Category Archives: writers in the schools

25

May. ’12

Mayborn National Biography Writing Contest

Here is information about the Mayborn National Biography Writing Contests from the Mayborn School of Journalism in Denton, Texas.  To submit your work and qualify to take advantage of this incredible opportunity, please visit their website.  The deadline is June 1st.

ELIGIBILITYHigh school and community college students, 14-25 years old are eligible for this contest.

WINNERS RECEIVE

The top 10 biographies will be selected by a jury pool of prominent biographers and narrative nonfiction writers. These 10 winners will each be invited as guests of The Mayborn to attend the most renowned narrative nonfiction conference in the country, The Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Conference in Grapevine, TX, July 20- 22, 2012. The award also includes each winner selecting a teacher at his or her school to join him or her at the Mayborn Conference. The award includes registration, hotel and meals for the students and their teachers (20 people total). Transportation costs are the responsibility of the winners and their teachers.

Winners will have their biographies evaluated and critiqued in a workshop held Friday, July 20, starting at 9 a.m. and concluding at 4 p.m. The workshop will be conducted by James McGrath Morris, author of Pulitzer: A Life in Politics, Print, and Power, and executive director of Biographers International Organization. The top 10 winners will also have their biographies published by The Dallas Morning News. The winners will be honored at the Mayborn Conference’s Literary Lights Gala on Saturday evening, July 21. All activities are held in the conference hotel. See details on the conference at: http://journalism.unt.edu/maybornconference.

CONTEST DETAILS

In considering the subject of your biography, keep in mind that we’re looking for a factual account of the life of a little-known person, living or past, who left a deep and lasting legacy in his or her community. You are responsible for the research and writing of the biography. You may receive help, advice and counsel from your teachers, parents and other adults on the research. Contest sponsors are providing handouts on the biographers craft to help you prepare your biographies. You may also obtain assistance in typing your paper, but the writing, thoughts and conclusions must be your own.

The biography may not have been previously published anywhere. Sources of information, including direct quotations, must be cited using either Kate L. Turabian, Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations or The Chicago Manual of Style.

Submissions should be printed single sided, paginated, double spaced and set with one-inch margins. The biography cannot exceed 20 pages, double spaced, or 5,250 words. Please use Times New Roman style, 12-point type. Please include a cover sheet that lists the title of the biography and the date.

No identification should be on any pages of the submission.

Your application and submission must be sent in the following two ways:

Hard-copy application and submission:

  • Two hard copies of your submission – printed, unstapled and in two separate folders
  • One hard copy of your application – signed in blue ink

Electronic submission:

  • One electronic copy of the submission only (Word Document only) – submitted via e-mail
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24

May. ’12

Goodbye to Grandpa

Photo by curlywurlygurly

There is a photo of me fishing with my grandpa,

standing by the water, throwing the rod,

cows eating grass behind us.

There is a photo of me talking to him,

surrounded by my family, smiling,

pictures of past generations on the wall.

There is a photo of me visiting him in the hospital.

He wanted to be in his own bed.

There is not a photo of me saying goodbye to him,

Grandpa lying on a bed,

eyes closed,

trying to sing an old song.

By Ramiro, 12th grade

Posted by . Categories: family, illness, loss, memory, poetry, student, writer, writers in the schools, writing. Tags: . Leave a comment

23

May. ’12

Fire Escape Writing Contest

_MG_4614 "Fire-Escape"

_MG_4614 “Fire-Escape” (Photo credit: Michael Menard)

Here is a contest that will appeal to many Houston youth that have at least one parent born in another country.
The following information comes from Mitali Perkins, an author who navigates the border between her Bengali roots and her California upbringing. For more information, please visit her website:
Do you love to weave words together?
Were you and/or one or both of your birth parents born in another country?
Do you live in the United States or Canada now?
Are you 13-19 years old?
If you answered yes to ALL of the questions above, YOU qualify to enter the 2011 Fire Escape Writing Contests! Submit an original, unpublished poem or piece of prose (fiction or non-fiction) that reflects some of the joys and struggles of growing up between two cultures in America. Mitali’s Fire Escape will only consider one poem and one piece of short fiction per person, so send your best work.

