Jennifer Tappenden works by day making small databases for researchers to track study data. By night, the 42-year-old New York native hones her poetry skills while in pursuit of her master’s of fine arts in creative writing at the University of Missouri–St. Louis. She’s scheduled to graduate in December, but before then she’s spending her final year at UMSL as the university’s first poet laureate.

Jennifer Tappenden works by day making small databases for researchers to track study data. By night, the 42-year-old New York native hones her poetry skills while in pursuit of her master’s of fine arts in creative writing at the University of Missouri–St. Louis. She’s scheduled to graduate in December, but before then she’s spending her final year at UMSL as the university’s first poet laureate.