Rate My Professor Paul Gibbons

Paul Gibbons serves as Teaching Professor of Writing Studies at the University of California, Merced, in the School of Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts. He holds the position of Full Teaching Professor in Global Arts, Media, and Writing Studies, where he acts as Vice Chair. A founding member of the UC Merced Writing Studies Program, Gibbons founded The Vernal Pool, the university's undergraduate journal of the arts, in 2014, and remains its faculty advisor. He has chaired the Writing Minor Committee, served on the Advisory Board of the Karen Merritt Writing Program, and played a key role in launching UC Merced's first Writing Studies major cohort in 2023. Throughout his career at UC Merced, he has taught a diverse array of courses, ranging from science writing and first-year writing to advanced writing and creative writing seminars at introductory and advanced levels.

With a B.A. and B.M. in English and Music Theory and Composition from Arizona State University in 1994, and an M.F.A. in English/Creative Writing with an emphasis in Poetry from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in 1998, Gibbons brings a rich academic background to his teaching and research. His scholarly interests center on creative writing pedagogy, hybrid writing forms, improvisation in writing, poetry, multilingual writing, and translingualism. He focuses on implementing creative writing pedagogies, developing strategies for teaching multilingual first-year writers, and synthesizing disciplinary and interdisciplinary writing approaches. A published poet and member of the working band G Street Revolution, Gibbons emphasizes curricula that employ metaphor and synthesis in cross-disciplinary contexts. His current research explores multilingual writing for first-year students and designing introductory creative writing courses as resources for student endeavors beyond the creative writing classroom. His areas of expertise include creative writing, multilingual first-year writing, creativity studies, and music composition. Additionally, he engages with the Merced LitFest, fostering literary community involvement.