From: Phil deHaan (dehp@calvin.edu)
Date: Tue Apr 08 2003 - 16:49:51 EDT
April 9, 2003 == MEDIA ADVISORY
A 27-year Calvin College tradition has a new name, a new logo and an expanded
audience.
For almost three decades, the college's Young Authors Festival has drawn
youthful scribes - clutching their own poems, stories and picture books - from
West Michigan area elementary and middle schools to the Calvin campus for
advice, encouragement and a chance to meet an actual published author.
Newly christened the Calvin College Youth Writing Festivals, the event is
expanding from one to two days and will include a festival geared to high
school writers.
Two different groups of young authors - all in grades 1 through 5 - will
gather on the campus from 8:30 a.m. to noon on Friday and Saturday, April
25-26. Friday will also see the debut of the High School Writer's Workshop from
8 a.m. to 2 p.m. On Saturday the Middle School Writers Workshop will be held
from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Altogether, the Youth Writing Festivals are expected
to draw 1,400 student writers to campus.
Although the name has changed the Festival will retain much of its past. Young
authors will gather in small groups to praise and critique the writing of their
peers. Local journalists, poets, children's authors and educators will teach
the tricks of their various trades in workshop settings. And celebrated authors
will take to the stage to talk about their work and the writing life. This
year's roster includes Richard Peck, the 2001 winner of the Newbery Medal for
"A Year Down Yonder," author and illustrator Tedd Arnold and Gary Schmidt, a
Calvin English professor and author of young adult literature.
The best of the middle and high school writing in six genres will be
recognized with awards. The Golden Pen will be awarded to the middle school and
high school authors of the best overall piece of writing in the festival.
"Think about how many times students are feted and acknowledged for athletics,
says Schmidt. "To have them feted and acknowledged for writing skills is
pretty significant."
The Young Author's Festival began in 1976 in Calvin's Education department,
hosting children from local elementary schools on a spring Saturday morning.
The student writers would meet in small groups, and a popular children's author
would serve as a featured speaker. In 1996, following the retirement of one of
the event's originators, Calvin's English department took over the festival.
The new planners made a crucial change to the roster of featured speakers. "We
didn't think one writer was enough. We tried to focus on an illustrator for the
younger students and a writer for the older students," Schmidt says. Past
festivals have welcomed Louis Sachar, Ann Rinaldi, Avi, Christopher Paul
Curtis, Eric Kimmel, Sarah Stewart, David Small and other recognizable names in
the world of children's literature.
In 1999, the festival added an all-day session geared to middle school
students. Local children's authors and writers from the Grand Rapids Press,
WOOD TV, the Peninsula Writers Club and other sources were drafted to teach
workshops to these slightly more mature authors.
Calvin English and Education students serve as small group leaders and guides
for the event, something English professor Nancy Hull sees as the joining of
two communities: "I love that blend," she says, "our students working with
students from the greater Grand Rapids area. It's a chance for our students to
model good practices for writing."
For more information about the Calvin College Youth Writing Festivals, call
Denice O'Heron at 616-526-6264.
See http://www.calvin.edu/academic/engl/festivals/ywf/index.htm
~written by Calvin staff writer Myrna Anderson
-end-
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