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The Power of Writing: Missoula Writing Collaborative
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Excited fourth-graders wait to share their work at a reading at the Missoula Art Museum, the culmination of a Missoula Writing Collaborative writer residency. Photo by Jason Seagle. |
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Founded in 1994, the Missoula Writing Collaborative (MWC) provides in-school creative writing residencies to approximately 1,500 elementary, middle, and high schoolers each year. MWC Artistic Director Sheryl Noethe, an NEA Literature Fellow in 1990, and Administrator Megan McNamer spoke with the NEA on the project’s impact on the student writers and their communities.
NEA: How did the Missoula Writing Collaborative begin?
MWC: We began in l994 with support from the Charles Engelhard Foundation. Since then we have grown—mainly through word of mouth from teachers and principals—from five school residencies in Missoula, Montana, to our current fifteen, located in Missoula and surrounding rural areas, including the Flathead Reservation of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. This year we were invited to mentor efforts by the Pacific Writers’ Connection to re-establish a writers-in-the-schools program in Honolulu, and we’ve begun initial planning for our own pilot residency in Alaska (dependent, as always, on funding).
In addition to our school residencies we teach workshops twice monthly at a local youth home, and we participate in a free after-school program that is designed to reach low-income kids. [We’ve also provided] writing workshops at homeless shelters, writing sessions for parents of the students in our programs, and writing workshops for disabled adults (in conjunction with those for teenagers from youth homes). We hope to soon begin creative writing workshops for public school teachers, based on the same strategies we use for their students.
NEA: Can you walk me through a typical school residency and classroom session?
MWC: A typical school residency extends throughout the school year, with the resident writer visiting a school each week for three hours at a time. In a typical class session, the resident writer introduces poems and poets to the students and discusses what he or she likes best about a poem and why. The writer asks questions of the students to jar their memories and imaginations. When everyone is comfortable and full of ideas, the writer gives the students a prompt. The resident writer stresses the use of the senses and detail and shows the students various forms they can use, or how they can make their own free verse poem. Next, the students have about 20 minutes to work on their writing in a quiet classroom, displaying respect for the other students, while the resident writer walks desk to desk to answer questions, offer ideas, give praise, or help with spelling. Finally, the students read aloud from the author’s chair at the front of the classroom. The rest of the students ask questions to help the student writer see what he or she needs to do for clarity. Then the class applauds, and the resident writer finds the best aspects of the writing and gives the student encouragement and support.
NEA: Do the students study all genres, or just poetry?
MWC: [They study everything] from poetry to short stories, to fiction and nonfiction, sci-fi, epic tales, and anything they express interest or curiosity about. Poetry is what typically emerges in student writing, but genre distinctions aren’t overly emphasized unless that is the particular goal for the day. A story can become a poem and vice versa.
NEA: Why do you think a program like MWC’s residencies matters?
MWC: Creative thinking gives students more options in every aspect of their lives. Students who have difficulty with the regular curriculum are able to discover their skills and talents in both writing and presenting. They learn to make positive criticism of each other’s writing and to realize previously unrevealed skills. The success they have in the writing workshop goes across the curriculum; they endeavor to recreate that success in other areas of their lives. We give them personal and cultural literacy, which enlarges their worlds. We allow them to rewrite the options and aspirations of their lives to a happier and more successful future.
NEA: In addition to improved writing skills, what do you think students gain from working with the resident writers?
MWC: The students join the fellowship of literature and contribute to it, they make better connections with others, and they define themselves in much more positive ways. They belong. They matter. They are someone of worth.
They also get to know people who have chosen to make creative writing their life’s passion and, whenever possible, their life’s work—which usually means opting for a definition of success that is not based on money. We don’t discourage the idea of power when encouraging kids to write. Words are powerful. We just hope that the students reached by our program will get a broad view of what it is that might really, finally, be worth pursuing. We think it is a great thing when students get a glimpse of the private promise of their lives.
NEA: How do classroom teachers participate in the writing residencies?
MWC: Classroom teachers are asked to collaborate with the [resident] writer, and to take part in the writing and sharing of the work. At first some are a bit nervous about bringing an artist into the classroom and uncertain of the validity of our mission. However, after seeing the positive results we bring to the school, they become our greatest fans and clamor for a writer every year.
NEA: How do you think the writing residencies affect the community in general?
MWC: Our public poetry readings and our anthologies of student work are very popular and valued. Parents and community [residents] see their children flourish in knowledge and pride. They say, “I never knew he had it in him!” The residencies bring various people together to celebrate their children’s work. They become proud and supportive. Our work extends into the community via children at risk, homeless populations, group homes, detention centers. We make people aware that their children are the most valuable resource.
NEA: Can you share one of your success stories?
MWC: A boy . . . who was always in trouble found success in his imagination. By recounting his memories, he realized the patterns and behaviors that got him in trouble. We celebrated his success in wildly humorous verse, and he began to define himself as a writer. He very proudly announced to his teachers that he was a poet now and a good one. His mother wrote to the principal how important this success was to her son and said it would very likely change the shaky and uncertain direction of his future.
NEA: How important is NEA funding to MWC?
MWC: NEA funding opportunities have helped us move into rural communities around Missoula, including the Flathead Reservation. And they have inspired us to think broadly, even daringly, so that when a new idea emerges we are less likely to say, “We can’t do that,” and more likely to say, “Let’s see if we can put it together.” Our NEA grants have been a huge endorsement, liberating us to become more creative in our ideas about the teaching of creative writing.
Read the latest issue of NEA Arts to learn more about the NEA and Arts Education.
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