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Curious about what the NYCWP has been up to over the past few years? Here’s a list of some of our past events:
The NYCWP hosted its 19th Annual Teacher-to-Teacher Conference (#T2T17) on Saturday, March 18th, 2017. More information about the Teacher-to-Teacher Conference this year can be found on the NYCWP’s blog, which covered the day’s activities. A wonderful time was had by all!
The NYCWP hosted two book clubs in the Union Square area for teachers who wanted to gather to discuss For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood… and the Rest of Y’All, Too by Dr. Chris Emdin. The first session was dedicated to discussion of the first half of the book, and the second session discussed the second half as well as Dr. Emdin’s keynote address at the Teacher-to-Teacher Conference the week prior.
The NYCWP hosted its second ever at-night Reading Series at KGB Bar on Tuesday, January 31st, 2017, from 7-9pm. This reading featured the poetry and prose of the 2016 Fall Writers-in-Residence: Caroline Carty, Peter DeMarco, Jolinda Hockaday, Saara Liimatta, Naomi Person, Zacarias Rivera, and Padraig Shea. We are grateful to KGB Bar for the donation of their space and their commitment to the literary community.
Our first Writing Marathon of 2016 took place at the Museum of the City of New York on December 10, 2016, at 10:00 am.
We gathered in the galleries to find inspiration for poetry and prose, and to share our writing with one another. A wonderful time was had by all participants, many of whom gathered for lunch after the event to continue the conversation about how writing marathons can be put into classroom practice.
Due to the success of our Summer Writers’ Residency, we re-imagined the program as an 8-week Fall Writers’ Residency, that launched on September 22nd. All sessions met on Thursdays, from 5:00-8:00pm, at Lehman College, through November 10th. This intensive and intimate workshop experience provided writers the opportunity to read, write, workshop, provide and receive feedback, and learn together to improve their writing craft and explore publication options. The fall Writers-in-Residence were Caroline Carty, Peter DeMarco, Jolinda Hockaday, Saara Liimatta, Naomi Person, Zacarias Rivera, and Padraig Shea. Congratulations to these wonderful writers! For information about future Residencies, email mallory@nycwritingproject.org.
The New York City Writing Project, for the third time, participated with Teens Take the Met On Friday, October 28th, 2016. This time, we partnered with the Center for Book Arts to engage teens in writing and book-making activities in the museum’s Nolen Library!
Over 40 other community partners organized teen-only activities across the Museum including art making, performances, gallery activities for teens by teens, music, dancing, and more.
For the first time ever, the NYCWP hosted a reading series at the historic KGB Bar on Friday, July 29th, 2016. This event celebrated the hard work of our inaugural group of NYCWP Writers-in-Residence, who completed their Residency in July. Summer Residents Sharae Allen, Irene Arholekas, Kate Francia, Saara Liimatta, Elizabeth Lorch, Jocelyn Meermans, and Eleni Rammos shared from their work to a great crowd!
The NYCWP hosted our summer Writing Marathon at Inwood Hill Park on Saturday, June 12, 2016. Participants gathered to hike, look, write, share, and repeat together as they explored the park’s natural beauty. Afterward, several participants joined the events at Drums Along the Hudson and continued to find inspiration in the park’s many offerings and events.
The NYCWP again expanded its summer offerings in 2016, this time inviting teachers to participate in a Leadership Institute, the Second Year Fellowship, and other single-week offerings for those with a variety of interests (such as our Open Institute for New Teachers, Connected Learning Institute, and programs focused on the Teacher-as-Writer). 
The NYCWP has established a fruitful partnership with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and we’ve enjoyed several co-hosted events with this historic institution. The most recent educator event at the Met, Reading Art, Telling Stories, was held on Saturday, May 7th, 2016 from 10:00 am – 1:00 pm. The NYCWP facilitated a looking-and-writing activity with a Met educator, and participants chose from among a wide variety of activities!
The Teacher to Teacher Conference is always the highlight of the NYCWP’s year. This year’s conference was held on April 2, 2016. The Keynote Speakers were Kylene Beers (morning address) and Marlon Peterson (afternoon address). To learn more about this year’s conference, view the event write-up on the NYCWP Blog!
The NYCWP was thrilled to host two four-session BOOK CLUBS around the works of Kylene Beers, who was one of our #T2T16 Keynote Speakers. Interested participants selected the text that best spoke to their teaching practice, their needs, and/or their interests as a teacher. The book clubs ran free of charge for all participants. This was a really exciting opportunity for the Project to engage with theory in a deep, meaningful way in advance of the Keynote at #T2T16, and wonderful professional learning was accomplished by all. Thanks to Christy Kingham, Jennifer Ochoa, Alie Stumpf and Priscilla Thomas for taking on this initiative!
February 1, 2016 was a Chancellor’s PL Day for High School teachers, so the NYCWP offered this full-day experiential workshop to explore student voice in writing. Participants engaged in a variety of activities, readings, and protocols designed to deepen their understanding of student voice and the ways in which teaching voice can improve student writing in different genres. This workshop was designed as the culminating project of those teacher-leaders who participated in our 2015 Second Year Fellowship. Thanks to Stephanie Douglas, Stephen May, Mayra Negrón, Grace Raffaele, Molly Sherman, Alie Stumpf for all of their hard work with the Fellowship and making this workshop happen!
