lora graduating at the end of the Spring 2024 semester, she is beginning to train the organization’s president-elect to show them the ropes of overseeing the day-to-day responsibilities of a national organization.
You have to know absolutely everything because nobody else knows everything that’s going on. They are coming to you for information,” she says.
Along with being president, Lora is in the French Honors Society, and she is earning a French minor as well. She has been an intern for The Southeast Review and was involved with Kudzu Review for a few semesters. In her words, though, “IEHS is definitely my baby.”
Taking over the position of president in the spring of 2023 was not something Lora had in mind when she first joined the organization in the fall of 2022. In the beginning, she did take the initiative to be more involved, moving from member to the IEHS secretary.
Even though Lora did not expect to become president, her view on how the situation turned out is positive.
“It kind of did fall upon me, but I’m very glad that it did,” she says. “I was really happy to be able to start a bigger thing for the undergraduates.”
Lora and other IEHS members have worked to create a bigger organization than it was when she first joined, and Lora’s efforts had a positive impact on not just English students but students of all majors. The organization’s members have created a welcoming and friendly environment for anyone to join.
Attending and presenting work at the Centennial Convention is another benchmark that could lead IEHS to grow into an even stronger organization for FSU students in the future.
Miranda Daubar is an English major in the Creative Writing Program, with a minor in history.
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Here is the list of Sigma Tau Delta-International English Honor Society members attending and presenting their work at the Centennial Convention.
Undergraduate students
Text and Illustration: Graphic Novels as Literature Panel
Grace Allen, English-Literature, Media, and Culture major: “Narrative Effects in Art Spiegelman’s Maus”
Original Poetry: Identity, Equality, and Response to Trauma Panel
Ashe Cendere, English-Creative Writing major: “Trauma Follows Better than Buses Follow Schedules”
Original Poetry: Authenticity and Mental Health Panel
Chaired by: Ashe Cendere, English-Creative Writing major and Linda Miller
Ethnicity, Culture, and Liberation Panel
Kaysyn Jones, English-Editing, Writing, and Media major: “Aesthetics of Place: Pleasure in the South”
Original Prose: Relationships and Thresholds Panel
Kennedy Lora, English-Creative Writing major: "The Stilt House"
Economics and Social Class in Literature Panel
Alex Moran, English-Creative Writing major: “Octavia Butler’s Dawn through a Marxist Lens”
Original Prose: Love and Romance Panel
Chaired by: Alex Moran, English-Creative Writing major and Sherri Craig
Original Poetry: In Flux and Change Panel
McKenna Oakley, English-Creative Writing major: “Yellow & Company: An Exhibit of Poetry”
Original Prose: Relationships and Thresholds Panel
Nyaysia Robinson, English-Editing, Writing, and Media major: "Killing Boys”
Storytelling, Feminism, and Power Panel
Hannah Squires, English-Literature, Media and Culture major: “Analyzing Feminism in Willa Cather's My Ántonia”
Graduate students
Original Prose: Exploring Adolescence Panel
Sarah Destin, English-Creative Writing doctoral candidate: “Troop 382”
Time, Monsters, and Divine Comedy Panel
Gwen Niekamp, English-Creative Writing doctoral candidate: “From Sequential to Circular Time in J. L. Borges”
Roundtable: Applying to Graduate Programs in English
Chaired by: Kristy Cherry-Randle, English alumna in Literature, Media, and Culture (Ph.D. 2023) and Digital Humanities (M.A. 2021)
Gwen Niekamp, English-Creative Writing doctoral candidate; Sarah Destin, English-Creative Writing doctoral candidate;
So Young Koo, English-Literature, Media, and Culture doctoral candidate