17 Apr 2018
A group of Year 10 Dubbo College students has been given a unique opportunity to have their writing published as part of a year-long WestWords project.
Teacher Rebecca Brown's English class of 23 students based at Delroy Campus was selected for the project following a visit to the school by WestWords chair Libby Gleeson late last year
Westwords celebrates and champions the stories of the people, places and cultures comprising Western Sydney and beyond, using literature and literacy to change the lives and experiences of communities.
WestWords organises specialised workshops, residencies and fellowships, with the program of workshops being run at Dubbo College only the second of its kind.
English teacher Rebecca Brown said her students were working with multi-award winning author James Roy and two Western Sydney schools on the project.
"James Roy recently ran a three-day workshop at Delroy for our students, inspiring them to write creatively surrounding concepts of place, belonging and character," she said.
"Next term students will take part in the editing and drafting process, with each student then submitting a piece of work.
"This piece will then be critiqued by students at Granville Boys High School and Arthur Phillip High School in Western Sydney, which are the other two schools involved in the project.
"It will give the students a chance to get to know their colleagues through their writing, before they all attend a week-long camp towards the end of term.
"As well as meeting face-to-face, this camp will give students the opportunity to take part in a series of writing workshops and work on their final copy prior to publishing."
The final publication will be launched in October at the Dubbo Dream festival, with Granville Boys High School and Arthur Phillip High livestreamed into the event.
Ms Brown said her students were challenged by James Roy's visit and it gave them a chance to experiment and expand their creative writing skills.
"James Roy's enthusiasm was contagious and he encouraged the students to think imaginatively about how to engage the reader in their writing through the creation of a ‘hook'," she said.
"He spoke about how to successfully create a character and stressed the importance of the drafting process."