Also on February 1, 2016,the NYCWP offered a full-day experiential workshop that explored the ways that teachers can support English Language Learners when writing in their non-native language. This workshop investigated the ways that ELLs can be engaged in authentic writing experiences that do more than only support grammar and vocabulary acquisition. The protocols and strategies presented in this workshop were appropriate for all students, but the particular focus of this workshop was on strategies that are proven to meet the specific learning needs of ELLs. Thanks to NYCWP TC Renée Ehle and teacher-leader Kristin Lawlor for their work to make this workshop happen, and to Susannah Thompson for coordinating!
This year, the NYCWP was invited to participate with the 2016 NYC Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, the longest running scholarship and recognition program for creative teens. New York City alone receives over 5,000 writing submissions for the competition. From December 21, 2015 – January 24, 2016, Writing Project teacher-leaders volunteered to read and rate student writing in a variety of genres, including critical essay, dramatic script, poetry, essay, memoir, narrative nonfiction, fiction, flash fiction, journalism and more. Some jurors also read student portfolios that included up to ten works in a variety of genres. Thanks so much to our jurors this year: Andrew Ahn, Chris Antonicelli, Jessica Harris, Marina Lombardo, Steve May, Ann Neary, Mayra Negron, Shirley Phillips, Gisela Rivera-Figueroa, Francis Roman, Molly Sherman, Ellie Shrier, Dorell Thomas, Christina Vowinkel, Darcy Whittemore, Bill Wrigley, and Lucy Zhang. We are grateful for your participation in this effort!
In advance of the New York City Writing Project’s annual Teacher to Teacher Conference in the spring, we hosted our 4th annual Crafting a Writing Project Workshop session on January 9th, 2016. This sold-out morning included teachers of a variety of grades and content areas from schools across the boroughs and helped them as they honed their ideas and drafted proposals for conference presentation. Participation in this event helped teachers create strong proposals for presentation at T2T and other educational conferences and symposiums.
On November 3, 2015 (Election Day), the NYCWP again offered two sold-out workshops to teachers of all grades and content areas from around the five boroughs.
In Writing to Create Community, teachers of all grades and content areas learned ways to develop classroom community using various forms of writing. Participants engaged in rigorous, academic writing instruction alongside process and exploratory writing activities, all of which foster engagement and collaboration in all grades and disciplines. Teachers then discussed the practical application of these types of activities in their classrooms, and created plans to use writing to foster classroom community and engage all learners when they returned to school.
In Not Just an Argument – A Historical Argument: Supporting Academic Writing in the Humanities Classroom, teachers of 6th-12th grade ELA and Social Studies explored the unique way the historian constructs evidence-based arguments. In this workshop, teachers interrogated their own relationship with the subject of history, engaged in critical readings, examined student work samples, immersed themselves in primary source documents and left with ideas to begin to build a text-based, CCLS-aligned writing assignment for students.
On October 16, 2015, nearly 4,500 teens from NYC and the surrounding areas attended Teens Take the Met! The NYCWP facilitated an art-and-writing based scavenger hunt in the galleries, which engaged teens in writing Twitter stories and poems in response to three works of art… if, of course, they were able to find them, first! Some NYCWP partner schools organized an after-school field trip with chaperones, pizza and support for kids as they entered the museum, many of them for the first time. More information and pictures from the event can be found in this blog post.
On October 2, 2015, the NYCWP again partnered with the Metropolitan Museum of Art in their large-scale educator event, Creativity Now! More information and pictures from the event can be found in this blog post.
On April 17, 2015, the New York City Writing Project co-hosted a Writing Marathon with the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was an exciting and beautiful collaboration. For more information, please see our blog post about the Writing Marathon, which includes the writing prompts we used, in case you want to re-create the marathon for yourself!
We hope to continue to collaborate with the Met, so keep your eyes on this site for future offerings.
The NYCWP’s Teacher to Teacher Conference is always a highlight of our year. This year’s conference featured 15 teacher-facilitated workshops and ten teacher panels, as well as keynote speaker Taylor Mali. Over 200 teachers attended this exciting, full-day conference. SAVE THE DATE for the 18th annual conference in 2016: April 2, 2016!
On Monday, February 2, 2015, the NYCWP re-offered its previously sold-out workshop, Writing to Create Community. This workshop addressed a variety of writing activities–both exploratory and rigorous, high-stakes ones–that could be used to create in students a community of writers.
Also on Monday, February 2, 2015, teachers of history and humanities participated in a full-day experiential workshop exploring the ways the historian constructs rigorous, evidence-based arguments. This professional development workshopsupported teachers in both engaging students in historical content (using primary sources) and in designing a challenging, CCLS-aligned performance task.
On Saturday, January 10, 2015, NYCWP teachers and teacher consultants gathered to learn what makes a Writing Project workshop so unique. In this workshop teachers of all grades and content areas considered ways to share their practice; created plans for interactive workshops and panels; learned how to write and submit a proposal; and left with the tools for future presentation! This workshop was designed for teachers who want to present at the upcoming NYCWP Teacher-to-Teacher Conference, which will be held on March 28, 2015. Please note that this event is typically offered annually.
The NYCWP hosts 2-5 Writing Marathons annually. The most recent Writing Marathon was hosted at Harlem’s Lenox Coffee on December 11, 2014. Participants wrote, shared, wrote some more, and shared some more. Three cycles of writing and sharing were held, with small breaks for coffee, wine and snacks in between.
On November 4, 2014 (Election Day) the NYCWP hosted the first of its 2014 Stand-Alone Workshops for teachers from grades PreK – 12+. The workshop, entitled Writing to Create Community, ran for two sold-out, full-day sessions. At this event, participants explored the variety of ways that both low-stakes, exploratory writing and more formal assignments can be used to build classroom community, engage learners, and meet Common Core Standards. Due to its popularity, this event will be re-offered on February 2, 2014.
