Summer 2017 marks the first Rollins Writers Conference, which will provide participating students and Winter Park community members the opportunity to attend a six-day conference filled with manuscript reviews, readings, and workshops. The conference will run from May 18 to May 21, 2017, with a key faculty consisting of well-established writers such as Billy Collins, Katie Farris, Laura Van den Berg, Ilya Kaminsky, and Carol Frost. While the Winter With the Writer’s Program has long been an established facet at Rollins, this Writers Conference marks a whole new opportunity to interact and learn from some of the best writers of their respective fields; perhaps one may even learn the “secrets of the craft and art of writing” on this six-day journey.
Carol Frost discussed the process in which she decided to start this conference, stating, “The idea came to me from my perception of the need for a rich literary experience for two groups locally – audiences for the Winter With the Writers master classes and students interested in finding a community after college to support their passion for the written word.”
Applications for the program open in December, giving participants “from this community and across the country,” especially Rollins graduates and undergraduates, the chance to apply to a “first-rate literary conference.” Attendees of the conference may come with very different goals. Some participants may be seeking an added boost to get their resume ready for graduate school applications, while others may just be seeking some company in which they can share mutual writing experiences and journeys.
However, whether you just want to talk about your favorite books or are enthusiastically looking to publish your first novel, a literary conference, such as this one, presents a great opportunity to learn, socialize, and network.
It was Frost’s advice to a Rollins undergraduate regarding graduate school that marked the very start of the Rollins Writers Conference initiative. “What [Master of Fine Arts] admissions committees want to see is evidence of independent writing and reading and a maturing sense of literature and aesthetics. As I was telling one of my writing students to go find a conference like Bread Loaf in Vermont or to read Shaw’s Guide to Writers Conferences and Writing Workshops, I began to think, why not start a conference here? Core faculty could come from Winter With the Writers authors.”
With conference faculty flying in from as far away as San Diego and Boston, the Rollins Summer Writers Conference will bring together a group of professional writers with very different experiences and counsel. And, with the success of the Winter With the Writers program in recent years, this conference is guaranteed not to disappoint.
Be First to Comment