Acknowledgements

This book was made possible only due to the incredible hard work and dedication of many individuals in the University of Massachusetts Writing Program. We would like to thank Tara Pauliny, Anne Bello, and Aaron Tillman for overseeing and supporting the project from the start. This book was crafted, edited, and created with the help of Gretchen Hohmeyer, who devoted much of their summer to editing, formatting, and conceptualizing this textbook. The original concept of moving to an Open Education Resource reader was proposed, discussed, and developed in the Writing Program’s Curriculum Committee. Many individuals were a part of that committee, including Haivan Hoang, Devin Day, Allie Itzi, Danielle Bradley, Ruby Ferris, Allison Ice, Suzanne Bagia, and Chandler Steckbeck. Those folks gave many hours to us in order to draft the structure of the book as well as sift through the hundreds of proposed essays. Speaking of proposed essays, we wanted to thank everyone who attended the Writing Program’s 2025 Spring Symposium for suggesting many of the texts that are published in this book today. We are grateful for the support provided by the UMass Library’s Open Education Initiative Grant, which allowed us to work through the summer in anticipation of publishing the book in the fall. Special thanks, again, to Aaron Tillman for spearheading that grant, and thanks to Heidi Therault who helped with budgeting. Finally, much of the success of the project is thanks to the UMass library’s devoted staff who helped shape and guide this book, especially Theresa Dooley and Christine Turner.