Woodsworth Graduate Wins Creative Writing Scholarship

MA CRW Kieran Kalls Rice Awarded 2026 Adam Penn Gilders Scholarship

By Anna Kozak

At this year’s MA in Creative Writing Gala, the University of Toronto celebrated the work of its students, mentors, alumni, and supporters with an evening of readings and recognition. A highlight of the event was the announcement of the 2026 Adam Penn Gilders Scholarship, awarded annually on the basis of a writing competition among first-year MA students. This year’s recipient is Kieran Kalls Rice, an immensely talented novelist whose work stood out for its originality, depth, and craft.

Rice’s winning submission—an excerpt from their forthcoming novel Intertribal—was selected by adjudicator Kateri Lanthier, a poet, mentor in the program, and undergraduate instructor at UTM. In her citation, Lanthier praised the piece’s “immediately engaging” voice, noting its skillful handling of multiple points of view, each rendered with “distinctive diction” and “wry humour.” She highlighted the work’s “convincing dialogue, candour, plangency, and expert pacing,” as well as its ability to grapple with complex themes including colonialism, Indigenous identity, spirituality, music, and authenticity.

Lanthier also remarked on the writing’s emotional and intellectual range, describing it as “exquisitely perceptive (at times to the point of anguish), yet often acutely funny, and even revelatory.” She noted a striking, if serendipitous, resonance between Rice’s fiction and an essay by Adam Gilders, after whom the award is named, underscoring the way Rice’s work engages with similar themes while offering a fresh and distinctly Indigenous perspective.

Kieran Kalls Rice is a writer of Coast Salish and Scottish-Settler descent and an MA Creative Writing candidate at the University of Toronto. Their work has appeared in The Malahat Review, and an earlier excerpt from their novel was awarded the 2025 Indigenous Voices Award for unpublished prose.

The Creative Writing Gala continues to be a cornerstone event for the program, offering graduating students the opportunity to share their work and recognizing emerging voices in contemporary literature. Rice’s achievement marks an exciting milestone in what promises to be a significant literary career.

Originally published in Arts & Science News.

Kieran Kalls Rice is a graduate of the Academic Bridging Program at the University of Toronto, which is proud to see its alumni continue into graduate studies and professional achievement. 

Applications for the Academic Bridging Program (Fall 2026) are now open until June 22. For those interested in learning more, the final two Academic Bridging Program information sessions this spring will take place on June 4 and June 11.