Malia Guerrero '22 Named Outstanding Senior in the Humanities

Malia Guerrero '22 was named Outstanding Senior in the Humanities at Pacific University's 2022 Undergraduate Awards Ceremony.

She is a creative writing major with minors in literature and Asia-Pacific studies. She has been accepted to the University of Hawai'i—Manoa to earn her masters degree in teaching.

She is editor of the new book Imua, Move Forward, an anthology of poetry by female poets of Hawai'i. Guerrero did all of the outreach to poets, selected their poems, put forth the concept of the book, and took great leadership on this project, with the support of Professor Kathlene Postma. She will distribute and use the book as a teaching tool in high school English classes across Hawai'i. 

Professor Darlene Pagan says, Malia was a First-Year Seminar mentor for Professor Darlene Pagan's class in the fall of 2020, and Pagan called her an inspiration to a class of students immersed in the pandemic and deeply in need of community. Guerrero "connected students via social media and met routinely online to assist students with writing across disciplines, and attended to multiple personal crises," Pagan said. "Classes always started with her pet duck, Jack, usually flapping his wings; her leadership was crucial to that course's success and definitely a quality we want to see in someone leading the humanities." 

Pagan called Guerrero "a phenomenal writer." 

She collaborated with other FYS mentors to create FindBoxer, a friendly game of finding a 3D printed statue of Boxer, for the first-year classes. She also has served as an interlibrary loans assistant, Safe Dates peer facilitator, and she volunteered at St. Francis Adult Day Care in Honolulu. Her creative work has been published in PLUM, the undergraduates magazine three  times. She also was assistant editor for the internationally distributed literary magazine, Silk Road Review.