Poet Karen Skolfield won the 2014 PEN New England Award in poetry and the First Book Award from Zone 3 Press. She received the 2015 Robert H. Winner award from the Poetry Society of America and the 2015 Arts & Humanities Award from New England Public Radio, among many other prizes. Skolfield is an Army veteran and teaches writing to engineers at UMass Amherst, where she earned her Master of Fine Arts.

From reproductive justice to immigration law, Nargis Aslami's activism spans from present organizing to future practice. She discusses how the Department of Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies, as well as other resources at UMass, have built a foundation for her work. Nargis was the recipient of the College of Humanities and Fine Arts Achievement Award, the Henry and Jean Hall Humanities and Fine Arts Scholarship Fund Award, and William F. Field Alumni Scholar Award and will be serving as a Legal Assistant Intern for Student Legal Services in Fall 2017.

As head of the Office of the Fabbrica di San Pietro in the Vatican City, Carlo-Stella oversees the preservation, maintenance and enhancement of St. Peter's Basilica, as well as the site of the tomb of the Apostle Peter. She will direct an exclusive tour of St. Peter's Basilica during the Art of Taste Alumni Trip to Italy in June 2016.

As one of the first BDIC Musical Theater majors at UMass, Meredith Wells pulls from the departments of Theater and Music & Dance. Notably, she co-created and starred in a one-woman show that explores her experiences with a disability. But her accomplishments at UMass do not end there. Meredith opens up about the importance of musical theater, making theater a platform for social issues, and discusses her exciting post-graduation plans.

Nick Bromell received a B.A. in Classics and Philosophy from Amherst College and a Ph.D. in English and American Literature from Stanford University. He was the founding editor of The Boston Review, where he continues to be a contributing editor; he also serves on the editorial board of The Sixties and as an advisory editor to the Class: Culture series published by the University of Michigan Press.

Pursuing a dual degree in Theater and Sociology (SBS), Erin Hamilton employs her sociological background to her theatrical ventures. She discusses her senior thesis project, her recent experiences in the UMass Amherst theater department, and her aspirations after graduation.