3,800 YOUTH INSPIRED
From Literary Arts’ 2023/24 Annual Report
Our Writers in the Schools (WITS) writers-in-residence taught across many classes, including radio broadcasting and film studies. Readings took place in coffee shops and bookstores around Portland, and on stage at Portland Book Festival. The East Side Slam returned, featuring poets from Parkrose and Nelson high schools, and two finalists advanced to our citywide youth poetry championship Verselandia! The College Essay Exchange returned to nine schools across three districts.
Writers in the Schools Residencies
We partnered with 24 educators at 13 public high schools throughout the year. Writers in the Schools (WITS) residencies were held in English and Creative Writing classes as well as Speculative Fiction, Radio Broadcasting, Multimedia Journalism, Film Studies, and Earth and Space Science classes.
Click here to learn more about our Writers in the Schools program.
“Working with a professional writer helped to show me different perspectives on writing and ways to analyze a text.”
—McDaniel High School student
Author Visits, Everybody Reads, and Students to the Schnitz
Hundreds of students engaged with six world-class authors in the concert hall and classroom throughout the year for the 2023–24 Portland Arts & Lectures season and Everybody Reads. 365 students attended lectures, and 282 students attended author visits. This year, Youth Programs continued to partner with OPB’s Think Out Loud to combine the live interviews with author visits, giving students the opportunity to participate in the radio program. We held Think Out Loud interviews at Grant, Ida B. Wells, McDaniel, Nelson, and Parkrose.
Click here to read more about our Students to the Schnitz program.
Verselandia! and East Side Slam
Verselandia! brought together poets from Portland and east Multnomah County high schools to compete for the title of Grand Slam Champion. Educators, friends, and family came out to the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall to hear the students perform. Oregon Poet Laureate Anis Mojgani hosted the evening.
The East Side Slam returned, giving students from east Multnomah and Clackamas counties the chance to compete for the night’s top prize of $500. Eight poets from Parkrose and Nelson High Schools participated, and two finalists advanced to compete in Verselandia! The slam was held at Adrienne C. Nelson High School for an audience of educators, family, friends, and even the school’s namesake, Justice Adrienne C. Nelson. Poet Armin Tolentino hosted the evening.
COLLEGE ESSAY EXCHANGE
The College Essay Exchange (formerly the College Essay Mentoring Project) offered 19 in-person sessions. 354 students from 9 Portland area high schools received help from 117 volunteers to write and edit their college application materials.
“They broke down the process and helped me understand my story better. The most helpful mentors!”
—Woodburn High School student
Workshops and Events
We offered three workshops at the 2023 Portland Book Festival for high school aged students: ekphrastic poetry, worldbuilding, and narrative and social justice storytelling. Students from across Portland, east Multnomah County, and Woodburn read their published work in front of an audience of nearly 200 at the WITS anthology launch.
Committed to Equity
- Continued deepening our relationship with schools outside of Portland and with culturally specific institutions.
- Further developed our Writers in the Schools Apprenticeship for Writers of Color with writers Judy Jiang, Nicky Nicholson-Klingerman, and Zoë Gamell Brown.
- 45.4% of students served identify as BIPOC, and 61.3% qualify for free and reduced lunch.
Read the full report below.
