HSPVA Friends, the non-profit organization that supports the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts (HSPVA), will host its 12th annual Encore Luncheon on Friday, March 2, 2018, at the Marriott Marquis in downtown Houston. Pulitzer Prize finalist and critically-acclaimed novelist, Susan Choi (Theatre ’86), will be honored as HSPVA’s 2018 Distinguished Alumna.

Susan Choi is the author of four novels. Her first novel, The Foreign Student, won the Asian-American Literary Award for fiction. Her second novel, American Woman, was a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize. Her third novel, A Person of Interest, was a finalist for the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award. In 2010, she was named the inaugural recipient of the PEN/W.G. Sebald Award. Her most recent novel, My Education, received a 2014 Lammy Award. A recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation, she teaches fiction writing at Yale and NYU, and lives in Brooklyn.

The Encore Luncheon is chaired by Julia and Thomas Pascal Will Robinson. Current students from HSPVA’s six art areas—Creative Writing, Dance, Instrumental Music, Theatre, Visual Arts, and Vocal Music—will entertain guests. Each year, the Encore Luncheon raises vital funds for art area supplies, state-of-the-art technology, specialized teachers, and other essential building blocks required by HSPVA’s rigorous arts curriculum.