Zachary Tackett, an English major from Lower Burrell, is concentrating his studies in creative writing and completed his senior project, entitled “Attempt at D
efinition,” in the fall. Tackett’s time spent during his service learning trip to the garbage dump community of Guatemala City during his sophomore year and his subsequent trip back this past summer as a volunteer for the Centro de Capitacion, a vocational school and public health center, was his inspiration for his senior project. “My time in Guatemala really shaped my time here at Saint Vincent College,” said Tackett. “I found it impossible to get away from or forget my own thoughts about my first experience in Guatemala, so I returned there a second time, but this time it was with Dr. Bennett of the Anthropology Department. We traveled to Santa Cruz La Laguna where she does research, and I conducted interviews with people I met there to get a better grasp of life in Guatemala and to find connections between my life and theirs.” Tackett described his senior project as a type of poetic documentary connecting stories he had gathered in Guatemala to his own stories and stories he would read about in the news, like lynchings in the South. “Everything I wrote about in my project was a reaction to what I saw in Guatemala,” said Tackett. In addition, Tackett won first prize in the Ragan Poetry Contest in 2010 and recently won the Thelma Hall Prize in Creative Writing at the Alpha Chi National College Honor Society Conference in Nashville, Tennessee. Tackett has served as President of Alpha Chi, Sigma Tau Delta and Alpha Lambda Delta and also served as student advisor for Alpha Lambda Delta. He is a member of Who’s Who among Students in American Colleges and Universities and works on various service projects with the Office of Service Learning. Tackett has worked as a tutor in the English department, as a student assistant in the Office of Foundation, Government and Corporate Relations, was an editorial intern with Samposonia Way Magazine and is a resident assistant and student intern for the Visiting Writers Series at SVC. Tackett is very grateful for being selected as a finalist for the President’s Award. “I think that the class of 2013 is a class of leaders,” said Tackett. “Many of us are passionate about the things we pursue, so I am very honored for the nomination because there are so many other students who are just as worthy as I am.” After graduation, Tackett will be working in the marketing department for the George DeLallo Company.