WNYWP BOOK CLUB ANNOUNCEMENT

The Western New York Writing Project’s final book club meeting has been moved to Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009 at 7:00pm at Borders Books and Café at Quaker Crossing in Orchard Park, NY. Our discussion will be based on Canisius College Writer in Residence Mick Cochrane’s new book, The Girl Who Threw Butterflies. Mark your calendars. We hope to see you there.

Young Writer's Workshops Quickly Approaching!

Summer quickly approaches. Teens and younger writers from across Western New York will again be descending upon Canisius College for our writing workshops. If you know any students who are interested in spending two weeks in a community of writers, let them know about our writing camps. Here is some info you can pass along:

• Tell Me About Yourself: Personalizing the Personal Essay
  Dates: July 13 - July 17, 2009 - A week long writing camp designed for all high school students who will be entering their senior year in September 2009. Download the brochure here.
• Young Writers Workshops
  Dates: July 13 - July 24, 2009 - Writers who are interested in pushing their creative boundaries meet with a community of writers to write, share writing, and write some more. Grade school students meet in our Young Writers' camp, while older students separate into our Teen Writing Workshop. Download the brochure here.

Jantsen's Gift

Moira Molloy-Krum's sister, Aimee Molloy has co-written an amazing book titled Jantzen's Gift. The book is about about co-author, Pam Cope, who turned personal grief into an incredible mission of public service.

We are all invited to a book release event on May 2 at the Tantalus Restaurant in East Aurora. Here's the information if you are interested:

Please join us for a luncheon to celebrate the release of
JANTSEN’S GIFT: A TRUE STORY OF GRIEF, RESCUE, AND GRACEby Pam Cope and Aimee Molloy

Saturday, May 2, 200912:30 p.m.Tantalus Restaurant634 Main StreetEast Aurora, New York$15
On June 16th, 1999, Pam Cope’s life changed forever with the death of Jantsen, her 15-year-old son, from an undiagnosed heart ailment.

Not long after, she accepted a friend's invitation to travel to Vietnam, and, from the moment she stepped off the plane, everything she had been feeling since her son's death began to shift. By the time she returned home, she had a new mission: to use her pain to change the world, one small step at a time, one child at a time. Today, she is the mother of two children adopted from Vietnam. More than that, she and her husband have created a foundation called "Touch A Life," dedicated to helping children at risk of being trafficked, or sold into slavery, in Vietnam, Cambodia and Ghana, West Africa.

“A wonderful story of a woman whose personal tragedy gave birth to a gift and how she fulfilled that legacy to make the world a better place.” - Publishers Weekly review
The luncheon will include a slide show about Pam’s work rescuing child slaves in Ghana, Africa and a discussion with the authors. $15 will cover the costs of lunch.Cash bar also available.
Please RSVP by April 24 to jantsensgift@gmail.comOr Moira Molloy Krum at (716) 674-1335

Spring Newsletter Submissions

Chris Salamone is currently soliciting submissions for our spring newsletter. If you know of anything newsworthy, send her the good word. Here is the information:

It’s time for the spring edition of the Western New York Writing Project Newsletter and, as usual, I need your help.
We accept original poems, short stories, announcements of births, marriages, awards, photos, and anything else exciting.
Deadline for submissionsIsApril 24, 2009
Email all information to:
HYPERLINK "mailto:Salamone426@aol.com" Salamone426@aol.com

2009 CEE Conference

2009 CEE Conference
The Council on English Education (CEE)is announcing its first conference which will be held in Chicago, IL on June 18 -21, 2009. As an affiliate of NCTE, CEE focuses on the professional life of the English educator and the policies that effect English education at all levels.

This conference will not only be informative, but it will also offer English teachers a venue for collaborative work to bring about change.

Tom O'Malley Published in My View

Congratulations! to Tom O'Malley, 1986 Fellow, whose personal essay, "There is an Upside to Every Downturn," was published in Sunday's Buffalo News, My View column.

You can read his essay by clicking on the link below:

http://www.buffalonews.com/opinion/myview/story/573162.html

Peaceprints Project Exhibition

We begin this year with peace in our hearts and in our schools. This post is from Evelyn, our Peaceprints Project coordinator. Thank you, Evelyn.

This month Tapestry High School and Catholic Central, pilot schools for the WNY Writing Project's Peaceprints Project held events that celebrated Sister Karen Klimczak’s “peaceprints” ways to further a culture of nonviolence. At Tapestry students photographed examples of justice and injustice throughout the city and wrote social analysis pieces to accompany their photos. This was part of Tapestry’s expeditionary learning mission. The work was exhibited at the Grant Street Gallery January 15-18, 2009. Tapestry wrote: “Working with all of you [at the WNY Writing Project] on the Peaceprints Project you continued to show us the importance of encouraging peace and nonviolence with youth. As we put the finishing touches on the exhibition we could not help but see the vital links to the message you all bring. Peace, nonviolence, justice, and hope are really the foundations that we all hope to impart to the students we see every day.”

At Catholic Central, the St. Monica’s division held a Martin Luther King Peaceprints day sponsored by Americorp. Students from St. Joseph University School wrote peace poems under the direction of WNY Writing Project teacher mentors, Pat McClain and Evelyn Brady, and at St.Monica’s under the direction of visiting faculty. On Martin Luther King Day, the two schools came together to share their poems, enjoy peace activities, learn how to “sign” to the “Peaceprints” song and create art works that spoke of peaceprints and MLK’s message of nonviolence. The students integrated their written work in their art pieces. As a final activity, the art pieces were “quilted” together to produce a peace quilt that will be placed at the Sister Karen Center for Nonviolence.

Make Your Students Part of History

In November my students took part in the PBS McNeil Lehrer Newshour "Video Your Vote" contest. My students used digital video cameras to document the essence of the election experience. They interviewed parents, students, and community members and weaved their stories into short videos. Here are a few examples that were featured on the PBS website.

As an extension of this project, Newshour has put together a podcasting project for inauguration day. All your students need is a cell phone (or a school phone that can dial toll free 1-888 numbers). Lizzy Berryman, the Director of the Newshour Teachers Center, is a NWP TC. Here is the blurb she sent me:

We are asking your students to call and record their thoughts and reflections on the Obama inauguration in less than two minutes...We will have students calling in from the parade, from the swearing in, one student calling in after singing back up for Beyonce, and of course kids calling from across the country in their classrooms and homes as they witness history. We will be publishing the posts on our student voices section of our website.

Lizzy asked me to spread the word to my teacher networks, and that means you. If you are interested, email me at malleyjoel@yahoo.com or jmalley@cheektowagacentral.org and I will forward the phone number, password, and extension.