AWF News
The Poet Laureate of Alabama
Ashley M. Jones is Poet Laureate of the state of Alabama (2022-2026). She received an MFA in Poetry from Florida International University (FIU), where she was a John S. and James L. Knight Foundation Fellow. She served as Official Poet for the City of Sunrise, Florida’s Little Free Libraries Initiative from 2013-2015, and her work was recognized in the 2014 Poets and Writers Maureen Egen Writer’s Exchange Contest and the 2015 Academy of American Poets [...]
Writing the Way Out of the Juvenile Justice System
Alabama Public Radio | By Lynn Oldshue Published June 2, 2022 The State of Alabama does certain things to rehabilitate juvenile offenders. There’s treatment for substance abuse and mental health issues as well as coaching and mentoring. This is a story about stories. The point is who the writers are and what the experience might mean for them. “Afterlife. I say when you die your soul goes high. It flies above the clouds. Above [...]
Alabama High School Literary Arts Awards: Young Writers Excel!
Each year, the Alabama Writers’ Forum recognizes outstanding young writers, their teachers and schools with the Alabama High School Literary Arts Awards. This year, more than 300 submissions were received from high schools across the state, from Anniston to Gulf Shores. Twenty-five top level awards were given, including four for literary magazines and four senior scholarships. Ninety-four winners were recognized in total. Brand new this year is the Judith Hillman Paterson Award for Excellence in [...]
Mr. Peter Datcher visits WOS class at Vincent Middle-High School
Our sincerest thanks to Mr. Peter Datcher of Vincent, Alabama, for visiting one of our Writing Our Stories classes at Vincent Middle-High School recently. Mrs. Erica Davis's 6th grade group of students loved writing persona poems and hearing about the Civil War and Emancipation in Alabama from Mr. Datcher, whose family owns the longest continually operated, Black-owned farm in the state. His visit was a part of our unit entitled [...]
Congratulations to Abigail Kulkarni, the 2022 Alabama Poetry Out Loud Champion
Alabama State Council on the Arts and the Alabama Arts Alliance announce that Abigail Kulkarni, a student at James Clemens High School, is the 2022 Alabama Poetry Out Loud™ champion. Congratulations, Abigail!A partnership of the National Endowment for the Arts, Poetry Foundation, and the state and jurisdictional arts agencies, Poetry Out Loud is a national arts education program that encourages the study of great poetry by offering free educational materials and a dynamic recitation competition [...]
Creative Writing Program, “Writing Our Stories” is helping troubled youth in Mobile County
Thank you to FOX10 News in Mobile for featuring Kate Duthu, Teaching Writer in our award-winning Writing Our Stories program, who shares about her experience teaching creative writing to incarcerated youth in the city. Read the full story here.
Alabama Writers’ Forum Recognizes 94 High School Writers Statewide
Each year, the Alabama Writers’ Forum recognizes outstanding young writers, their teachers and schools with the Alabama High School Literary Arts Awards. This year, more than 300 submissions were received from high schools across the state, from Anniston to Gulf Shores. Twenty-five top level awards were given, including four for literary magazines and four senior scholarships. Ninety-four winners were recognized in total. Dr. Susie Paul, former AUM English professor and chair of the AHSLAA judges, [...]
Writing Our Stories Pilots in Mobile
This spring, youth at Strickland Youth Center and POINTE Academy in Mobile have had the opportunity to participate in a 10-week creative writing program called Writing Our Stories. A condensed version of the Alabama Writers' Forum's well-established program serving middle school and high school students in the Montgomery, Birmingham and Shelby County areas, the spring program is a pilot for the Mobile County area. Writing Our Stories, established in 1997 as a partnership between AWF [...]
An Afternoon with Daniel Wallace held on 22 September 2019
The Alabama Writers’ Forum’s “An Afternoon with author Daniel Wallace,” a fundraiser to celebrate 25 years of service by the Alabama Writers’ Forum, was held on September 22, 2019 in the Dorothy Jemison Day Theater at the Alabama School of Fine Arts (ASFA), Birmingham, AL. The event included special recognition of Alabama’s award-winning young authors through the Forum’s High School Literary Arts Awards, a 25-year-old program that recognizes young writers grades 9-12, their teachers, [...]
