Whittier College English majors graduate with a wide variety of opportunities before them.
Graduates have gone on to successful careers as novelists, elementary or high-school teachers, college professors, technical writers, and travel writers, to name a few.
Find your own career and internship opportunities at the Center for Career and Professional Development.
Adam Pava ’99
Screenwriter
If you’ve laughed at the antics of The LEGO Movie, The Boxtrolls, or Harvey Birdman, Adam had a part in that. With his wit and writing talents, Adam has been hired by the likes of DreamWorks Animation, Cartoon Network, Warner Bros. and Laika to help tell beloved stories. He’s now adapting a popular comic book into a film for Walt Disney Pictures, and writing an original movie for Legendary Entertainment. He earned those jobs after double majoring in English and the Whittier Scholars Program—in which he designed his own course plan—at Whittier, where he wrote one-act plays and, for his senior project, a full-length musical.
"Whittier gave me the unique opportunity to try many things inside and outside the classroom. Through the theater program, the student newspaper, the fiction and poetry classes in the English Department, and elsewhere, I was able to develop my love for writing. I wouldn’t be where I am today without being able to try it all."
Dawn Finley ’00
Co-Founder, Feminist Library on Wheels
Dawn promotes feminist literature with a mobile library, Feminist Library on Wheels (FLOW). With a bicycle loaded high with books, Dawn and co-founder Jenn Witte traverse the Los Angeles area to share a wide range of feminist books, textbooks, and movies with patrons. The project that’s garnered the attention of the Los Angeles Times and more.
One of Finley’s goals with FLOW is to inspire similar feminist book bikes in places outside of LA.
Floyd Cheung ’92
Vice President for Equity and Inclusion, Professor of English Language and Literature and American Studies at Smith College
Author, editor, award-winning professor, restorer of lost literature. Floyd has been a major figure in the recovery of forgotten and lesser-known Asian American writings. He’s edited the collected poems of Sadakichi Hartmann, the novels of H. T. Tsiang, and co-edited Recovered Legacies: Authority and Identity in Early Asian American Literature, to name only a few. He’s also penned his own book of poems, Jazz at Manzanar.
"Professors at Whittier set the high bar I now try to reach when teaching and advising my own students. Their dedication, intellect, and kindness still inspire me."
