A literary researcher reinvents her passions in a career on campus

As a first-generation college student, Beth Polzin broke barriers with her previous schooling — a bachelor’s degree in politics, history, international relations and African studies from Mount Holyoke College, and a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from Bowling Green State University. But she realized something was still missing from her training.

Enter Binghamton University’s comparative literature program.

“By the end of my master’s in creative writing, I recognized I had a deficit,” she said. “I had studied politics and history as an undergraduate and read plenty of literature, but I realized there was a vast world of contemporary literature that I didn’t know much about, and I was not as well versed in world literature as I wanted to be. And I thought, ‘How can I evaluate myself if I’m so unexposed to what is out there?’ Binghamton’s program seemed like an ideal place to build on my background and start to fill the gaps.”

Polzin, now the associate director of the External Scholarships and Undergraduate Research Center (ESURC) on campus, originally decided to come to the area in 2009 to pursue her doctorate. She quickly fell in love with its natural beauty and sense of community.

Her career in the area solidified along with her academic interests. She believes that her background gives her a unique view of the university and what it has to offer.

“My time as an alumnus has overlapped almost entirely with my time as a staff member. I came to see the campus in its full dimension, not as the siloed doctoral student on a narrow path that I once was,” she said. “I learned how the campus operates and how to be effective within it, which was initially a major learning curve. The space itself didn’t change so much, but my relationship to it changed dramatically.”

Over time, her career evolved along with her. Polzin has taught writing- and research-focused courses in several areas, including comparative literature, the Translation Research and Instruction Program (TRIP) and the Latin America and Caribbean Area Studies Program (LACAS). Eventually, she moved to the Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities (IASH) and served as the coordinator of Independent Undergraduate Research in the Humanities (IURH), where she taught and mentored sophomore-level students she recruited in the Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) and Student Support Services (SSS), as well as juniors preparing to complete honor theses.

After other roles as a proposal writer in the Division of Research’s Office of Entrepreneurship and Innovation Partnerships (E&IP) and as a grant and contract administrator in the Division’s Office of Sponsored Programs, Polzin finally moved to her penultimate position as the program coordinator for the TRIP program.

There, she trained instructors, developed workshops, advised students and improved program administration. Ultimately, she rebuilt the undergraduate minor curriculum — increasing enrollment from one to nearly thirty students.

“When a position opened in TRIP, I was excited about the opportunity. I returned to my home department, to a program I knew so well, and to work with many people I already knew,” she said. “I filled that role for five and a half years until this position opened.”

And it was the ESURC where Polzin found a new means of applying her passions. Because of her background, she connects heavily with this role that offers a chance to apply her previous training in new ways to serve the entire campus.

“After college, I completed a Fulbright-funded research project in Ghana, and now, I work in an office where I support students to pursue campus and external research opportunities and apply for external scholarships,” she said. “We hear from students regularly who say, ‘I had no idea this office existed. I didn’t know about these opportunities,’ and I was in that position once. So, to help those students is very fulfilling.”

The ESURC develops and awards undergraduate research, assists students with locating and applying for external scholarships and provides outreach and advising to undergraduates, faculty and the broader campus community. These objectives provide a transformative learning community that prepares students for advanced education, careers and purposeful living.

Polzin says that her earlier degrees help her bring the best to her charges. With her background in mentoring, creative writing and global studies, she is well suited to help students prepare for their futures.

“My background in languages and literature is helpful to aid students in telling their stories,” Polzin said. “Another throughline to my own education is looking for meaning, for a clear understanding of how things work, whether it’s personal or external. That’s what students are trying to do when they write application essays. They’re being prompted to say: ‘Here’s who I was, here’s what I’m doing now, here’s who I’m going to be.’ And that can be challenging to articulate but a really gratifying process.”

This role gives Polzin the ability to help students gain experiences on campus in each of their four years. She says she is especially happy to witness students thriving and expanding their understanding of their own capabilities while they seek and participate in meaningful research experiences like Binghamton University Projects for New Undergraduate Researchers (BUPNUR) and the Source Project, a course-based undergraduate research experience in the humanities and social sciences.

Her most recent teaching role supports students to expand on their work from the Source Project in an advanced colloquium course. She says that working with these dedicated students while spreading the word about opportunities available to them through her office is a big motivator for her. She recalls that her own experiences would not have been possible without the mentors and offices that supported her.

Thanks to Binghamton, Polzin has found a way to return the favors she was granted through her education.

“This class makes it possible for me to address our office’s three major areas in one place,” she said. “The students have taken advantage of the option to continue to develop their first-year undergraduate research projects. I can promote external scholarships to these very motivated students who will make great candidates for nationally competitive opportunities. And this class lets me get to know them and their projects directly and participate in their process!”