School One's Write Rhode Island program is open to young writers from grades 7 to 12

YOUTH WRITERS

Our Write Rhode Island programming is open to young writers in grades 7-12. From our annual flagship creative writing contest, to after-school classes, to an intensive summer program, we offer students the opportunity to find their voice and explore their creativity, while strengthening their writing skills. Classes change regularly, so check back to see what’s on tap next!

Annual Writing Competition

Each Fall, in collaboration with Goat Hill, School One offers a short fiction competition for Rhode Island students, grades 7-12. Write Rhode Island provides students opportunities throughout the state to work with professional writers and to be published in a high-quality print anthology.

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Write Where You Are Nonfiction Program

Write Rhode Island presents Write Where You Are

Write Where You Are is a flash nonfiction program, co-created by School One and authors Hester Kaplan and Taylor Polites, that invites young writers in grades 7-12 in the state of Rhode Island to document what they see, think and experience in their hometowns. A reading panel will review every submission and propose entries for posting/online publication on the Write Rhode Island Facebook page, website, and inclusion in a RI sound map. Select stories will be published in a print anthology.

Submit one written, flash non-fiction reflection of 1000 words or less, and one recording of the same story. Students are not required to attend a workshop to submit a story. The competition is free to enter. Only one entry per student.

Submit your short essay here.

Write Rhode Island: Fiction Program

Each year, Write Rhode Island hosts a short fiction competition. As part of the competition, Write Rhode Island hosts creative writing workshops for students in grades 7-12 in partnership with local schools and libraries. Students can expect to learn the basics of short story writing, do in-class writing and receive feedback on their work.

Students are not required to attend a Write Rhode Island workshop to enter the competition. The competition is free to enter. Only one entry per student.

Submissions have now been closed. Please visit the website in September for the 2023 guidelines and deadline.

If you'd like to host a writer or workshop in your school, please contact Diana at School One.

Our Lives Now Flash Non-Fiction Program

We are all living in an extraordinary moment. Our normal routines have been dramatically altered. Most of us are at home. Schools are all online. Write Rhode Island! asks the young people of our state to reflect on their experiences and tell us your stories. What are you seeing and doing? How have these changes affected your school and family life? What moments have you observed in the world around you?

We’re launching a flash non-fiction program that invites young people in grades 7-12 in the state of Rhode Island to reflect on their current experience during the Covid-19 outbreak. Submissions need to be 400 words or less. A reading panel will review every submission and propose entries for posting/online publication on the Write Rhode Island! Facebook page, website, and inclusion in the RICovidArchive.org, a digital archive co-managed by the Providence Public Library and Rhode Island Historical .

Send us a flash non-fiction reflection of 400 words or less that recounts some experience or examination of the changes in your daily life.

Submissions have now been closed.

Read the Stories

Write Rhode Island’s Creative Writing Summer Institute

Write Rhode Island’s Creative Writing Institute provides young writers the opportunity to develop their writing skills in a fun, relaxed, and motivating environment.

Write Rhode Island's Creative Writing Institute is an intensive one-week writing camp offered to young writers in grades 7-12. Our institute is a chance for students to immerse themselves in a community of young writers with shared creative interests and to learn from professional writers and teachers who are as passionate about their craft as they are. Students will have the opportunity to write an original story, poem, play, essay or try out a new genre. Options include Visiting Writers Series, Dungeons & Dragons, Silkscreen Studio, Introduction to Comics, Writers Playground, Book Arts and more.

Creative writing classes coming soon.

Where do poems come from?

Victoria Rose

Are you a poet and you know it? Unsure but want to give it a try? This poetry club is the perfect place to flex your imagination and hone writing skills through free writing exercises and prompts. We’ll look at short contemporary pieces as examples, and unwrap the question ‘where do poems come from?’ Generate new work and share it with other young writers!

Afternoon Session I Grades 7-9

Character Factory

Rodney Witherspoon, III

Character development and dynamic dialogue.

Afternoon Session I Grades 9-12

Film Society

Eve Kerrigan

In this writing class, we will watch films (some together, and some on our own) and discuss them. We will write critically about them, exploring the essay review form, and we will respond creatively to them by writing themed fiction, fan fiction, speculative fiction, among other types of creative response. We will share our written work.

Morning Session I Grades 9-12

Welcome to the World of Anime: Comics & Manga

Miles Cook

If you love comics and illustration, including anime and manga, join us for this exciting program and discover how to draw characters in a variety of styles. You’ll learn the techniques you need to draw your favorite characters, and to invent characters of your own. We’ll cover drawing fundamentals such as perspective, linework, coloring techniques and how to draw facial expressions and figures in action. We’ll use different materials like colored pencils, markers, or digital art programs to create characters and plan a project of your own.

