About the program

Writers in the Community (WiC) is a collaborative community outreach program run by the Quebec Writers’ Federation (QWF). It began as a one-day event in 2003 and now presents up to 20 ten-week workshops a year in partnership with schools, community organizations, and group facilities in the province of Quebec. Most of the young people we work with are aged 14 to 24, and fall into one of these groups:

• Teens in youth protection
• Teens with behavioural difficulties and/or social maladjustments
• Teens with learning disabilities
• Teens living in neighbourhoods with economic and social challenges
• Young single mothers (ages 15 to 24)

WiC pairs small groups of these youth with a professional writer or literary performance artist to provide them with a positive role model who can teach and motivate them to use language to express themselves in productive ways. The goal is to help participants improve their prospects in life by giving them opportunities and guidance to:

• improve their literacy and writing skills
• learn the value of staying the course, by completing a cooperative group project
• give and receive constructive feedback in a positive way
• take pride in their work, presenting it to friends, family, and members of their school or group home community
• be more reflective and channel their emotions into productive and creative work.

In each project, a writer-facilitator works with a group for 10 weeks, giving them language tools, boosting their self- confidence, and showing them that they are capable of producing something of value. The facilitator presents a stimulating variety of creative writing and spoken word activities that culminate in a tangible “product” (zine, recording, spoken word performance).

They glowed with pride on Poetry Reading day. At first they were very nervous, but as they got going reading each other’s poems as well as their own, they just continued taking turns until they almost ran out of poems. I truly believe that after all these years of struggling with any writing assignment given in class they finally produced a zine full of poems and writing that they were truly proud of and wanted to show off.

Comment from WIC writer-facilitator report

Activities and outcomes

Participants are exposed to literary activities that motivate and engage them, extend their appreciation of literary expression, produce tangible products, develop new skills, foster pride in their accomplishments, and connect them to the literary community. We have seen participants in this program improve their skills in writing and using language, and gain appreciation of various literary genres. Most important, they learn to use the literary arts to gain control over their lives, and make better choices for their own futures.

The results have been gratifying:

• One young woman who had dropped out of school was inspired by our workshops to re-enrol.
• A teacher has reported improved attention span and desire to write among her class of learning-disabled students.
• A teacher of troubled young women has reported generally improved behaviour in the classroom.
• A residential unit for single teen mothers now uses written reflections as a way for the women to process their experiences and difficulties.
• Several participants have had their poetry published in the Montreal Review of Books or carte blanche.
• One young woman enrolled in a creative writing program at CEGEP.
• One young woman went on to create poems for CBC Radio.
• Two boys wrote and produced a hip hop video that received thousands of web hits and was the subject of a TV news report.

Program coordinator

Media