in Poetry from the Iowa Writers' Workshop, where she studied with Donald Justice, Larry Levis, and Jane Cooper.

She earned a Ph.D. in English and American Literature from Brandeis University, where her thesis advisor was the poet Allen Grossman.

Stearns began a long teaching career at the College of St. Catherine in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

In 2008, as a Preceptor in Harvard’s Writing Program, she received a Certificate of Excellence and Distinction in Teaching from the Derek Bok Center.

[1] She lives in South Natick, Massachusetts, with her husband Richard Klug, a film director and cinematographer.