What is it? Who are we? What is writing? Who is a writer? All these questions can create unrest in the hearts, hands, and minds of those that find, or do not find themselves to be creative in the first place. Those that are participating in the JustWrite program, whether it be from the confines of a correctional facility, the classroom of a University setting, the classroom of a charter high school, or in this “free” wide world – ALL participants were posed with the questions below:
- Do you consider yourself a writer, why or why not? If so, when did you realize you were a writer? If not, what about writing interests you?
- What kind of things do you write about?
- What interests you most about writing?
- What are your expectations of this workshop/project? What are you excited, nervous, confused, and or in the dark about?
- What would you most like to learn about poetry?
- What do you hope to learn about yourself?
- What do you think you will learn about others?
- How old are you? What is your ethnicity? What “Campus” are you participating in the JustWrite Program from?
This set of questions is intended to create a common bond – place, jump off point – in order for all our participants to feel as though they started somewhere and might have a gauge of where they are capable of ending up. Due to the “disconnected” nature of the numerous populations participating in JustWrite, the function of all participants filling out this form is to make sure that we all can look at each other and get somewhat of an idea of where other writers are coming from. This is an introduction of sorts – a way to make sense of the varied skill levels, interests, levels of confidence, etc. that our participants come with. We are all represented by way of intials only on this site – but in the end, we are all represented by simply words – place, intent, feeling, emotion, and the common bond found “between the lines.” There are no right answers to the questions above; in fact, each answer given, as long as it is honest and genuine, is as right as each answer can be – we are writers, will be writers, can be writers, or may never be writers – but right now, we are writing, and this is who we are. JustWrite 2013….
JustWrite 