Stockton Writing Tutor Award Won By Galloway Student

GALLOWAY, NJ — Though writing has never been easy for Alicia Jenkins, she now has an award to show her talent.

Jenkins, a senior at Stockton University, is the fifth and latest winner of the Paul D. Staller ’97 Writing Center Tutor Award, the school said in a release. Since she had to work hard at her writing during her time at Absegami High School, the award comes with special meaning.

The monetary award comes from the Paul D. Staller ’97 Writing Center Endowed Fund. Billie and Alan Staller, of Atlantic City, established the fund in memory of their son, Paul, a 1997 Stockton graduate with a degree in Communications Studies. Paul, who died in 2014 while working as a comedy writer in Los Angeles, worked as a tutor at the Stockton Writing Center. The Stallers set up the fund in 2016.

“My son could tell great stories,” Billie Staller said, according to Stockton. “That’s what he did best. He was a tutor and a brilliant kid.”

Jenkins is a Mathematics major with a concentration in Education. Even with a Mathematics major, she's the perfect choice, Writing Center Coordinator Eddie Horan said.

“She is almost impossibly patient,” Horan told Stockton. “She’s just a good person who meets students where they are. She can really tune in to what a student needs from her and give it to them, without judgment.”

She became involved with the Writing Center after being recommended by a professor as a first-year student. But Jenkins didn't see herself as a good writer until the end of high school.

“I see myself in some of these students that may doubt themselves,” Jenkins said. “Maybe they are scared to go to tutoring. They feel like they are less than other students because they are asking for help. But I was there once.”

Alan Staller said Paul had a terrific sense of humor, and he was able to help students improve their writing “but in a funny way,” seeing a lot of those same characteristics in Jenkins.

“She has kind of the same personality, not as caustic, as my son,” Alan Staller said with a laugh, according to Stockton. “She’s welcoming, helpful and wants to do a good job. I think she enjoys what she does. She’s following in my son’s footsteps as someone who enjoyed the people he worked with.”

“She is sympathetic and understanding without being judgmental, and that’s what you need from a writing tutor,” Billie Staller said. “You need (a tutor) not to make fun of what you are writing, but help you assess it and make it better.”

Now, Jenkins' name will be added to a plaque outside of the Writing Center, next to a small biography of Paul Staller.

“I feel like it’s my way to give back for all the times that people have helped me,” Jenkins said. “For me to give any knowledge that can help somebody, make their day, make them smile, make them feel better than how they came in. That is my goal.”