Welcome Back Tea Party
September 30, 2026
Join us from 12:00-1:30 PM in the Multipurpose Room, Education Building for light snacks, tea, poetry, and art!
We are starting 2026 celebrating the creative lives of our community! This year's Welcome Back Tea Party will feature poetry by Dr. Jane Alberdeston Coralinis (English) and artwork by Professor Emily Culver (Art). Come, say hi to old friends, meet new friends, and rejoice in creative community! Event registration is required – limited seating available!
Artist Bios
Jane Alberdeston
Dr. Jane Alberdeston Coralinis an Assistant Professor of English and Creative Writing. For many years, she taught in the Department of English at the University of Puerto Rico, Arecibo. Her poems have been published widely in print and online publications throughout the US and Canada, including Sargasso: A Journal of Caribbean Literature, Paterson Literary Review, Louisiana Literature, Caribbean Vistas, among others. She co-authored the novel Sister Chicas, and her new novel, Colony 51 is anticipated THIS FALL!!! She is currently working on a collection of stories titled Vivid Gods. Jane is an alumna of Cave Canem, a writers' organization for poets of African descent, and a recipient of a District of Columbia Arts and Humanities Grant. Her work has been included in Step into a World: A Global Anthology of the New Black Literature (John Wiley & Sons); and her poetry collections Waters of My Thirst and The Afrotaina Dreams are still in circulation. She has a Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Binghamton.
Emily Culver
Existing primarily as sculpture and objects, Emily Culver’s work explores notions of intimacy, (non)functionality, gender and identity through corporeal qualities. Through these works she considers how interactions among objects are interpreted, translated, and mutated by negotiations with the body and anthropocentric tendencies.
Culver actively exhibits her creative work nationally and internationally and is the recipient of various awards and residencies, including a 2017 Toby Devan Lewis Fellowship, a 2022 residency at the James Castle House and grants from the Foundation for Contemporary Art among many others.
She holds a MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art, a BFA from Tyler School of Art and is an Assistant Professor of Jewelry and Metalsmithing at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA.
