Alex Ruskell Associate Director of Academic Support
Prior to joining Roger Williams in July 2007,
Associate Director Ruskell was the Director of
the Academic Support Program at Southern New
England School of Law, and before that,
Associate Director of the Legal Writing Center
at the University of Iowa College of Law. Before
entering education, he practiced as a litigator
in Boston, focusing on securities and corporate
non-competition agreements. He has also served
as General Counsel for a midsize publishing
company, Associate for a large oil and gas firm,
and as an Assistant in the Texas Attorney
General’s Office of Environmental Crimes.
Associate Director Ruskell holds an M.F.A. in
Fiction from the University of Iowa Writers’
Workshop, an A.L.M. in English from Harvard
University, a J.D. from the University of Texas
at Austin, and a B.A. in English from Washington
and Lee University.
Associate Director Ruskell’s first jobs after
college consisted of teaching in a Russian
orphanage and counting otters for the Idaho
Department of Fish and Game. Both of these
resulted in several articles, printed in The
Tampa Tribune and many other publications. In
addition, according to a National Catholic
Reporter review of his wife’s book, Fumbling, he
is also “a saint.”
Associate Director Ruskell frequently presents
at writing conferences and symposiums across the
country, most recently at the 2006 AWP
Conference in Austin, Texas, where he sat on a
panel questioning the continuing vitality of the
American novel.