Alum Bernard Jankowski, a poet and essayist, delivers annual Bothe Poetry Reading

McDaniel College hosts the annual B. Christopher Bothe Memorial Lecture with poet and essayist Bernard Jankowski '80. 

Organized by McDaniel’s English department, the event takes place on the eve of National Poetry Month on Tuesday, March 31, at 7:30 p.m., in Coley Rice Lounge, McDaniel Hall.  

An alum of the college with a bachelor's degree in Political Science and International Studies, Bernard Jankowski has a passion for helping students with learning and emotional disabilities. He is the former head of the English department and AP teacher at the Regional Institute for Children and Adolescents (RICA) in Rockville, Maryland, an educational facility serving adolescents with severe emotional disabilities. He has also served as a teacher and special education coordinator at Amidon-Bowen Elementary School (ABES) in Washington, D.C., and a special education teacher at John Poole Middle School in Rockville, Maryland, where he currently serves as athletic coordinator.

Jankowski is the author of “Music in the Halls, a memoir of teaching in D.C. public schools. 

He has also written five books of poetry, including "The Bullfrog Does Not Imagine New Towns," which won the Washington Writers Publishing House contest, "Luminous Mud," "The Shamokin Monologues," "Radio in the Basement," and "Couplets for a Shrinking World." His poems have been published in the Baltimore Review, Atlanta Review, Potomac Review, and Sycamore Review, and online on Poetry Daily.

The annual B. Christopher Bothe Memorial Lecture brings a distinguished visiting writer to McDaniel’s campus for one day to meet with student writers and to give a public reading and lecture. B. Christopher Bothe, a member of the class of 1972, was a poet, award-winning journalist, and printer who died in 1984. Bothe’s family and friends developed the lecture in his memory in 1987. 

This event is free and open to the public. For more information, call 410-857-2530.

Additional information: 

• Requests for ASL interpreters are welcome and should be made as soon as possible (two weeks prior to the event preferred) by contacting the specific event organizer. Other accommodation requests and questions can be directed to Conference Services at 410-857-2407.
• Visitors are asked to adhere to all health and safety policies and regulations in effect at the time of the event.