SC011 Portfolio

The portfolio collection largely consisted of work written by students in Shimer’s creative writing workshops. The only exception was the 1984-1985 edition, composed of expository essays analyzing texts read in the Shimer curriculum, which students had written for various classes. All portfolios were published during Shimer College’s time at its campus in Waukegan, Illinois. The portfolios were published with the intention of sharing with readers the exceptional writing Shimer students had completed during their time at the college. This was especially pertinent for the essay collection, as academic essays tend to be shared only with one reader, the instructor of the course for which they were written. The creative writing portfolios mostly contain poetry with some prose pieces included as well. The content of the creative writing portfolios alludes to the freedom of expression allowed to Shimer students even in an academic setting. Many of the pieces included heavy swearing and otherwise explicit content, with references to drugs and sex. The expository essays also demonstrated Shimer students’ freedom of expression. Far from having a rigid, depersonalized structure, the Shimer students included in the collection of expository essays were allowed to identify with the authors about whom they were writing, sometimes even using personal anecdotes to illustrate their points.