Kelly White
6 December 2023: The final masterclass has now been delivered for UWrite@UC!, officially wrapping up the successful pilot program.
The UWrite@UC! Program offers high school students from the ACT and surrounding NSW region the opportunity to develop their creative writing and storytelling skills with the help of award-winning Australian young adult writers.
Designed and delivered by Faculty of Arts and Design’s Professor Anthony Eaton, the program brings world class authors to the University’s Bruce campus to deliver masterclasses for visiting high school students, who can develop their creative writing powers in a low pressure, assessment-free, highly creative environment.
Each masterclass features presentations and interactive activities, with time built in for writing, reflection, and socialising with other students. This year’s visiting authors, Lili Wilkinson and Barry Jonsberg, each delivered two full-day workshops.
Professor Eaton, a young adult and children’s author and former English teacher, identified a gap in the extracurricular activities available for young people in the region with a passion for creative writing.
“If you’re a young person interested in sport, there are plenty of opportunities out there, but particularly in the ACT region, there’s much less for kids who are into creative arts,” he said.
“That’s why this program is designed for students who are already passionate about writing and storytelling, but don't have a lot of opportunities to get together and do what they enjoy with their peers.”
Over 50 Year 7-12 students from Yass, Goulburn, Cooma and local ACT schools attended four full-day masterclasses throughout the program, where they were able to experiment with new writing techniques and develop their craft.
“As their work is not being assessed, the students can really let loose and experiment. It’s an atmosphere that encourages them to take risks and be creative,” Professor Eaton said.
“Last week, one student read her story out – you could see that everyone was blown away – it was so powerful. It’s amazing to see, in real-time, the impact of what they’re learning.”
UWrite@UC! is also accredited as professional learning by the ACT Teacher Quality Institute, meaning supervising teachers also gain valuable experiential learning from the program.
“We’ve received really positive feedback from English teachers that this is a valuable source of professional learning for them — although we can’t bring every student here to campus for the day, hopefully the professional learning aspect means that the teachers can embed the learning into their own lessons,” Professor Eaton said.
UWrite@UC! is based on the West Australian-based Young Writer’s Collective program, run by The Literature Centre, and joins a diverse tapestry of programs embedded in the Faculty of Arts and Design that connect with the Canberra community.
“UC was the first tertiary institution to offer creative writing as a qualification – our creative writing department is very vibrant and doing some sector-leading work,” Professor Eaton said.
“There’s the Defence ARRTS (Arts for Recovery Resilience Teamwork and Skills) program, where veterans come to the campus to do creative writing, visual arts or music performance, as part of their recovery process.
“We also have a wide array of PhD students, studying a breadth of topics, such as narrative in bushfire recovery and creative writing to represent Indigenous culture and experience.”
While UWrite@UC! has officially wrapped up for the year, Professor Eaton hopes that it will become a regular fixture in the University calendar, so that more young people feel empowered to write with passion and purpose, and see tertiary level creative writing as a valuable pathway for achieving their dreams.
“Many of our undergraduate creative writing students are studying to be teachers; we have students from every other faculty taking our units,” Professor Eaton said.
“A creative writing qualification does not only lead to becoming a poet or an author. While we do have many talented poets and writers in our midst – the skills our graduates learn here make them incredibly valuable across a range of professional disciplines. And hopefully some of our future writing students are now getting their first taste of the University of Canberra through UWrite@UC!”
