Octavia E. Butler Scholar Honored

A handcast commemorative pendant in the shape of an owl was awarded to the 2009 Octavia E. Butler Scholar, Rochita Roenen-Luiz, at the conclusion of this year’s Clarion West Writers Workshop. The Octavia E. Butler Memorial Scholarship Fund, created in 2006 and administered by the Carl Brandon Society, provides full scholarships to Clarion and Clarion West students of color, covering tuition, room, and partial board for up to two students annually. Roenen-Luiz, a writer of Filipino extraction living in the Netherlands, says, “Without dreams, you’re nothing. I am so grateful to the Butler scholarship for giving my dreams wings.” The pendant was cast from an exclusive design that SF author and MacArthur “Genius” Award-winner Octavia E. Butler commissioned from artist Laurie Edison. This is the fifth pendant Edison has donated.