Cartersville campus associate professor of English Jessica Lindberg, is also a poet.

Originally from Decatur, Georgia, Lindberg “wanted to get out of the south.

So she attended school at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, where, she graduated with a bachelor’s in Spanish.

Lindberg began to write poetry at a young age and stated, “I didn’t ever think of it as something that you could do as a profession. It just didn’t occur to me, it was more of a hobby.”

After moving to Rome, where she read her poetry socially, she met GHC’s Jon Hershey, Dean of Humanities. Lindberg said, “Up until that point I had mostly been a stay at home mom.” She was “really shy and really nervous” about pursuing an MFA, which was Hershey’s suggestion.
Commenting on her creative life, Lindberg said, “It has ups and downs, you have to have thick skin to be a poet and send your stuff out into the world.”

She explained that she “has a constant rotation of poems” and that “three times a week” she receives rejection notices. According to her, receiving a “beautiful email” from someone that wants to publish your work, “makes it totally worth it.”

Lindberg currently has a few works published and as part of her doctorate program, she is putting together a book.

She said, “My priority for my creative life is teaching and encouraging creative writing in others.”

Tying in her love for Hispanic culture, her bachelor’s degree are in Spanish and the teaching of literature.