Teaching is a career that is filled with as many heartaches as it has rewards. And while a teacher may hope to reach each student, it is not always clear if she is successful. Teachers say that any recognition by students makes it all worthwhile.
Current and former students of Harriette Austin pay tribute to their favorite educator each year. Austin has inspired her students for almost three decades to dream to become writers and to follow the dream. A writing instructor for the Community Programs at The University of Georgia Center for Continuing Education since 1972, Austin is honored annually with a writers conference which carries her name. In its fourteen-year history, the Harriette Austin Writers Conference has gained a national reputation as one of the top writers conferences in the country, and has attracted some of the most desirable names in the publishing industry.
"She inspired several of us to pursue careers in publishing and writing," Charles Connor, founder of the Harriette Austin Writers Conference, said of Austin. "She has served as mentor and gathering point for a community of writers. Because of her kind, benevolent and knowledgeable influence, an incredibly large number of her students have achieved success in writing. This year alone, four of her students will have novels released by national publishers, including St. Martins, Cumberland House, Harlequin-Worldwide and Signet. During the course of her tenure at the University of Georgia, her students have had millions of copies of novels sold. She is a major influence."
Austin was a stand-in for actress Gail Patrick, at the old Republic Studios, and studied at Yale University, New York's Barnard College, and at the Max Reinhardt Theatre in Hollywood. Austin's students co-sponsor the Harriette Austin Writers Conference, not only to honor the instructor, but also to fulfill Austin's three-decade-long desire to provide aspiring writers with the resources they need to fulfill whatever dream they may have.