September Community Outreach
Dear Friends of Project Write Now:
We believe in the power of words to inspire, connect, and heal.
Now more than ever, our stories matter. In a world that often feels divided, storytelling generates understanding, compassion, and empathy. It connects us through our shared experiences—through joy, laughter, and tears—reminding us that we are not alone.
This month, we experienced firsthand the power of live storytelling—especially for voices too often unheard.
In celebration of Black History Month, we were invited to bring a group of our Asbury Park High School students to Monmouth University’s Toni Morrison Day, a day honoring the acclaimed author. As part of the event, three of our students—Robert, Miliani, and Sahar—read original pieces that moved the audience to tears, reminding us of how essential youth voices are to ignite change.
We are so grateful for our friends Catherine Ferguson and Christy Sunquist for bringing the phenomenal multigenerational storytelling program Generation Women to New Jersey, which honors women for their wisdom, resilience, and truth. Several of our PWN team members—Meredith Avakian, Jennifer Chauhan, Bethaney Clarke, Nathalia Garcia, Lisa Hartsgrove, and Pamela Major—have shared their stories in front of packed audiences. You can catch the next show on Wednesday, May 7, at Triumph Brewery in Red Bank—tickets sell fast, so sign up for their newsletter here!
Coming up next month on Friday, March 28, is PWN’s BIGGEST live storytelling event, CringeFest! During this annual fundraiser, adult writers share their most embarrassing moments on stage at the Vogel at Count Basie Center for the Arts.
During difficult times, comedy is more than entertainment—it’s relief, release, and a way to build understanding. And ALL proceeds support our community outreach programs, which give people of all ages and backgrounds opportunities to write and share their stories.
We hope you can join us! Tickets are on sale here.
As always, we could not do this important work without YOU!
Whether you’ve taken a class, signed your child up for a class, participated in one of our events, or given a generous gift, YOU help us provide meaningful writing experiences that foster authenticity, connection, and empathy.
And a special thank you to our 2024-2025 PWN Partners for your generosity and commitment to our mission of transforming lives through the power of writing.
With love & gratitude,
Here’s what else we’ve been up to this month. If you are interested in bringing a program to your school or organization, email executive director Jennifer Chauhan at jennifer@projectwritenow.org.
Art of Social Justice
What an incredible day we had at the Art of Social Justice: EmpowHERment professional development event for educators! Our morning at the T. Thomas Fortune Cultural Center was spent being inspired by the revolutionary achievements of Constance Baker Motley, Pauli Murray, and Angela Davis. Then, we gathered at the Two River Theater for an afternoon of connection—starting with delicious pizza from Urban Coalhouse—followed by an engaging conversation with TRT artistic director Justin Waldman and playwright Jeffrey Hatcher on his decision to reimagine a main character in Dial M for Murder as female. We closed the day with reflective writing, empowering us to take pride in our own stories. We can’t wait to continue these important conversations! Join us for our next EmpowHERment day on Friday, April 4.
Asbury Park High School
- Field Trip to Asbury Book Cooperative
We had the absolute honor and pleasure of sharing our love of literature and community with local students, authors, and writers alike. A huge thank you to the Asbury Book Cooperative for coordinating and hosting a special afternoon for some of the Asbury Park High School students who participate in our Spoken Word Project! The students felt so welcomed by everyone. Thanks for all of the effort and love that went into planning this special visit! Thanks also to local authors Khalid Uddin, MK Pagano, and Jen Doktorski for kicking us off with an insightful and informative panel discussion. Thanks to The Journal Club for leading an engaging and thoughtful journaling exercise. And always, thank you, Ms. DeMarsico, for continuously connecting your students with real-life opportunities. It was an incredible experience and we are grateful to have been a part of it!
