In March, the Center for Translation & Global Literacy hosted Mark Hauber from the Center for the Art of Translation (CAT) for a weeklong residency in which he led a training workshop, visited classes, and engaged in conversations with students, faculty, and community members. Hauber is the Program Director for Poetry Inside Out (PO), a CAT education initiative. 

Poetry Inside Out is a collaborative, cross-cultural language arts curriculum that celebrates classroom diversity, builds literacy skills, improves critical thinking, and unlocks creativity by teaching students to translate great poetry from around the world. Poetry Inside Out embraces—and relies upon—the cultural and linguistic diversity found in today’s classrooms, schools, and communities. As a world literature program, it treats great poets as teachers and their work as models.

As part of Hauber's visit, he led a workshop on the Poetry Inside Out methodology and practice, engaging participants through the PO process step by step and allowing them to experience firsthand PO's signature approach of translation and poetry as creative and critical practice. 

One of the workshop attendees was Andres Alfaro, a secondary Spanish educator at West High School in Iowa City and alumnus of the Literary Translation MFA here at Iowa. Here's what Andres had to say about the workshop: 

The Poetry Inside Out workshop allowed attendees to collaboratively translate a poem from an unfamiliar language (to most of us) in order to gain first-hand insight into the process of literary translation. The process was fun and useful. Working with others allowed us all to decide on a translation that made the most sense to our group. The materials provided were structured and well-thought out, which allowed us to translate a poem from a language that no one in my group spoke. 

As a Spanish teacher, I can foresee utilizing this same process with my students in order to familiarize them with the ins and outs of translation. This will help facilitate classroom conversations about appropriate language register, word choice, and aesthetics. Overall, it was a rewarding experience. Highly recommended!
- Andres Alfaro, Spanish teacher, MFALT alum

In addition to visiting classes and meeting with various members of the University of Iowa community, Hauber also participated in a conversation about careers in the nonprofit sector for students with translation and language skills and degrees. This conversation was part of spring 2025's professionalization series for translation students, which included other events focused on AI; museums, galleries, archives, and libraries; interpreting; and freelance translating. 

Poetry Inside Out embraces—and relies upon—the cultural and linguistic diversity found in today’s classrooms, schools, and communities. As a world literature program, it treats great poets as teachers and their work as models.

We're so excited for what we hope will become a long-term, lasting relationship between the CTGL and Poetry Inside Out. If you're curious to learn more, visit the Poetry Inside Out website, and take a look at some of the PO materials available at our virtual library!