Gillian Turnbull has been named the inaugural director of writing and publishing at the University of King’s College in Halifax.

The position was created after a recent reorganization changed the university’s School of Journalism into the school of Journalism, Writing, and Publishing. The school also recently approved a new MFA in fiction program. Each program has its own director: Turnbull will run the school’s MFA programs in both creative nonfiction and fiction; Fred Vallance-Jones will continue to oversee the undergraduate and graduate degrees in journalism.

Turnbull, an author, writer, and editor (Sonic Booms: Making Music in an Oil Town) is an alumna of the MFA in creative nonfiction at King’s, and has served as a mentor to students in the program since 2019.

“I don’t think it is an understatement to say the King’s MFA program changed my life,” Turnbull said in a release. “Until I joined as a student in 2015, I was on a standard academic trajectory; that is, I was teaching, researching, and publishing in my chosen field of music. The MFA in Creative Nonfiction not only offered me a chance to write about music for a broader audience, it also revealed a community fundamental to my growth as a writer.”

Turnbull began in her new role on January 3.