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Category Archives: In The News
Writing for Vonnegut
I can’t believe it’s taken us this long to introduce Kurt Vonnegut to Exclusive Ink, although it might be more appropriate to say that we simply re-introduced him to Shortridge High School. Vonnegut actually went there, and so did his father. He wrote for the school newspaper and then went on to become one of America’s most imaginative and celebrated writers. Often combining humor with social criticism, Vonnegut painted modern landscapes through a speculative lens. He asked us to consider our present by considering the future and the past — sometimes all three at once.
He continues to be an inspiration for a lot of our work as mentors in our own writing, so we wanted to share that with the students. It wasn’t much of a surprise when we got some truly imaginative works of fiction and poetry about all sorts of futuristic worlds.
To see the exercise, click here for the PDF, and be sure to check out our regularly updated archive of fiction and poetry exercises by clicking on the Writing Exercises tab at the top.
For more information on Kurt Vonnegut, here are a few related links:
Biography from the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library
“Harrison Bergeron” and “The Big Trip Up Yonder” – the stories that inspired this prompt
Digging Out, Digging In
In case you weren’t around, Indianapolis had a pretty crazy start to the winter season. Snow, snow, thaw, more snow, tons of snow, and then flurries. IPS was out of session for a while, Butler University was closed for a lot of the semester break. I lost power and heat. It has been an unorthodox beginning to a new semester, one that I think is egregiously mislabeled as “spring” semester.
All that aside, we’ve dug out of the snow, and we’re back at Shortridge with a new crop of diverse mentors. But before I tell you all about that, a few scenes from the end of the fall semester.
If you’ve kept up with us the past two-and-a-half years, you know that every year we throw a holiday party at the end of the fall semester. This is when we really pull out all the stops: spiral ham (hand-carved!), homemade desserts, soft drinks, and presents, of course.
Though some kids may scoff at the idea of getting a book for the holidays, our students seem to love it. Some popular titles this year: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, and The Rose that Grew from Concrete by Tupac, among others.
The holiday party this year was a resounding success. The room was packed, and we got a really nice group photo out of all the organized chaos.
But now that the blizzard is over, school is back in session, which means Exclusive Ink is officially back in session, too. Be sure to check out the Our Team section of the site to meet all the new mentors as well as the newest on Exclusive Ink, our group’s official blog for student work.
More to come after the first week. In the meantime — in case you missed it — here’s a link to a short video documentary about our mission at Shortridge High School: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VcDi4CSm2Y.
Shortridge, In Brief
Anyone who has ever wondered what goes on during Exclusive Ink — all the stuff before the big readings at the end, all the stuff that we try to bring to you in the student work and the blog updates — this is for you. Thanks to Bob Barrick, a senior English major at Butler (and one of our Fall 2013 volunteers) for putting this together to capture, in brief, a day at Exclusive Ink.
Writing Exercises Really Work…Most of the Time
Both Butler and Shortridge are currently on Fall break until the start of next week. While all of us probably needed some rest, I know that our team is ready to get back to Shortridge. And despite the fact that the most meaningful thing we do there is develop relationships with the students, we all also look forward to hearing the work that the students (and sometimes the mentors) produce at the end of the day. But how do they do it? Surely they can’t all just have amazing amounts of creativity just oozing from their overactive adolescent imaginations all the time, right?
Turns out that the answer is yes. Whether it’s a short story, a poem, an essay, or even a collaborative rap, these students always manage to produce some really astounding work. Sometimes, however, they just need a little jumpstart. That’s where we come in.
Every day one of our graduate assistants brings an exercise to help get some ideas flowing. Although most of them focus on poetry, they are all generally meant to be used for all genres of writing. What comes out of the prompts ranges from the profoundly heartbreaking to the intensely cerebral and from lyrical wordplay to just pure hilarity.
And most of the time, the work is a result of the prompt; a lot of the results of the prompts can be seen at the Exclusive Ink website. If you’re interested in a collection of writing prompts and exercises, check out our new Writing Exercises tab, where you can find a bank of some of the prompts we’ve used in the past. Try them yourself or with others – a lot leave room for collaboration.
