Dear Keith,

This is sad news for us, and (I hope) nevertheless happy for Dana. She won't be at all easy to replace, I agree. If anyone can come up with a feasible scheme to somehow keep the continuity of the novella contest going, I'd be all for that--but, as you describe the situation, I agree with your inclination to pause at this time. A real shame to interrupt the momentum, but perhaps the price for trying to get it done anyway might be too great (in time and effort, and perhaps cost, too) I mean. I hope to hear of a better solution, but I don't expect one,

David

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From: Miami University Creative Writing Faculty [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Tuma, Keith W. [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Monday, May 14, 2012 4:48 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: MU Press news

Hello All,

I'm writing with news about the MU Press. Dana Leonard told me a week or so ago that next year will be her last with us. She'll have the opportunity to work through May if she wishes, but right now she's planning to resign at the end of December.

I don't tell you this to encourage you to try to persuade her to stay on, as much as I'd like her to stay on: she's done great work for the press and the department. But she's looking to move on to other things.

Dana's news has me wondering if I should cancel next year's novella contest. We'd need to announce that decision in the next 10 days; Dana is out of the office for a few months as of the end of May.

A few contexts to think about:

Dana's position with the press, which will be half of her job next year, is supported by the provost's office. The rest of her salary is paid by the CAS out of "temporary money," i. e. funds generated as vacancy credit.  Her position has become essential to the functioning of the press, but the funding that supports it is secured each year. While I am confident that the funding from the provost for the press position will continue beyond next year, and also the funding for the webmaster position from CAS, there is no guarantee that it will.  It's also worth knowing that the two "jobs" need not be bundled as they have been, though bundling them has worked well thanks to Dana's many talents, hard work, and patience.

Next fall the press will publish (in late September, I hope) the novella that won the contest this year, Men Beware Women. There is work to do yet on that book, but as I say I hope we'll publish it early in the fall. Next year we also have to finish work on and hopefully print by late December a book about the Freedom Summer Memorial on Western Campus. This book is being edited by Western College archivist Jacky Johnson and includes essays about Freedom Summer and Miami's memorial to it, with photographs of the stones and their inscriptions, a poem by Rita Dove, etc. Work for this book is ongoing, with a lot yet to do. I expect us to be busy with it all fall after I do some line editing this month and next.

In the fall Dana will also have to write a manual of operations for the managing editor position for the press and similar notes about the D of E website. Combined, this is a lot of work. Remember that she also does the web work for the department, and that will include putting up spring semester courses late in the fall.

Meanwhile, if Dana does not change her mind about the December date, at some point in the fall we will have to advertise her position and try to hire her replacement. I don't expect that finding someone with her talent and dedication will be easy, especially since we'll be hiring someone for a job that will be advertised for January-May with the reasonable hope that the job will return August-May the following year. But we'll try.  Assuming that we do find another person, that person will need time to learn the job.

My fear is that if we select a novella in the fall we might well find ourselves without someone to do Dana's job for several months and have a novella on our hands without help to bring it into the world, apart from whatever time I can spend doing that (and the spring is very busy in my office). In a happier scenario we'll hire someone who will need time to learn the job.  I don't like either scenario as a way of pushing along a book on a tight schedule such as that of the contest. So I am thinking that we probably ought to take a year off from the contest and regroup. If we're going to do another new book next year beyond the Freedom Summer book, I would rather start work on a book of poems with a very flexible schedule, and I would rather not commit even to that until we have a person hired and in the office.

I've talked with the university counsel and we are able to cancel the novella contest if we want to do so. We have five or six novellas that were submitted ahead of Dana's recently announced decision. We have cashed checks for their entry fees, but we can send that money back while also covering postage and returning manuscripts. We'd post a note at our website saying something like "Due to unforeseen circumstances Miami University Press is canceling its 2012 novella contest. The rest of our publishing program continues, and we plan to resume the novella contest in the fall of 2013. Authors who have submitted work for the contest will be reimbursed for their entry fee and postage and have their manuscripts returned. We apologize for this late decision, which is necessary because of transitions at the press. Please check back at the site for news about forthcoming publications."

I might want to tweak that a bit—suggestions welcome. One point of the note would be to try to limit whatever damage we will do the press  by hitting the pause button on the contest.  We have after all good momentum with the contest. But I don't see a way to avoid hitting that pause button. Debbie Morner suggested that other personnel in English might take on some of the work Dana typically does in distributing novellas to readers and making sure that they are returned in a timely fashion, and that would certainly help Dana, but it doesn't help us with production schedules in the spring if she's not here, as it now seems nearly certain she won't be. We could farm out production and pay for it, just as we often pay for cover design etc. now, but even overseeing that requires time and knowledge.

I haven't altogether made up my mind to pull the plug on the contest, which is why I am writing asking for your thoughts. But I'll need a good reason to reconsider and a plan.

Sorry for the long email. Hope all goes well with whatever you're doing.

All best
Keith