Writers Center
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ECC’s Writers Center is a place where creatives from all corners of ECC gather to ponder, write, revise creative writing in its many forms. From songs to poems to personal narratives to screenplays to short stories to plays to graphic novels, the Writers Center fosters a love for all things writing. It fosters and cultivates ECC’s literary community through various programming.
Readers Series
Each year, critically acclaimed writers are invited to campus to offer a public writing session and a public reading. Students are granted the opportunity to grow and glean from professional writers. All Reading Series events are free and open to the public.
Coffee House
This event is an open mic and generative writing workshop rolled into a single event. Participants learn about writing craft and apply those concepts in various writing activities. Then, they are invited to share their original work for five minutes in a public reading. Reading is not required. Being a supportive audience member is allowed.
Spire Literary Journal
Spire is an annual publication featuring students’ literary and visual art including poetry, prose, drawing, printmaking, and photography. Students play an active role in selecting the works featured in the publication and designing the journal.
Scholarships
The ECC Board of Trustees grants up to three full-tuition scholarships that are renewable for up to two years. Students with a love of creative writing and community have the opportunity to work weekly in the Writers Center and help plan and execute all Writers Center programming. Creative writing includes fiction, poetry, and non-fiction. But it is also applicable to personal narratives, songs, and scripts.
Deadline: ongoing; priority deadlines: October 31 and March 31
For more information, visit (link forthcoming) or email Writers Center Director, Professor Chasity Gunn at cgunn@elgin.edu.
Gandhi/King Peace Scholarship
Sponsored by the Illinois Community College Trustees Association (ICCTA), this scholarship awards $1,000 scholarship to the student who best articulates the peaceful messages of Mahatma Gandhi and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Participants write a 500-word essay on the writing prompt below and submit a nomination form. The Writers Center will select one student to represent ECC in the statewide competition. In addition to a scholarship, winners are invited to attend ICCTA’s award banquet on June 6 in Normal, IL.