DEAR YPW
COMMUNITY
MEMBERS,

—[AND EVERYONE ELSE ♥]—

1,700 miles and 3 time zones.

Without having attended the same writing camp in

summer 2022, we—Ivi, Fiona, and Jupiter—would have never met. Today, beyond the regular exchange of “dog meme” in our Discord DMs, we can confidently say writing community was crucial in our growth as early-career teen writers. However, we were acutely conscious that barriers of access gatekept much of the resources, validation, network, and experience that we benefited from: high costs, ultra-selective applications, and the sheer subjectivity of writing. Especially as second-generation immigrants who attended public, open-enrollment schools, who taught ourselves how to write on the family computer, Young Poets Workshops was a product of our belief that every writer deserves a chance.

Starting as just a Discord server with a permanent, public join link, we have since hosted 40+ free events, five book clubs, a Literary Magazine Fair (which led to the publication of two books!), a Summer Workshop Series, a Summer Mentorship, and received grant support from organizations like the We Are Family Foundation, Hershey’s Heartwarming Project, and the Incandescent Review.

More than statistics and proper nouns, however, we’re proud to have stuck with our ethos as a truly community-based organization. We pay every collaborator an honorarium of $60. We continue to have new writers of ages 13–22, from 20+ countries, introduce themselves in the server weekly. We have many, many ongoing jokes. (The haikubot tournament is the only contest we get competitive about.) We would love to have you.

To any young writer reading this right now—you belong. YPW started and grew in a Mariano’s, in a WiFi-less Beijing apartment, wrapped in avocado-patterned and pink blankets, and most of all, on the internet, a space we’re so glad to share with you. Welcome.