FROM OUR EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Dear Friends,

Our last year at The Telling Room has been filled with stories of our partnerships, the stars that are part of our community and shine brightly, shaping our own galaxy.

Returning partners uplifted Telling Room authors and books statewide, while community members joined us everywhere that Telling Room students were writing. New partners came together to make beautiful books—like the chapbook Trinkets & Knick-Knacks, written by students at Oak Hill High School, accompanied by photos by artist Tanja Hollander—or essential programming, like our LGBTQ+ writing group, OUTSpoken, which took place at Cumberland’s Prince Memorial Library. 

By collaborating with all of you, we’ve been able to nimbly respond to the needs of Maine’s youth, whether they’re seeking a safe space to write in or a mentor to help them on their creative journey. 

As we continue to prioritize partnerships alongside our strategic plan in the years ahead, we are grateful to you for joining us in supporting youth throughout the state, and hope you’ll help to continue to make these vital programs and publications possible. 

With Gratitude,

Kristina Powell
Telling Room Executive Director

“Older Sister to Younger Brother” by Jules Vázquez

Recently my younger brother smells unfamiliar
He leaves with little to no warning 
And returns with the lingering scent of grass stains, sweat,
And someone else’s living room on his sweater 
He walks out quickly and clean 
Returning with a mature, teenage kind of mud on his knees 
In the beds of his fingernails rests paint and dirt

I can feel him tearing away from our mother 
Ready to take on the vastness of his future 
Without me or our cozy loft beds to return to
I wish I had missed him this much when he was small and moldable
As foolish as it sounds maybe he’d want to stay 
Where blood was stronger than any friendship 
And our whole world was our messy bedroom floor

Jules Vázquez wrote “Older Sister to Younger Brother” as a sophomore at Baxter Academy for Technology and Science to showcase sibling bonds. They are a ballerina with Maine State Ballet, and an active environmentalist, having co-founded a municipal initiative to plant fruit trees in their community addressing two prevalent issues; food insecurity and climate change. They are a descendant of the Taino; the people of first contact with European settlers as they made their way across the Atlantic.

The Telling Room’s Statewide Writing Contest invites youth from all over Maine, ages 6 - 18, to show off their writing. A panel of professional writers and youth selects one grand prize winner, as well as a winner from each of Maine’s participating 16 counties.

Gray
Greene
Greenfield
Greenwood
Guilford
Hallowell
Hampden
Harpswell
Harrington
Hartland
Hollis Center
Hope
Houlton
Kennebunk
Kittery
Kittery Point
Leeds
Lewiston
Limestone
Lincoln
Livermore
Mariaville
Maspeth, NY
Minot
Monmouth
Monroe
Monticello
Montville
Mooresville, IN
Morill
Naushahro Feroze, Pakistan
New Gloucester
New Sharon
Newcastle
Newport
Nobleboro
North Haven
North Yarmouth
Oakland
Orono
Otis
Passadumkeag
Peaks Island
Pembroke
Poland

Portland
Presque Isle
Readfield
Richmond
Robbinston
Rockland
Rockport
Saco
St Albans
St George
Sanford
Scarborough
Searsmont
Searsport
Sidney
South Berwick
South Bristol
Southport
South Portland
Standish
Stoneham
Teaneck, NJ
Tenants Harbor
Thomaston
Topsfield, MA
Topsham
Trenton
Turner
Unity
Vassalboro
Wakefield
Waldo
Wales
Washington
Waterville
Wells
West Baldwin
West Bath
West Gardiner
Westbrook
Westfield, NJ
Whitefield
Windham
Winslow
Woolwich
Yarmouth
York

Long Creek Youth Development Center
Maranacook High School
Marcia Buker Elementary School
Mast Landing School
MSAD 52
Mt. Ararat Middle School
Oak Hill High School
Oceanside Middle School
Portland Public Schools
Shapleigh School
Talbot Elementary School
University of Southern Maine
Wells Junior High
York High School

RESIDENCIES

264 students served in 8 programs

Even though we’re often new faces in the classroom, sometimes we know it takes an additional outside voice to make a residency experience all that more special. Enter Tanja Hollander and her brilliant Ephemera Project. Our Oak Hill High School creative nonfiction students quickly embraced the idea of collecting miscellaneous objects from their backpacks and rooms to write about. As often happens, in exploring their different unique experiences, they discovered just how much they have in common. The pieces in their book, Trinkets & Knick-knacks, are as varied as they are, ranging from serious to funny and everything in between. Their book launch, where they shared what they had learned about connecting with people, was one of the highlights of the year.

WORKSHOPS

782 students served in 26 programs

As part of our goal to increase access across our programs, we took a look at who we weren’t reaching with our college essay workshops. After gathering feedback, we formed a partnership with Make it Happen!, a program through Portland Public Schools that supports college readiness for multilingual students. Because nearly all of the students in Make it Happen! and their families are newer to the United States, they may not know how to navigate all the intricacies of our complicated college admissions system. We designed college essay workshops just for Make it Happen! students from the three Portland high schools and met with them both at The Telling Room and at their schools—whatever worked for their schedules. Our volunteers put in extra time in person and in online consultation to ensure every student got what they needed to have a strong college essay to share with schools.