Contests
Poetry (up to three poems)
Short Fiction or Essay (up to 1000 words)
Prizes
Winner in each category: $50

How to submit an entry

  • Paste your poem or story into an e-mail message and send it to
    contests – at – mitaliperkins.com. I will not open attachments.
  • Proofread thoroughly and keep your presentation simple. Entries with spelling, grammar or punctuation errors and funky characters/fonts may be disqualified without notice. Do not include any clip art, images, or photos with your entry. Words only, please. Fiction longer than 1000 words will not be considered.
  • Include your name, age, and e-mail address in your e-mail. Also include your countr(ies) of origin. You and/or ONE of your birth parents must have been born outside North America. If you were born in Puerto Rico and are now living in one of the states or Canadian provinces, you qualify.
  • Current U.S. or Canadian residents only please, and previous winners are not eligible.
To qualify, your entry must be received by June 1, 2012.
REPEAT: You must be an immigrant or internationally adopted teen (or a teen with one immigrant parent) currently living in the United States or Canada.
NOTE: Failure to follow all of the contest guidelines will disqualify your entry.
Winning Poems and Stories will be published on the Fire Escape. Winners will be notified by July 30th. If you do not hear from us by September 15, 2012, you can assume that your entry was NOT a winner. Prizes must be claimed by September 30, 2012. Please note that editorial or any other personal comments will not be provided for contest submissions. The Fire Escape reserves the right to award no prizes if no entry meets the judge’s standards.
The Fire Escape seeks the following permissions from young authors: permission to publish your work on the web site, and permission to include your work in online archives after publication. Authors retain the copyright to their work. Once selected, winners must send their school information and a mailing address so that the Fire Escape can validate the entry and send the prize. Read the Fire Escape’s privacy policy for more information.
Posted by . Categories: contest, creativity, education, essay, family, poetry, story, student, student writing contest, writer, writers in the schools, writing. Tags: , . Leave a comment

22

May. ’12

Dreams

Bunte Leichtigkeit

Bunte Leichtigkeit (Photo credit: Ela2007)

Someone is trying to explain and spread feelings out.

Red, blue, angry.

Black, red, happy.

Red, pink.

I see my dreams every time I wake up.

The sketches are still there in the morning.

They remind me of somebody I know.

It seems as if it was all real and golden.

Is it so?

It must be something haunting me from the past.

By Allenique, 3rd grade

Posted by . Categories: imagination, memory, poetry, student, writer, writers in the schools, writing. Tags: , . 1 Comment

21

May. ’12

Where Are We Now: Carmen Jacobsen

WITS writer Carmen Erna Jacobsen will read at the Webster Barnes & Noble, 1029 W. Bay Area Blvd. at I-45 on May 22, 2012 ~7:30 PM.

Here is the information from the reading series:

Carmen Erna Jacobsen was born in Kansas City, Missouri. When she was 4 years old her family moved to Mexico City, where she was raised. Carmen worked for a private English school teaching English-as-a-Second Language to pay her way through medical school. She received a Bachelor of Science degree in Medical Sciences at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México in1987.

Carmen writes non-fiction and poetry. She has set up musical plays for a Montessori school at the Bayou Theater at UH Clear Lake and directed a small Ballet Folklorico group named “Aztlan”, where children combined poetry with the Mexican zapateado. A Creative Writing Teacher for WITS – Writers in the Schools, she is also an Education writer who does research and writes articles related to the K-12 public school system for The Rice Entrepreneurship Educational Program Blog. http://reepblog.com/welcome-to-the-reep-blog/ She also works with DPISD and The Hua Xia Chinese School as a writing teacher for 2nd to 5th grade students.

Posted by . Categories: event, Reading, where are we now, writers in the schools. Leave a comment

21

May. ’12

Enter the Texas Book Festival Fiction Contest

On October 27-28, 2012 the annual Texas Book Festival will occur at the State Capitol Building in Austin, TX.  This event features authors, readings, and plenty of literary fun. Students may submit work for the festival by clicking here. Here are the details from our Texas Book Festival friends about the 11th Annual Fiction Contest:

The Texas Book Festival, with support of the University Interscholastic League (UIL), announces the 11th Annual Fiction Writing Contest, sponsored by Read to Lead. The contest is open to all Texas 7th, 8th, and high school students. Prizes will be awarded to the first, second, and third place finishers per division. First place winners of the Contest will be invited to participate in a panel discussion on writing and the inspiration for their original compositions at the Texas Book Festival, October 27-28, 2012 at the State Capitol in Austin.