Morning Session I Grades 7-12

Writers Round-Up

A series of talks with authors, visits to literary institutions, tips on reading your work in public, and workshops for editing and publishing your work.

Morning Session I Grades 7-12

Silkscreen Studio

Jim Drain

Students will learn the ins and outs of screen-printing.

Morning Session I Afternoon Session I Grades 7-12

Dungeons and Dragons: Creative Writing and Play

Evan Flesicher

Dungeons & Dragons is a collective storytelling game played amongst friends with dice telling you what you can and can't do. Over the course of one week, you are cordially invited to come play D&D, build a character, and go on an adventure. What makes this particular D&D game unique is that we will be taking a break over the course of the game to allow writers space to write the story of their character, with the hope that -- at the end of the week -- the story will continue.

No previous D&D experience necessary. Extra readings available.

Morning Session I Grades 7-9

Art and Mindfulness

Phil Goldman

A sampling of five different activities that include art making, writing and meditation.

Morning Session I Grades 7-12

Graphic Novel Incubator

In this class, students will read some well-known graphic novel memoirs and will learn about and explore the graphic novel and memoir genres.

Students will settle on a story from their own lives to tell in this format, write and illustrate it to create their own graphic novel memoir.

Afternoon Session I Grades 7-12

Writers’ Playground

Darcie Dennigan

This is workshop for writers-- or future writers!-- who want to practice becoming more comfortable with failure and confusion. We'll do different writing activities to help you get closer to your writing self, and the ineluctable expression that only you can execute.
Some questions we'll hang out with: How much space can you or should you take up on the page? How boring can you be, and what might be wonderful about boring writing? How can you give yourself permission to write the things you're most scared to write?

Students will end the week having created a short play, performance, poem, essay, or something else.

Afternoon Session I Grades 9-12

Centering Yourself for School: Wellness & Creativity

Siobhan Cute, Phil Goldman

The pandemic has focused all of us on wellness, as we struggle through social isolation and see the loss of so many in-person connections. This class focuses on the many ways we keep ourselves happy and grounded, including creativity, nature, physical activity and community.

Ceramics Studio

Deb

In this class, students will learn ceramic hand-building techniques. Students will
create functional and nonfunctional ceramic art. Learn how to create with coils, slab construction, and clay pinching methods. Students will create their own pieces and learn how to glaze finished artwork.

Morning Session I Grades 7-12

Brave New World

The worlds of fantasy, science fiction, and more don't emerge out of thin air – these worlds are built. Come discover how that's done - how to build an imaginary world that can serve as the skeleton for any story that might happen on it. Create new customs, languages, values, geographies and more, the figurative (and perhaps literal) architecture of a world so compelling your readers will lose themselves in it.

We’ll learn skills that apply to all forms of fiction – so everyone is welcome. Join our amazing community of writers, try a wealth of prompts and shape worlds from the richness of your imagination.

Afternoon Session I Grades 7-12

“The challenge for every writer is to draw her reader fully into the character's experience. Scenes are where the action of a story comes alive and invites the reader in. Scenes are where the story is lived.”
– Hester Kaplan, Author and Goat Hill writer

“Writing is like detective work: to reveal the story, you pull at the threads which will force the story to reveal itself. My goal as a teacher is to help you understand how to spot the clues.”

– Mark Fogarty, Writer and GrubStreet Instructor

“We turn to fiction to be transported, thrilled, immersed in the new and strange. Science Fiction and Fantasy takes us to these other worlds, and provides perspective on our own.”

– Amanda Kallis, Writer and School One Faculty

“We’re at a point in the world right now where we need empathy if we’re going to make any kind of progress. This is the best time for theater; it’s the antidote to apathy”.

– Ben Jovilet, Writer and GrubStreet Instructor

“I believe that openness and innovation are integral to teaching. This is certainly reflected in School One’s philosophy.”

– Victor Wildman, Frequency Writers and Creative Writing Instructor

YOUTH WRITERS

Annual Writing Competition

Where do poems come from?

Character Factory

Film Society

Welcome to the World of Anime: Comics & Manga

Writers Round-Up

Silkscreen Studio

Dungeons and Dragons: Creative Writing and Play

Art and Mindfulness

Graphic Novel Incubator

Writers’ Playground

Centering Yourself for School: Wellness & Creativity

Ceramics Studio

Brave New World

At School One, we teach students to think, write, analyze, and create. As a community, we treat each other with care and respect. We appreciate each other’s differences as people and as learners.

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