Young Writers & Leaders (YWL)
Young Writers and Leaders is a free, nine-month afterschool literary arts education program exclusively for high school students with international and multicultural backgrounds. We select 32 students a year through a competitive application and interview process to participate for nine months. During that time students will:
• Explore poetry, spoken word, personal narrative, and documentary storytelling
• Work one-on-one with a writing coach
• Read their writing in front of a live audience
• Become a published author in a book
• Get paid to participate
• Make friends and have fun!
Led by Teaching Artists:
WHO: High school students with international and multicultural backgrounds.
WHERE: At The Telling Room, located at 225 Commercial Street, Suite 201 (second floor) in Portland, ME.
WHEN: This nine-month program meets weekly in two groups (on either Tuesdays and Thursdays) from 3:30pm - 6pm from October - June.
COST: Free!
CONTACT: Please reach out to Sonya at sonya@tellingroom.org with any questions.
APPLICATIONS ARE NOW CLOSED. Applications will reopen in the early fall of 2024. Let us know if you would like to know when applications reopen by completing this interest form.
History
YWL first piloted in 2010. Since then, the program has published 11 anthologies and served over 325 teens from 46 unique countries: Afghanistan, Angola, Antigua, Azerbaijan, Burundi, Cameroon, China, Congo, Cote D'Ivoire, Djibouti, Dominican Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, El Salvador, Ethiopia, France, Gabon, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, India, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan , Kenya, Kurdistan, Kuwait, Libya, Liberia, Mexico, Netherlands, Pakistan, Rwanda, Russia, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Turkey, Uganda, USA, Vietnam, and Zambia. Alums of this program have had the opportunity to meet and share their writing with legends like Representative John Lewis.
President Barack Obama visits Young Writers & Leaders
In 2021, our Young Writers & Leaders students were invited to have a special conversation with acclaimed author and renowned world leader President Barack Obama. President Obama shared insights on writing, reading, his taste in music, and the experience of growing up between cultures. Ahead of his visit, Crown Publishing sent a free copy of A Promised Land to every student enrolled in the Telling Room YWL program and made the audiobook available as well. Watch an excerpt of their conversation here.
National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award
In November, 2015, the Young Writers & Leaders program was presented a National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award by the White House, the highest honor given to afterschool arts programs in the country. Iraqi student alum Ibrahim Shkara and his family traveled with us to the White House to accept the award from First Lady Michelle Obama.
Each participant visits the Telling Room weekly for afterschool sessions that provide:
Creative Writing Guidance & One-On-One Writing Coaches
Students engage with all of the genres of writing in this intensive program; from poetry, personal narrative, fiction, journalism and documentary. Staff and guest artists guide students in writing projects here in our studio and out in the city throughout the entire year. Also, each YWL student is paired with a writing coach from the community who works closely with them for three months to develop an original personal story to be professionally published by The Telling Room.
College Preparation Assistance
Each year students are offered help with their college essays by Telling Room staff and writing coaches. YWL students also go on a college visit with us each year; past visits include the University of Maine at Farmington, USM, and Bowdoin College. The TR also partners with USM's Admissions Office to offer YWL students an experience called "Dean for a Day" where they see the college application process transparently, and read real applications and essays.
Leadership Experiences
Students share their work publicly on many occasions, whether it be at our studio for an audience of family and friends, or on stage at Portand Museum of Art's Bernard Osher Auditorium in front of 300 strangers. They engage in Q&A's with these audiences, having conversations with community members they might not normally meet. Getting your footing in a new culture can be incredibly hard work, and we give our YWL students as many chances as we can to find out about the community. Students receive a monthly stipend for their time and commitment to the program along with financial literacy programming.
YWL One Week Intensive Program
Each year we have over 100 Greater Portland area students apply to be a part of our nine-month long YWL program and we can only accept 32. Beginning in the summer of 2013, we began offering a one-week summer intensive for 16 young writers so we could serve more students. Since then, we’ve expanded to offer these one-week YWL Intensives during other school breaks as well. Since 2016, we've expanded our geographic reach beyond Greater Portland to South Portland, Westbrook, and Lewiston. Through these intensives we are able to serve an additional 48 students each year.
YWL Intensive participants commit to five full days of creative writing and storytelling projects. Students work with writing coaches, go out into the community to find inspiration for their writing, and end the week with a public reading of their work.
A SEASON FOR BUILDING HOUSES
We produced this anthology in 2015 to celebrate the Young Writers & Leaders program's National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award from the White House. The thirty pieces of poetry and prose in A Season for Building Houses open a window onto today’s immigrant and refugee experience. Along their journeys to new homes in the United States, the teenage writers in this collection explore what it is to belong and to lose, to experience danger and safety, to remember and forget, and to build home after home.
NO TIME FOR REHEARSING
A global pandemic. A year of remote learning. A visit from the former President of the United States. Through it all, and through writing, we learned that we share a lot of the same feelings and experiences, and we found comfort in sharing our stories. In the pages ahead, you’ll read about the lasting impact of hiking the Appalachian trail, offloading toxic friendships, straddling two cultures, looking in the mirror and admitting your sexuality, and telling white lies.