Inevitably, however, some of our students already have ideas of their own and want to work independently on their own projects, and of course, we don’t mind at all. We encourage them to pursue their endeavors in any way that gets them to express themselves while at the same time learning valuable skills in communication and creative thinking.
Here’s are a couple results of some more independent projects from a couple of our veteran students – and poetry contest winners – Zuri and Paula:
Zuri
Paula
We love all of the student work, and we love coming up with new exercises to help create a spirit of community in writing, and yet we also know that exercises aren’t everyone’s cup of tea. Even if the exercise doesn’t necessarily fit their taste, I guess there are always sandwiches.
Contributed by Luke Wortley
Some Old Dogs Learn New Tricks
The fall semester for both the Butler Bulldogs and the Shortridge Blue Devils is in full swing. For many this means football, leaves, and getting back into study habits that have been neglected over the summer. For us the fall semester signals that it’s time to gear up for Exclusive Ink, which means poetry, art, stories, and bologna sandwiches.
Our first week of Shortridge picked up right where we left off in the spring, despite bringing in some new mentors and new students at SHS. The students certainly didn’t miss a beat, seeing as how they were brandishing their phones and notepads at us as soon as we walked in the door, ready to share what they had written over the summer. Some of us, on the other hand, were a little rusty, and even though some of the Exclusive Ink regulars are involved in other fall activities like football and marching band, we had other veterans really step up this week, even going so far as to teach some of us old Butler dogs some new tricks.
While I was walking around and helping people get going on the prompt, I was about to sit down to talk to Z — and I –, two of our students who have both contributed a ton of work to the Exclusive Ink blog and magazine. I noticed they were working with a couple of our newer mentors and wanted to see how things were going on the first day. I was surprised to see (although I suppose I really shouldn’t have been) that Z — and I –, instead of dutifully scribbling away, were sharing their wisdom on writing poetry and some of the techniques they had learned over the past couple years. They were engaged, laughing and joking, pushing our mentors much the same way we push them at times to just put something on the page and keep writing.
It was so gratifying to see that relationship developing so quickly and to see the how their confidence has grown over the past year or so. For these students to feel comfortable enough with us, even on the first day, to share their thoughts and opinions on something abstract like writing poetry, felt like a huge victory for us. I suppose that we’re proving an old cliché wrong, while affirming another; it seems that you can teach an old dog new tricks and the teacher really does learn more from the student.
Have Your Cake And Wear It, Too
There was plenty to smile about at our last day at Shortridge this school year. On Thursday, April 25, we capped an incredible semester with a launch party for the second edition of the Exclusive Ink print magazine. As always, the first step was to make sure that all our friends were well-fed.
We had more than 30 students show up for our spring shindig, including some new Exclusive Ink regulars who have livened our group during the past few months.
Chicken, mashed potatoes, hot cheetos, hugs. Hard to come up with a better menu…
…that is, unless you add another cake with our name on it for dessert.
The magazines looked great this year, making them even harder to put down.
I can’t think of a better picture to end with. A little icing on the cake (face?) for Doug after two years of amazing work at Shortridge. Like our students, we’ll certainly miss having him around to lead our readings and get the crowd hyped.
Outspoken at Butler ArtsFest
As part of a busy April for the Writing in the Schools program, Exclusive Ink took center stage on Butler’s campus for the university’s ArtsFest series on Saturday, April 20. Reflecting on the topic of revolution, Shortridge students and their Butler mentors delivered powerful group performances for the audience of nearly 50 spectators at the Eidson-Duckwall Recital Hall.
After months of preparation and practice, it was beyond satisfying to see our students, including Eric (above), conjure up their finest readings to date, especially considering the bright lights and new eyes. But they earned their turns as stars, and we couldn’t have been any prouder.
Although the video and audio isn’t up to the usual caliber because of our set-up in the theater, the following footage of Darlene and Zuri performing “Two Sides of the Coin” illustrates the strength and confidence that were on display all afternoon.
