Rude radar

That Rebel Girl—aka Lisa Alvarez—is a retiring soul. She’s shy and quiet, unassuming. She's not someone who seeks the limelight.

Still, manifest facts collect around her. The Reb is plainly a mover and shaker. Over the years, she’s occasionally held central roles in trustee campaigns, and she's had her fair share of leadership roles within her School. As a writing instructor, she’s made a big—sometimes, a huge—difference in the lives of many of her students, the continual evidence of which I experience first-hand as her friend and office mate.

She is, you know, the radical conscience of the fitfully pestiferous Dissent the Blog. 

But the world is bigger than SOCCCD politics. The Reb produces "The Mark on the Wall," the best literary blog in Orange County. And, as many of you know, she has long been associated with the prestigious Community of Writers at Squaw Valley, where, along with novelist Louis B. Jones, she directs the Writers Workshops.

But there's much more. Together with National Public Radio’s Alan Cheuse, she edited the well-received Writers Workshop in a Book: The Squaw Valley Community of Writers on the Art of Fiction.

Her own work has appeared in many publications—and in several noteworthy anthologies, including Norton’s hot new Sudden Fiction Latino: Short-Short Stories from the United States and Latin America, which has received terrific reviews (see), and seems destined to make a lasting splash in the literary/academic pond.

Owing to the latter, she was invited to the annual conference of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) in Denver, Colorado. By all accounts, the Sudden Fiction Latino session was a blazing success.

Naturally, she's been invited to speak in various other forums. Not for the first time, she's in demand.

So, why am I blowing Rebel Girl’s horn?

Because, it appears, the college refuses to.

This has long been the case, I believe. Naturally, some who deserve to be celebrated at Irvine Valley College are celebrated, and that's great. I don't want to take anything away from them. Still, often, the college's rude radar fails to detect prominent corsairs on the academic horizon. The pattern is a curious one.

So, a few days ago, I contacted the relevant person and informed her of some of the above Rebellious factoids. She responded immediately and positively, eager to correct the oversight. Good!

Then Wednesday passed. Then Thursday. Then Friday.

Nothing.