MALS Current Student Spotlight: Andree Sole

Where are you from, and when did you start at MALS?

• I'm from Brisbane, Australia, and I started in Spring '22.

What is your previous academic/professional background?

•  I was a Speech and Language Pathologist at the University of Queensland, Australia, who went on to complete an MBA from the University of Melbourne, Australia. After completing my masters in business, I then worked in several different industries, from disability non-profit, gambling enterprises, and automotive companies. I was running my own technology firm when I decided that MALS would be a great fit, allowing me to draw from my diverse academic and professional backgrounds.

How did you find out about our program?

• I found out about MALS from the Dartmouth website.

Why MALS?

•  MALS has an incredible range of courses and opportunities. The breadth of offerings was the main attraction for me.

What is your concentration?

• I am enrolled in the Creative Writing concentration.

How is your concentration connected to your future prospects/academic or career goals?

• My concentration is related to an interest in pursuing my own writing. However, I also have a strong interest in mental health, and MALS has been helpful in being able to pursue this while being outside a medical, psychological, or cognitive neuroscience paradigm.

What are your research interests? (if you are writing your thesis, what are you writing about?) 

•  My interests are mental health, the power of storytelling, and the role of folk tales as a kind of group societal therapy. Folk tales often act as cautionary tales or exemplary tales showing social responses (eg., listening to your parents, or not being greedy). However, they have changed over time to reflect shifts in attitudes and mores, and they will (or should) continue to do so. My thesis is updating some of these tales to modern versions.
• I also presented this research at the 2022 Association of Graduate Liberal Studies Programs (AGLSP) Conference in San Antonio, Texas. This year's theme was BiblioTECHa - Reading the Past, Performing the Present, Writing the Future." (To read about Andree's research and presentation at the conference, click here!)
• Shortly after my presentation in San Antonio, I won the $1000 Social Entrepreneurship Grant from the Magnuson Center and a $1000 grant from Amazon Web Services to continue my research.
• My work went on to be published in the Spring 2023 edition of Confluence, a national, peer-reviewed, interdisciplinary journal published by the AGLSP, reflecting scholarly and creative work (including fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, and visual art) produced within and beyond AGLSP member institutions.

How are you involved on campus, or in the graduate student community (name all clubs, organizations, sports, jobs, professional development courses, extracurriculars, etc.) 

• I've been involved in DIADH (Dartmouth Innovation Accelerator for Digital Health), the Social Entrepreneurs group at the Magnuson Center, the Dartmouth Healthcare Foundation, and Global Health Fellowship. I've been a Teaching Assistant for Writing 2-3 and German 14 (Into The Woods). The opportunity to work with undergraduates is fantastic. The Dartmouth Center for the Advancement of Learning (DCAL) has been an excellent provider of further training in relation to teaching. I have also worked as an Assistant Editor on Clamantis: The MALS Journal,a bi-annual publication for the Master of Arts in Liberal Studies (MALS) program at Dartmouth. The journal aims to showcase the strongest pieces of creative and critical writing submitted by MALS students, MALS alumni and Guarini graduate students. I am also involved in The Dartmouth Writers Society, which is operated by a dedicated group of writers, and is a phenomenal resource on campus.
• As for recreation around campus, I have season passes for Dartmouth Skiway and the Dartmouth Sailing Club at Lake Mascoma. I'm involved with the Dartmouth Outing Club in maintaining the section of the Appalachian Trail that crests Holt's Ledge between Goose Pond Road and the Dartmouth Skiway Lodge. Beyond that, my favorite extracurriculars are attending the myriad of lectures available to us, and shows put on by The Hopkins Center for the Arts (known around campus as "The Hop"). There's some incredible quality – my latest favorite was a one man play called The Bookbinder that had been brought from New Zealand. And no, I didn't see it because I was homesick (they're good neighbors). It was utterly brilliant in conception and execution.

In what ways have you developed since beginning MALS? 

•  I've been able to indulge my very broad ranging interests within a classroom and many groups.

Have you been published since enrolling in MALS? If so, which publications?

•  I have been published in:
• Clamantis: The MALS Journal (Winter '22 edition) - "Flood, Fire, Drought, and Pestilence on the Appalachian Trail (The Impact of Climate Change) "
• Confluence ('23) – "Fairy Tale Endings."
• Clamantis: The MALS Journal (Spring '23 edition) – "Dance, Monkey, Dance" (available June 2023).

Favorite professor(s)/favorite course(s)?

• It's not nice to have favorites! They're all good in different ways.

What advice would you give to an incoming MALS student or prospective MALS applicant? 

• Talk to the incumbent students: they're incredibly helpful in figuring out which courses will suit you. And they're just great people, so it's fun to hang out with them.

Feel free to mention anything else of importance!

• The MALS Admissions Coordinator, Ashley Riley is fantastic!