2024 Reflections

So much happened in 2024 that we are so grateful for, including celebrating our 10-YEAR ANNIVERSARY!

A big highlight of the year was coming together in November for our Community Celebration, during which we honored our community partners with awards, including the team at Red Bank Middle School; educators Amy Campbell (Red Bank Middle School) and Christine DeMarsico (Asbury Park High School); Shore House, Lunch Break, the Source at Red Bank Regional High School; and the Grunin Foundation.

Inspired by the joy and love shared at this event, we are more excited than ever to carry this momentum into 2025. But first, a look back on our 2024 accomplishments.

-We continued our long-standing expressive writing programs at Red Bank Middle School and Asbury Park High School, culminating the year with three anthologies of student writing and Writers Celebrations.

-We published SEVEN issues of our online young adult literary journal, Bridge Ink, featuring writers from the United States (Arizona, California, Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Texas, Virginia, Washington, Washington, DC), Australia, India, Ireland, and Pakistan. We partnered for the second year with the literary journal Let’s Say Gay for a special pride-themed issue, Rainbow Ink.

– We collaborated with the Count Basie Center for the Arts on the Freedom of Expression contest and gave 16 awards to writers ages 12 to 18, several of whom read their original work on stage as part of the Count Basie Center for the Arts’ Critical Conversation event on book banning in March. The winners’ pieces were also published in a special issue of Bridge Ink.

-We celebrated 12 winners of our annual teen Voices & Verse poetry contest. We then published their pieces in Bridge Ink and held a Zoom Writers Celebration during which winners shared their pieces.

-In collaboration with the Two River Theater’s Crossing Borders Festival, four of our young adult writers performed original pieces on stage.

-We adjudicated more than 100 pieces of teen writing as part of Monmouth Arts’ Teen Arts Festival. 

– We brought the creative writing class from Asbury Park High School to Monmouth University’s Toni Morrison Day where we met author Ross Gay. One of our students read his original work as part of the event.

-We held our FIFTH annual Writing on the River Retreat at the Oyster Point Hotel for more than 40 teachers. 

-We launched a new four-session professional development program for educators, “How to Engage Students in Authentic Writing,” with the ELA team at Long Branch High School.

-We provided eight after-school writing clubs.

-More than 30 teens participated in our summer internship program as teaching assistants, editorial assistants, and in The Interview Project. We collaborated with Blue Dot Social & Community Wellness for The Interview Project and seven teens interviewed members and documented their stories for a special issue of Bridge Ink.

– We continued our three PWN India writing clubs: one for children (ages 10-12); one for adults; and one for teachers (of children ages 3-6).

-We partnered with more than 30 organizations/schools to deliver our community outreach programs. Among our new partnerships are Academy Charter High School (Lake Como) Generation Women NJ, Middletown Public Library, Project HEAL, and Planned Parenthood. 

-We impacted nearly 2,000 children, teens, and adults through our community outreach programs.

-We launched a new playwriting program, Community Playmaking, with the Two River Theater and held our first program with Lunch Break. Nine debut playwrights wrote original 10-minute plays that were performed by professional actors at an event at Lunch Break in December.

-We awarded 59 scholarship seats to youth and adults totaling $14,342.50 for our fee-based programs.

-We held our annual fundraiser, CringeFest, on the big stage at the Vogel in Red Bank with lots of laughs and lots of funds raised for our community outreach programs!

-We provided in-school multi-session writing programs for grades 6 through 8 at Markham Place in Little Silver.

-We held 47 adult classes, 7 youth classes, 24 virtual one-day workshops, and 25 in-person workshops.

-Sixteen writers completed full-draft manuscripts (50,000+ words) through book inc’s Novel and Memoir Incubator programs.

-Thirty-five writers revised their novel or memoir manuscripts in book inc’s Book Revision Lab.

-More than 20 writers and instructors (double from last year) had their works published in literary magazines or other publications. One writer’s piece was nominated by Cleaver Magazine for Best of the Net 2024.

-One writer alone has had dozens of pieces published since August 2023.

-One instructor received numerous awards for her most recent novel.

-Another instructor’s short film, whose screenplay was conceived in our screenwriting incubator with fellow screenwriters, received numerous awards.  

-PWN got a testimonial from best-selling author James Dashner of the Maze Runner series.

We could not do any of this without YOU! We are so grateful to our amazing staff, our incredible community partners, and all who participated in our classes, workshops, and events.

Together, we are changing lives through writing.