- Toni Morrison Day
We want to give a huge thank you to Monmouth University for the warm welcome this month at Toni Morrison Day 2025! For the second consecutive year, students from our Spoken Word Project at Asbury Park High School attended and participated in this annual event, which is planned and hosted by the MU English Department. The morning started with a welcome from the university president Patrick Leahy and other university leaders, followed by keynote remarks from Autumn Womack Ph.D. (who did a phenomenal job!). Then the university generously provided lunch and little swag bags for the students. In particular, the pizza and sunglasses were a hit! After lunch, two incredible student guides gave us a walking tour of the university. The whole tour was super exciting to the students. Their three highlights were: visiting a decorated dorm room, walking through the sports complex while it’s in action, and seeing all of the absolutely stunning architecture. To culminate the afternoon, we joined the university’s poster and creative writing contest award recipient presentation. After the winners were called up, three of the APHS students were then invited to the mic to each read poems they wrote as part of PWN’s Spoken Word Project. We are so proud of them for sharing their authentic words from the heart! Many thanks to Ms. DeMarsico for sharing these meaningful and impactful experiences with your students! It truly was a special day for everyone involved!
- Values & Vision
The seniors at Asbury Park High School have identified the area that concerns them most in their community, including community beautification, homelessness, and kindness/anti-bullying. They are now doing the work of finding community partners to help them do the work of community change. They are also beginning the work of journaling this journey, capturing their thoughts and feelings on paper.
Asbury Park Library Journaling Club
We launched a six-week youth journaling club at Asbury Park Public Library. The program targets middle schoolers and is a free offering, allowing students to drop in for one session to check it out or come back every Wednesday if they like. Each week offers a new theme and prompts for creative exploration. Thank you to the Asbury Park Library for opening your doors and welcoming our expressive writing program.
Brookdale Community College GEAR UP
We started an eight-week-long partnership program with GEAR UP, offering creative and expressive writing workshops to middle school students from Asbury Park at Brookdale Community College’s Wall Township Campus. GEAR UP aims to provide students from economically diverse communities with the resources, support, and guidance necessary to prepare for and succeed in college. The students already were eager to share their love of language and enjoyed kicking off the series with a “word circle,” some journaling, and group sharing.
Lunch Break Womyn’s Worth
We had our second session of journaling with the incredible women of Womyn’s Worth! We began with a grounding writing activity, focusing on our senses—what are five things we see, four things we hear, three things we feel, two things we smell, and one thing we taste. Then we looked at our wins & glimmers for the month, inspired by January Gill O’Neil’s “Night at the Roller Palace.” We explored experiences that bring us joy or moments we’d love to return to. We look forward to writing with these women again in March!
Lunchtime Write-In
On Fridays, we host a one-hour writing workshop on Zoom during which we write in response to themed prompts. This month, we explored the themes: “Cold,” “Valentine’s Day,” and “Red.” Though writers never have to share, we always enjoy hearing one another’s pieces and have formed an incredible, supportive community. Join us for our next Lunchtime Write-In to see what our upcoming themes will be!
Red Bank Middle School
- 7th & 8th Grade AVID (in-school)
We are so happy to have PWN Teen intern Chloe joining us at Red Bank Middle School for the next month and a half! Chloe is one of our lead editors for our PWN Teen Voice & Verse Writing Contest, so having her alongside the students as they work on pieces to submit is extra special right now. We also did some Post-It poetry, writing what love is in our own words that we collected into these collaborative class love poems and also writing about what it means to be in our AVID family (poems to come soon). And we read “black love” by Evie Shockley and “Given to Rust” by Vievee Francis to celebrate love, writing, and Black History Month.
- 6th Grade AVID (in-school)
With the 6th grade AVID students, we read “The Grass Ceiling” by Kevin West and then we looked at the art that inspired the poem—“Self-Portrait as a Prep School Llama” by James Valvis. We made a list of what the art evoked in us, including feelings, shapes, sounds, flavors, and more. And then we used that list to come up with new imaginative stories of our own. In our second class, we invited students to bring in their own art to try this practice again with a piece that speaks to them individually. We loved what they all came up with!
