English Department

English Dept. Faculty: Ms. Kimberley Hunt, Ms. Virginia Hamill,
Sr. Susan Quaintance, OSB, and Ms. Margaret Pajakowski

Ms. Margaret Pajakowski
Ms. Margaret Pajakowski is Chair of the English Department.  Ms. Pajakowski received her B.A. from Western Michigan University and her M.A. from Indiana University. The National Endowment for the Humanities awarded her three grants: the first to study Gothic Cathedral Architecture in Paris (1987); the second to study Greek tragedy at Stanford University (1992); and the third to study Dante's Divine Comedy in Siena, Italy (2001). In June 2006, she was selected to be the teacher observer at the International Baccalureate English grade award sessions in Cardiff, Wales. She has been a faculty member at St. Scholastica since 1982. 

Ms. Pajakowski teaches Pre-IB 9th grade English and all 12th grade English classes. She is a senior class homeroom teacher and co-moderator for the SSA literary magazine.

Ms. Virginia Hamill
Ms. Virginia Hamill holds a B.A. in English from Loyola University of Chicago with a minor in Communications. She completed an M.A. in Writing from DePaul University in 2004. She began her career at SSA as the junior varsity basketball and assistant track coach.  Ms. Hamill has been teaching English at SSA since 1998.

Ms. Hamill teaches 10th grade English, Philosophy, and Journalism. She is a freshmen homeroom teacher. She coaches varsity basketball and is the adviser for The Raven student newspaper and the yearbook.

Ms. Kimberley Hunt
Ms. Kimberley Hunt, English instructor, has been a faculty member at St. Scholastica Academy since 2005. She received her B.A. in English and Communications from Mundelein College Chicago, and took an M.A. in English from Loyola University of Chicago and an M.A. in Linguistics, with a concentration in Teaching English as a Second Language, from Northeastern Illinois University. In summer 2007, she was awarded a fellowship to attend the American Society of Newspaper Editors’ Reynolds High School Journalism Institute at the University of Nevada, Reno, and in 2008 served on the Board of the Scholastic Press Association of Chicago. In 2010, she was awarded a graduate Certificate in Creative Writing (Short Story) from the Writers Studio at the Graham School, University of Chicago. She is a teacher consultant with the Chicago Area Writing Project and taught a workshop on using technology in the English classroom at UIC in November 2011. She is also a member of the "Hard Core Bard Core" curriculum development group at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre.

Ms. Hunt teaches 9th grade and 11th grade English. She is a sophomore homeroom teacher and she directs V-Show, the annual school variety show. She is the webmaster for the academic and club webpages on this website.

Sr. Susan Quaintance, O.S.B.
Sr. Susan Quaintance received her B.A. in English from the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign, in 1985, and completed an M.A. in Theology at St. John's University in Collegeville, MN. She has received the University of Chicago's Outstanding Teacher Award and has been listed several times in the Who's Who Among America's Teachers, most recently in 2005. She is also on the Editorial Review Board for American Benedictine Review. Sr. Susan has taught at St. Scholastica Academy since 1991.

Sr. Susan teaches 9th grade Theology and 9th grade English as well as Speech.  She is a freshmen class homeroom teacher and the freshmen class moderator. She co-moderates the SSA literary magazine.