Young Poets Speak Out
Butler freshman Evie Schultz recently penned a terrific feature about the Butler Writers program and our upcoming Butler ArtsFest performance on Saturday, April 20. We love Evie’s article and appreciate the time she spent at Shortridge hanging out with Exclusive Ink, so I’ve excerpted the full text from Sky Blue Window. To view the original publication, which features a great spread that includes photos and student poems, click here. Thanks again, Evie.
Eric Williams sits on a chair in Room 238 in Shortridge Magnet High School, typing out rhymes on his iPhone, which is where he stores all his poems. Williams loves to write about anything, everything. These moments, when he’s jotting down ideas for new poems or performing his work in front of his peers, are his favorite part of the week. Poetry has provided a way for Williams to express himself through words and channel his emotions into written form.
The 16-year-old participates in Writing in the Schools, a cooperative effort between Shortridge and Butler University’s Creative Writing MFA program. Every Tuesday and Thursday after school, Room 238 becomes a place for Williams and other Shortridge students to tell their own stories.
Now these students will be sharing these stories with a much larger audience, at a performance titled “Outspoken” at Butler on April 20 at 1 p.m. The performance, which will be held at Eidson-Duckwall Recital Hall, was coordinated by Susan Sutherlin, an English instructor and director of peer tutoring at Butler, and is a part of the university’s ArtsFest.
ArtsFest’s theme, Revolution, will be incorporated into the students’ work as they interpret what the word means to them.
The program itself has been revolutionary for some students. Williams joined Writing in the Schools at its conception, two years ago. He says when he first began attending, he was in a dark place because of some bad relationships, and his poetry reflected this.
“But the people in this program really learned to love me and care about me, so progressively [my poems] just got more and more brighter and more and more uplifting,” he said. “You can say they changed my perspective on life.”
Paula Cloyd, 16, had the same experience. “I’ve suffered from chronic depression, so obviously things haven’t been easy,” she said. “[Writing in the Schools has] given me something to look forward to.”
Chris Speckman, one of the program’s graduate assistants, says the program was intended to help students grow as writers, students, and people. “If you’re willing to meet these kids and show attention, they will rise,” he said. “They will inspire you and impress you.
“To give these kids a forum to perform stuff that is meaningful to them and then to have their peers cheering for them, clapping for them…. I think the confidence boost is just amazing for some of these kids.”
Not only has the program been a way for the students to grow more confident, it has also given these young writers the opportunity to express their feelings on topics they know personally, such as love, heartbreak, family troubles and school.
“Being a teenager doesn’t mean all your issues are petty,” Cloyd said. “Like, you can have real stuff that some adults don’t even go through. I don’t like the whole, ‘Oh, you’re young, or you’re this, or you’re that, so you don’t know anything.'”
The students performing at the event are ready to show audiences that though they are young, they can understand and write about an important idea such as revolution. Williams is excited to show audiences his interpretation of the topic.
“I want them to leave and be like, ‘Wow, he’s just a 16-year-old kid, but he’s saying something deeper than other people might say,'” he said. “It gives them a different outlook on inner-city kids like myself.”
Zuri Palmer, 16, said the theme of revolution will be apparent in her performance. “I’m really trying to hit the idea of change,” she said. “Revolution is just being in a place and having something change and you’re coming out of it. It doesn’t have to be in the best shape, but you’re coming out of it.”
The students and their instructors say Writing in the Schools has allowed them to grow and change, becoming revolutions themselves.
“I think these kids even coming here Tuesdays and Thursdays to see us is a revolution,” graduate assistant Doug Manuel said. “They could be anywhere, doing anything, and deciding to care about words, and to care about poetry, and to care about searching within themselves, two days is a week is more than many people do. To be engaged with the inner workings of the self is a revolution. A small one, of course, but it seems like all the revolutions that matter are small.”
EN 455: The Movie Trailer
We’ve made a short film to promote the Writing in the Schools program. Maybe someday we’ll see Shortridge at Sundance.