This anthology of writing from the 2021 Young Writers & Leaders program features photographs by Molly Haley and original artwork by student Zina Mohamed.
BETWEEN MY RIBS
Over the past dozen years, three-hundred-and-seventy-eight students have come through our doors for the Young Writers & Leaders program, found a corner in our writing center, and put their stories down on paper for readers like you. What you’ll find on the pages to come are the stories that each student chose to share heeding the advice from program alums who said to, “write something that feels comfortable and worthy of sharing.” You’ll hear about the influence of big brothers, how a trip to Sudan made someone feel whole, what it felt like to process a loved one’s death over a screen, surviving the jungles of Columbia and Panama, creating a school’s first prayer room, an adventurous trip to Boston, and so much more.
"THE WHOLE WORLD WAITING"
THE WHOLE WORLD WAITING is our film that tackles the myths of America from the perspective of the immigrant and refugee youth in our Young Writers & Leaders program. Directed by David Meiklejohn and produced by Sonya Tomlinson.
COVID-19
As we welcome students back into our space for in-person programs, we will be implementing social distancing protocols to ensure that our space remains a safe and hygienic environment for students to participate in our programs.
How to Apply
To apply for Young Writers and Leaders you must be a Maine resident in grades 9-12 and born internationally or the first generation of your family to be born in the U.S.. Young Writers and Leaders program staff conduct informational sessions at the following high schools in September each year: Portland High School, Deering High School, Casco Bay High School, Westbrook High School, and South Portland High School. At these informational sessions, students complete an application and verbal interview. For more information email Sonya Tomlinson at sonya@tellingroom.org.
FAQs
Young Writers & Leaders (YWL): Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Will I still be able to work and play sports/do extracurricular activities?
A: Many students are able to work part-time, play sports, take part in other activities and hold down their responsibilities. We have the year's schedule outlined and you will receive a calendar the first day of YWL to plan your life around.
Q: Are there snacks?
A: We understand it is a lot to ask of our students to write and participate after a full day of school, having had lunch around 12, and our session ending around dinner time. We will always provide a few options for snacks and refillable water. Students are also welcome to bring food.
Q: Can my friends come to sessions?
A: As soon as our sessions begin at 3:30 PM we ask for no guests. It can be distracting and disrupt the flow of the program. Our sessions are special because we only get to see each other for a couple of hours once a week. Friends and family are more than welcome at our events.
Q: Do the coaches work with all of the students?
A: For the personal narrative unit, students work one-on-one with a writing coach for seven weeks. Each student has a unique coach devoted just to them.
Q: What if I don't like writing?
A: Some students start this writing program not liking to write. That is okay! We work with avid writers and reluctant writers. Our hope is to have you experience writing in a new way that makes you think more fondly of it by the end of our time together.
Q: I'm shy. Will I make friends?
A: Our group will bond and grow to embrace everyone. We play a lot of games which open us up to having fun. We also take the time to get to know each other. Your cohort will be made up of five different schools from Portland, South Portland and Westbrook. You most likely will not know a few people, but that's okay because we will build those relationships together.
Q: Do we write the whole session?
A: We enter the space with a free-write, share, play games, watch videos, etc. Most of the sessions are different but there is a lot of writing. It's not intense and doesn't feel like a task.
Q: Do we write at desks?
A: There are many tables in our space, two couches, bean-bag chairs, we have clipboards and other rooms we can sometimes use to spread out in. Sometimes we play music in the background. It's chill.
Q: How do I get there?
A: The Telling Room is in downtown Portland in the Old Port. We are located on 225 Commercial Street, Portland, ME 04101. We are on the second floor in Suite #201. It's a ten-minute walk from the Metro Station across from the library.
Q: Parking?
A: Commercial Street can be very hard at times to find parking, especially in the evening. Luckily when we are in session there isn't as much tourism and in the colder months it can be easier. If you plan to drive, plan to give yourself 10-15 minutes to find parking. You'll need a debit card, credit card or change. The pay-to-park machines do not take bills. It costs $3.50 for two hours of parking ($1.75 an hour) or you can download the Passport Parking app and pay from your phone.
Q: Can I use my phone during our sessions?
A: No, well... sort of. Students in the past have used their phone for translation purposes or during freewrite to listen to music. If you're expecting a call or message and need to have it with you, just let us know. Otherwise, we ask that phones are put away because it can be really distracting and we ask that we are all present.
Q: Do we get paid?
A: Yes! Students earn a stipend after every four weeks of attendance. We do dock pay if you're more than 15 minutes late. We understand that for some students this is a big commitment and the stipend is an incentive for all the hard work that takes place.
Q: Will I have to perform in front of an audience?
A: You will always be asked to share among peers in your cohotr. But don't worry, we will go slow and we will always give you the option to pass or just share one word from your writing. We understand that when writing is personal, it can also be private and just for you and the page. That said, there are events throughout the year where you'll be asked to perform both solo or as a group. We will be there to encourage you, support you, and rehearse with you every step of the way. True fact, in the nine years the program has existed, not a single student backed out of performing once it came time.
Q: Should I apply?
A: YES!