Entries must be original fiction, no more than 2,000 words in length, on this year’s theme “Out of the Blue.” There is no entry fee. Entries must be double-spaced and formatted as a Microsoft Word document, then submitted online no later than July 3, 2012.

Stories will be judged by Texas writers, some of whom have presented their work at the Texas Book Festival. Judges will look for excellence in use of dialogue, imagery, character development, setting, plot, conflict and resolution. Submitted entries will be considered in three divisions: Grades 7-8; Grades 9-10; Grades 11-12. Authors will enter the division for which they were a student during the 2011-12 academic year.

Read work by past student winners here.

Posted by . Categories: contest, fiction, homeschooling, student writing contest, writers in the schools, writing. Tags: , . 1 Comment

17

May. ’12

A Poet

Calligram by Guillaume Apollinaire.

Calligram by Guillaume Apollinaire. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When a poet stares at time, everything stops.

When a poet loves, he freezes,

and his heart bursts open like an over-ripe banana.

When a poet thinks, he is so happy he will melt of happiness.

When a poet is angry, he will go crazy.

When a poet is sad, he will cry to death.

When a poet travels to a new land, he gets lost.

When a poet imagines, he sees himself as an astronaut

and then becomes one.

When a poet writes, he believes nothing is wrong

because he is at his best.

By Saadat Makki, 3rd grade

Posted by . Categories: poetry, student, writer, writers in the schools, writing. Tags: , , . Leave a comment

15

May. ’12

Street Books

Congratulations to Laura Moulton in Portland, Oregon.  She has worked with Writers in the Schools (WITS) as well as Writers Outside of the Schools (WOOTS) in Portland.

In 2011 she founded Street Books, a bike-powered cart that provides library services to the homeless.

She was recently awarded a National Book Foundation Grant  for “passion, creativity, dedication, and leadership in the service of creating and sustaining a lifelong love of reading.”

Posted by . Categories: writers in the schools. 1 Comment

11

May. ’12

Students Will Rock the Menil

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On Thursday, May 17th, at 7pm, Writers in the Schools (WITS) students will share their art-inspired creative writing at the Menil Collection. This reading, called The Watchful Eye, will feature stories, essays, and poems that come out of a collaborative project called Writing at the Menil. The event is free, and the public is welcome.

Posted by . Categories: art, contest, education, event, Houston, Reading, student, writers in the schools. Tags: , , . Leave a comment

11

May. ’12

Tiger Trouble

Roar! Roar! I hear the sound nearby. I see 10,000 black stripes. I am scared. “I am in India. I must watch out,” I say to myself. There is the sound again. Roar! Roar! Roar! I look back, then yell like crazy. There is an entire herd of tigers. They charge at me and are close on me. “Help! Help!” I yell. I run to a tree and scamper up it. Caw! Caw! I hear a crow who warns me of the tigers. I jump out of bed and look around. Phew!

By Sahana, 2nd grade

Posted by . Categories: animal, story, student, writers in the schools. Tags: . 1 Comment

09

May. ’12

Calling Houston Young Writers

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Summer is coming.  Have you made your plans? There are still spaces available in the Writers in the Schools (WITS) Program.

Who: Middle and High school students

What: Summer writing workshops

Where: Bellaire High School

When: June 11-29, 9 am -12 noon

Why: Because you have a story to tell

How: Click here to sign up today

In the Creative Writing Camp, you explore different literary genres (poetry, fiction, essay, drama) with friends. You learn about craft and revision in one-on-one conferences with published authors. Through multi-disciplinary projects combining text and art (such as painting, sculpture, or music), you will also find new ways to address a particular audience. At the end of the three weeks, you will publish your best work in an anthology and celebrate!

  • Write your own poems and stories, real or imaginary.
  • Compose an essay or a manifesto.
  • Perform your play.
  • Discuss your revisions with published writers.
  • Spend your Fridays on the Rice University campus.
  • Gather material and gain the skills to write a great essay for college applications.
  • Visit a real publisher.
  • Publish your work in an anthology.
  • Make friends with other writers.

Click here to find out more from a Rice News story. This summer program is sponsored by Writers in the Schools (WITS) and Rice University’s School Literacy and Culture Project.

Space is very limited. Click here to enroll.

Posted by . Categories: creativity, education, essay, event, homeschooling, Houston, publishing, spoken word, student, writer, writers in the schools, writing. Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment