English Department Awarded Grant to Publish Student Work

I was excited to get a letter from The HCHS Foundation over break that said that we had been awarded the Jodie Harrison Teacher's Grant to publish our second book: Best Student Nonfiction Essays 2010-2011. We hope to build on the success of last year's book.

Here's a snapshot of the process of how essays are selected. Teachers nominate students in their courses who wrote remarkable papers this year, papers that teachers found compelling and thoughtful, papers that fulfilled assignments, but something more. We sent out letters of recognition to these students and their parents and asked them to consider sending in their favorite essay/s to be considered for the book. Often this leads to discussions between teacher and student about which writing was remarkable.

Next, the Honors Seminar in Writing students (with guidance from the Honors Seminar teachers, Alexis Colianni, Angelique Burrell, and Jared Friebel) serve as editors of the book, selecting the year's very best writing. Students also serve in designing the cover and layout and working as a liaison with the printer. Students who will be published are notified in May. The book, which comes out over the summer, is distributed to all the published students, the HC library, the Hinsdale library, the Clarendon Hills library, and a few others in the building. Students can also order extra books at a small extra cost.

I have nine extra books from last year if you are interested. Contact me if you're interested.

The goal of this project is that it will help students become young authors communicating valuable ideas.