- 4th & 5th Grade AVID (in school)
In honor of February, the LOVE month, our 4th and 5th grade AVID students have been writing letters to people who have shown them kindness. We read the poem “Others” by Unknown and then we made lists of times when we have been kind to others or others have been kind to us. We each chose one person to write a letter to thank them for their act of kindness. The students decorated their letters and envelopes and took a lot of pride in their writing because it was being sent out to the world. When writing has a real-life purpose, magic happens. Students value their writing, they take pride in it, and they imagine their audience. Their writing then went out into the world and the students couldn’t wait to deliver or make a plan on how to deliver their “thank you for showing me kindness” letters! Letter writing is a true authentic way to have students express themselves on paper.
- PWN Quest Club Grades 6-8 (after-school)
In Quest Club, we read “Don’t Go Into the Library” by Alberto Ríos and wrote about mysterious places both real and imagined. We also read a translation of “Wake, butterfly” by Bashō and wrote in response to the poem. Some wrote about literal butterflies. Some wrote about figurative butterflies (the kind you get in your gut). And some chose to reject the prompt, having enough ideas already with their wild imaginations. Then we pulled questions from our Quest Box to respond to.
RBR Dreamers at Red Bank Regional High School
We visited the RBR Dreamers at Red Bank Regional, gifting journals and stickers to encourage using writing as a way to process emotions. We read “Where I’m From” by George Ella Lyon and then crafted our own “Where I’m From” poems as a way to remind us of the people, places, and cultural experiences that have shaped us into who we are. Our plan is to publish the members’ pieces in an anthology at the end of the year, so we can always be reminded of our roots.
Shore House
We kicked off Community Playmaking in partnership with the Two River Theater for the members of Shore House. We read a play written by a Lunch Break writer in our last Community Playmaking session as an example. Then we began brainstorming by making lists of people and places that are important to us, smells and sounds that intrigue us, our favorite colors and words, and more. We can’t wait to start shaping these ideas into plays to be performed by professional actors at the end of our seven weeks together. Stay tuned!
Teacher Writing Collaborative
With our TWC, we took inspiration from the Planetary Parade that will take place on Friday, February 28, when seven of the planets will line up in the evening sky. We read the poem “nothingness and the inability to be celestial without it,” by Calista L., which was published in Bridge Ink as inspiration and then we wrote pieces inspired by all things space. We had a story about the stunning beauty of a night sky while camping, geocaching, an “Ode to Pluto,” and the relationship between the planets and teaching. It’s always an inspiring experience! Our next TWC is Wednesday, March 26, and all are welcome to join!
Teen Writing Space
This month in Teen Writing Space, teen leader Skyla gave us some great prompts for Valentine’s Day. She had us write a love poem in 10 words or less, do some ekphrastic writing using this art as inspiration, and we used music as a writing prompt too. The following week, we wrote about memories, then we moved to a fun activity where we each tried to describe a place without naming it, using all five senses as clues. The rest of the class guessed where each of our places were, which was an awesome exercise in sensory development! We also did some found poetry using books in our vicinity to lift lines from.
Zoom Open Mic
We had an awesome open mic on Zoom this month, with nine writers joining us to share their words. We loved the eclectic mix of sharing, from poetry to fiction to memoir. There were fantastical stories that dipped into our imaginations and introspective poems that resonated across the Zoom room. It was a powerful, moving experience and we are so grateful to all who attended.
Scholarship Seats
Through our mission as a nonprofit organization, we remove barriers to participating in our fee-based classes by providing full and partial scholarship seats as well as payment plans. Since 2020, we’ve seen a dramatic increase in the need for financial assistance and therefore have met that need by offering more scholarship seats. For 2024, we provided 59 seats totaling $14,342.50. So far this year, we’ve provided 19 seats totaling $7,149. For information about our scholarship program or to become a valuable donor providing these seats, please email Jennifer Chauhan at jennifer@projectwritenow.org.
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