LAFAYETTE, La. – The National Writing Project of Acadiana/GEAR UP showcased student and teacher writings created during the 2019 Improving the Blank Page: Character Matters Summer Writing Camp on the UL Lafayette campus.
This week, a group of 10 high school teachers who were awarded fellowships for the 2019-2020 academic year, joined by 10 enthusiastic young writers from GEAR UP schools (11th and 12th graders who attend Acadiana High, Carencro High, Northside High, or Lafayette High) created poetry, fiction and theater performances.
Today, those performances were presented in H. L. Griffin Auditorium.
“It’s extremely special and celebrates the power of the written word,” said Toby Daspit, Co-director of the National Writing Project of Acadiana. “They have been working hard all week and writing amazing pieces and all the writing that we do or exercises that we do here at UL in our Creative Writing Department and our English classes and education classes. So they’re also getting a bit of the college experience while they’re here.”
The National Writing Project has the mission of improving the teaching of writing in schools across the nation and society overall, stated Daspit. The project gives students the opportunity to do creative writing, write poetry, fiction, and theater.
“This gives them the opportunity to flex those creative muscles, but all of that translates to critical writing skills which are absolutely fundamental to every profession,” Daspit said.
