A 2007 MA graduate of the UH-M English Department, Ryan Omizo's honors include the Dream Travel scholarship to the Conference of College Composition and Communication in New York City. Now finishing up his first year in the PhD program at Ohio State, Ryan looks back on his time in the UH-M English Department.

I spent six years at UH Mānoa, earning my BA and MA in English, specializing in rhetoric and composition. Being a little long in the tooth, I must confess that my MA education is much fresher in my mind than that of my BA; however, if it were not for some extraordinary professors, I would never have been in a position to attain my MA in the first place. Professor Stephen Canham was particularly instrumental at undergraduate level. While inducting me into Phi Beta Kappa in 2002, Prof. Canham convinced me that academia could offer me more fruitful opportunities than my then entry-level retail job ever could. I recall running into Prof. Canham on several occasions, and each time he provided me with useful nuggets of information about the English graduate program. He became, along with Professors Bacchilega and Heberle, one of my chief sponsors for the program.

While pursuing my MA, I had the privilege of studying under an amazing group of professors, all of whom have dramatically shaped my intellectual and scholarly outlook. From John Zuern, who presided over the first graduate class that I took in the department, I inherited an interest in critical theory and technologies studies. From Darin Payne, I learned the fundamentals of rhetoric, and how to be a professional in the realm of academia. Under Darin's tutelage, I produced a presentation for the Conference of College Composition and Communication, a seemingly impossible MA project, and the oh-so daunting Writing Sample for my PhD applications. In Jim Henry, I found a unique audience and collaborator. His courses in composition pedagogy and workplace writing allowed me to reclaim my pre-graduate student life in retail and transform it into critical scholarship. Jim's incorporation of ethnography and performance theory into his pedagogy has been an inspiration, and both subjects animate my main academic pursuits.

Due to the support of these professors, I graduate from UH Mānoa well-prepared to engage with the field of rhetoric and composition as a professional. What's more, because of the diversity of scholarship that marks the strength of the UH English Department, and the diversity of the University as a whole, I feel that I can offer a unique perspective about major issues affecting the future of academia, such as multicultural literacies, digital literacies, and the rise of transnational domains of power. Currently, I am a first-year PhD candidate at The Ohio State, focusing on rhetoric, composition, and digital media studies, endeavoring to finish my coursework and preparing for exams while my fellowship lasts, and shaking off the trauma of my first real winter. During a recent snow storm that dumped twenty inches of powder on Columbus, I found my thoughts constantly flying back to Hawai`i--back home to Pauoa Valley and UH.