AP announced a few hours ago that Virginia governer Tim Kaine is appointing Carolyn Kreiter-Foronda to the post of Virginia Poet Laureate. She succeeds Rita Dove, and is, like Dove and other predecessors, more than a poet. Kreiter-Foronda also wears the hats of a painter, sculptor and eductator. Her writings include four books of poetry, Contrary Visions (Scripta Humanistica), Gathering Light (SCOP Publications, Inc.), Death Comes Riding (SCOP), and Greatest Hits (Puddinghouse Press). She has also co-edited an anthology of poems, In a Certain Place (SCOP), articles about writing and chapthers on poetry and thinking skills in other books.

Kreiter-Foronda has been nominated three times for the Pushcart Prize, and been awarded an Edgar Allan Poe first place price, as well as having received a number of grants as an Artist in Education and an Arts-On-The-Road grant. She was a 1992 Virginia Cultural Laureate for her contributions to American Literature. Her poems appear in Hispanic Culture Review, Prairie Schooner, Poet Lore, Mid-American Review, Antioch Review, Passages North and others. Kreiter-Foronda lives her commitment to bringing poetry alive for young people in such things as young writers both alone and with other writers. Among her projects for next year before this announcement is running interactive workshops for students in middle school and older called Discover Your Inner Poet: Art-Inspired Writing.