WWU Alumna Zoe Ballering Awarded 2025 Oregon Literary Fellowship 

Literary Arts, a Portland-based nonprofit literary organization celebrated recipients of the 2025 Oregon Literary Fellowships at the 2025 Oregon Book awards ceremony on April 28. Fifteen fellows were chosen from over 500 applicants, and one of them was WWU alumna Zoe Ballering (‘19, creative writing).  

“Being selected as an Oregon Literary Fellow is such an honor! I'm working on my second collection of stories now — a daunting and joyful process — and it means a lot to have this type of recognition and support,” Ballering said.  

The fellowships are intended to help Oregon writers initiate, develop or complete literary projects.  

Ballering graduated from Western with a master’s in creative writing in 2019 and currently works as senior assistant dean of admission communications and special projects at Reed College.  

Her short story collection “There Is Only Us,” released in November 2022 by the University of North Texas Press and won the 2022 Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Short Fiction. "There Is Only Us” got its start during Ballering’s time in grad school at Western. From a satirical retelling of the story of Noah’s Ark to sisters transforming into naked mole rats, Ballering’s debut collection journeys into weird and wonderful worlds and examines the connections that bind us.   

Ballering’s short stories are forthcoming in the Cincinnati Review and Story Magazine and have appeared in Electric Literature’s Recommended Reading, Hobart and Craft.  Read an interview with Ballering about “There Is Only Us” here

Click here to learn more about Western’s Master of Fine Arts Program in Creative Writing.  

Allie Spikes covers the WWU Graduate School for University Communications. Reach out to her with story ideas at spikesa@wwu.edu.