FIELD TRIPS

281 students served in 6 programs

This spring we were thrilled to welcome field trips into our writing studios on Commercial Street for the first time since 2020. Groups bussed in from Freeport, Biddeford, and Lincolnville, filling our space with creativity and excitement. For some, this was their first visit ever to Downtown Portland. After years of remote learning and social distancing, students bravely came out of their shells to interview folks on the street in Vox Pop-style interviews, finding inspiration in the stories they heard and getting to know our wider community a little better through storytelling.

85 students served in 8 programs

One of our most popular programs continues to be a strong access point for writers exploring their craft and The Telling Room. We welcomed returning writers to the three sections of Writers Block (Word Play, Story Sleuths, and Works in Progress) as well as youth new to our programs. This year, we took Writers Block on the road, holding program sessions at Waterfall Arts in Belfast and the Desert of Maine in Freeport. After tackling questions of craft in these programs segmented by age, Writers Block students have gone on to Second Story, Publishing Workshop, and this year, Young Emerging Authors. At the end of each semester, we celebrated students’ work through a gallery walk, reading, and games shared with friends and family. We hope to see these students return to The Telling Room again and again—whether to Writers Block, or another program—as they continue to dig deeper into their writing.

41 students served in 6 programs

SWARM! continues to be a vital virtual space where young writers across Maine can connect with other youth who share their passion for stories and poetry. Many students started this year’s programming with their cameras off and hesitant to share their work. Through nurturing a supportive environment and encouraging writers to share—one word, one sentence, one paragraph at a time—their confidence grew. One writer who began the program too shy to read a single word shared their full draft with their peers by the end. At the reading, this author was ready to have their words spoken aloud with the audience of friends, family, and community members.

Published In:

4 students served in 1 program

Celebrating its 10th year, Young Emerging Authors kicked off in the fall with a group of four ambitious writers ready to transform their manuscripts from rough drafts into polished publications. This year’s works included a collection of poetry, a young adult novel, speculative fiction, and a novella told in poetic vignettes. 

Two authors explored personal experiences foundational to their own growth, including family relationships, the experience of living in Maine as a Sudanese-American, mental health and healing, and coming to embrace their own queer and trans identities. The other two authors used fiction to explore important issues, including using a story of cryptids to interrogate the increased oppression and marginalization of the LGBTQ+ community. The writers this year exemplified how writing holds an important place in social change and transformation as they gave voice to their own experiences. 

65 students served in 5 programs

As we teamed up with King Middle School for a second vacation camp, brought our annual poetry reading to the stage of Mayo Street Arts alongside students from Second Story, and returned to in-person coaching, we saw our community truly come together to support our Young Writers & Leaders. 

One such writer was Ferlande Landu, who first participated in Young Writers & Leaders as a summer camper in 2021, having just arrived in Maine from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. After completing a masked and mostly outdoors summer camp, she returned that fall to apply for the year-long program, was not admitted, then applied again and was accepted in the fall of 2022.  

A member of the Science Leadership Program at Deering High School, employed part-time, navigating her senior year and the college application process, Ferlande did not let that stop her from being as engaged as possible in the program. This year’s chapbook title Printed in My Soul came from her piece after getting the most votes from her peers.

Published In:

13 students served in 2 programs

Writers with a wide-range of experience levels came together to write and support each other this year in Second Story. They included alumni of Young Writers & Leaders, Young Emerging Authors, summer camps, and returning Second Story participants. Whether accomplished novelists or newcomers to Maine, these writers showed up for each other week after week, building a strong sense of community. Fall semester, these writers fearlessly took the stage at Mayo Street Arts to share their work at the mic alongside Young Writers & Leaders students. 

19 students served in 2 programs

Publishing Workshop participants took The Telling Room’s annual Statewide Writing Contest to the next level this year, garnering submissions from each of Maine’s sixteen counties, for a grand total of over 500 submission pieces of writing to consider. To honor the breadth and range of the writing submitted, a winner was selected from each county, as well as the grand prize winner. At Big Night, Publishing Workshop editors had the chance to greet these writers from far-flung corners of Maine as they celebrated their publication in the 2023 annual anthology, From the Edge of the World, with a cheering crowd of 200 attendees. 

A Room of One’s Own Bookstore

Back Cove Books 

Baxter Memorial Library

Beautiful Blackbird Festival

Bowdoin College

Briar Patch Books

Cultivating Community

Desert of Maine

Dimillo’s 

Dski Design

EqualityMaine

FACE Foundation

Farnsworth Museum

Flatbread Company

Growing to Give

Gulf of Maine Research Institute

Holocaust and Human Rights Center

Hurricane Island Outward Bound School

Indigo Arts Alliance

International Community Center

Lucky Fox Books 

Maine Academy of Modern Music

Maine Association of Nonprofits

Maine Climate Action Now! 

Maine Department of Education

Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance

Make It Happen!

Market Street Eats

Mayo Street Arts

Nonesuch Books & More

The Opportunity Alliance

OTTO

Pink Eraser Press

Portland Community Squash

Portland ConnectED

Portland Museum of Art

Prince Memorial Library

Portland Public Library

Portland Public Schools Summer Learning

Portland Trails

Print: A Bookstore

Prosperity ME: the Center for Financial Education

Quiet City Books 

Royal River Books 

Sherman’s Books & Stationery

Southworth Planetarium 

SPACE

The State Theatre

Union Wharf Market

University of Southern Maine

Unwritten Roads

Walch Publishing, Inc.

Waterfall Arts

WBFY 

Winky Lewis Photo

WMPG

Youth Leadership Advisory Team