Photocredit: youngalbertawriters.com
Every summer, an AWESOME crop of students gathers at Camp Kiwanis for a week of creativity, excitement, and self-discovery. Wordsworth is a youth residency that brings together talented minds to impart inspiration, challenge, and knowledge to children who are rich in writing potential.
Photocredit: youngalbertawriters.com
I sat with Wordsworth’s Youth Residency Director Lisa Murphy-Lamb to chat about the residency program.
What is Wordsworth?
“Wordsworth is a writing residency for youth between the ages of 12-19. It’s a residency sleepover for them to attend for a week and a place for them to come and get a writing experience they can’t get anywhere else. It’s a place to come and explore the written word through the arts. We do everything from spoken word, visual poetry, photography, comics, nonfiction, journalism [to] fiction. Every year it changes, and the students come and study it. They eat it, they live it, and they breathe it for a week. We try to bring in instructors that can bring in something unique and different that children wouldn’t get in classrooms or community course.”
This youth camp is run under the Writer’s Guild of Alberta’s Young Alberta Writers program. The program has existed for 14 years, and Lisa took over as Director four years ago. Her background in education and passion for creative writing came together as she grew into the role. Organizing the camp is a yearlong process. The first week is for youth ages 12 to 14, while the second is for ages 15 to 19.
What goes into planning the courses?
“It’s usually a dialogue between a number of mentor instructors who are interested in teaching, and I just try to balance it out. We try to bring something fresh every year. I keep some tried and true courses, like songwriting and a course called “Breath, Body, Flow”, which teaches writing using breath, body, and movement. The [courses] that are popular are kept every year. From there I try to change it up. For example, this year we had an instructor who has done illustrations for Marvel Comics. Overall, I try to maintain some form of fiction, poetry, and non-fiction course. We have students that come back for year after year, some up to 7 to 9 years so they need something different.
I always ask students what they want and what they loved. They get a chance to evaluate their experience because they’re the stakeholders, the ones who we create this program for. But sometimes I might surprise them because I want them to try something that they didn’t think they would never try. There are some courses they don’t get to choose until the day they come. [Students choose courses] by a lottery system, so they may be the last person whose name is pulled out of a hat. Or, the course they wanted to take could also be full, so they’ll have to make another choice, they think they’re fiction writers, and they think that spoken word has nothing to do with writing fiction. They quickly learn that learning spoken word has everything to do with writing fiction. And the students are good about it because they know they’re there to push themselves.
This is why I only hire amazing teachers and instructors.”
How do you select instructors?
“When I first started the job, I didn’t know very many people in the literary community and nobody knew me, so it was difficult knowing who to hire. I went by recommendations. But now word has gone out on Wordsworth and what it is about, that it’s a pretty dynamic place to spend a week or two in the summer, and now it’s become a dialogue and a lot of coffee meetings. Now I get to meet all types of literary instructors.”
Do the same instructors come back every year, or do they also change as the courses change?
“It’s really tricky, especially when you work alone. It’s certainly one of the most difficult parts of the program, as well, because almost everyone who works [or] worked at Wordsworth would happily come back again next year, unless life commitments made it inconvenient for them. Some instructors have been there for 14 years. But because I try not to offer the same program every year, because of students who come back year after year, I have to balance genre, new and old programs, and the programs that rated highly with children. I also like to offer new instructors, some who are just out of university and are just starting [as] writers themselves. So, this is a great place to start teaching. And I also have veteran instructors [and] writers, people who have several years of published work under their belt and have been teaching in a variety of settings for 10 to 20 years. This mix brings a different level of enthusiasm and skill and expertise from everyone.
I’m looking for an instructor who really wants to be part of the program, rather than someone who comes in to do their 90 minutes and leave. Well-rounded instructors who are articulate and know the subject they are teaching, but also get into the camp life as well. When we discuss the climate of the program I listen for “what can I get out of this” vs. “what can I offer these young writers?”
Photocredit: youngalbertawriters.com
At the end of the week students get a chance to showcase what they’ve written at Wordsworth’s 2-hour Open Mic showcase. This closes the week, and parents come down to watch their children. They also publish an anthology so participants get a chance to see their work on page.
How do you find working with parents in the program?
Parents have been really good. The first year that I came in, some of the parents didn’t know who I was and [were] more involved. But now most of the parents come to the drop-off (which is on a 3pm on a Sunday) and they’re gone within half an hour, we don’t see them till open mic night. With very little contact with the parents, it’s important for me to do a lot of communication before the camp starts. Now the parents just let us do our job. We have built and maintained the reputation of running a safe program.
The application process to Wordsworth begins when potential students fill out an online application through Wordsworth’s website. Those who apply for the first time must provide writing samples, as well as a 300-word essay on why they want to attend Wordsworth.
So what happens to students after they graduate from Wordsworth?
Almost every year, we’ve had a young writer graduate and become a team member. Through some festivals, we’ve hired some of them to be on the stage. It’s hard not to keep in touch; sometimes when they’re in town they stay at my place. They’re really dynamic people and most of them cite Wordsworth as one of the most important places in their world. For a lot of people its natural not to let the relationships they’ve developed here go, so a lot of them keep in touch with us and [maintain the] friendships they’ve made.”
Some Wordsworth alumni are currently active writers and poets and are gaining recognition like Lyndsie Bourgon (award winning freelancer), Sebastian Wen (member of 2013 Calgary’s Slam Team), Mary Sanche (featured in Avenue Magazine), and Jessi Tollstrup (travelling poet and musician).
Finally, I asked Lisa how her involvement with Wordsworth has influenced her life as a writer.
“It’s been inspiring and extraordinarily humbling. The amount of talent that comes together in one week is mind-blowing, from the 12 year olds to the instructors. So much talent, and they take such risks with their writing [experiences] that I wish I could take home at the end of summer and apply to my own writing.
It’s daunting how talented these kids are. It’s why I went back to creative writing, because I wanted to keep up.
Kids write constantly. I wake up and there are already a handful of them already writing, and sometimes I have to turn the lights of at night because they never stop writing.”
Photocredit: youngalbertawriters.com
The planning process for Wordsworth 2014 starts late this year. There is also a weekend program called Winter Wordsworth that Lisa will run. Currently, Wordsworth is considering a third camp week due to the high volume of demand (as evidenced by a waitlist). .
To find out more about Young Alberta Writers and the Wordsworth program visit
http://youngalbertawriters.com/wordsworth/