What We Do
Our programs are dedicated to bringing professional film and television writers together with underserved communities to encourage self-expression through writing. Currently, our two active programs are The Helen Deutsch Writing Workshops and The Michael Collyer Memorial Fellowship in Screenwriting.
The Writers Guild Initiative doesn’t just fix people’s hearts, you actually save people’s lives…
— Workshop Participant
Writing Workshops
We are professional writers who share our love of the process of writing with others. As professionals, we’ve learned that the road to discovering a story can also be the road to discovering your story: who you are, what you feel and think, and what your experience means.
We design our workshops around specific groups. For the most part, we look to work with groups that don’t have ready access to an education about the craft of writing. For example, we’ve worked extensively with the Wounded Warriors, the Innocence Project, prisoners, first responders and victims of natural disasters. While it might seem that these groups have little in common, they all share a common purpose: they want to tell their stories. In our workshops, we don’t limit our focus to specific genres. Participants aren’t asked to write specifically about the experience that brings their community together. We’ve had veterans come in to write children’s books, caretakers who want to write romance novels. A story is a story is a story. We say, “Come in and tell it.”
How We Do It
When the WGI began, we designed our workshops to be held over two weekend sessions, held months apart. The first weekend was devoted to sharing some of the tools of writing and giving writers particular tools they would need to tell their unique story. We used prompts, exercises and assignments to help people recognize what they already had in their “toolbox” and what they needed. By the end of the weekend, our participants would often identify some project – a particular piece of work, a story they wanted to tell, a genre they want to explore, etc. They would then go home and continue work.
Months after that initial session, we would meet again. Some students would bring back work they’d done. Many others – because of schedules, work, life – didn’t have work but wanted to resume what they’d done during the first weekend. We would devote the second session to digging deeper, going further, and establishing habits. We’d continue to write together, to read our stories to each other, to share ideas and approaches.
Afterwards, many of our participants continue writing, staying in touch through social media groups and our website. In the past, some of our mentees formed a kind of “graduate program,” meeting monthly over Zoom with our mentors.
Over time, our writers have published books, entered and won competitions, and – most of all – continued to use writing to express themselves.
During the pandemic, we had to adjust to new realities. We’ve conducted workshops remotely. We’ve shortened the amount of time between sessions. But we continued to fulfill our initial purpose: sharing our love of the process of writing.
As writers, we know that writing usually is driven by a vision of the final product. But we also know that the long road to that final product is a road through our own hearts. The truth of a story, the essence of a character, the rhythm of a sentence or the choice of a word come from what’s inside us.
Ultimately, we share the tools to discover what is already inside us. Our mentors dedicate themselves to helping others use the tools of storytelling to find meaning in their experience.
Our Impact, Their Words
United We Dream immigrant youth share their stories
Who We Work With
Brooklyn Public Library
Pendelton Correctional Facility
What We Can Do For Your Organization
The Writers’ Guild Initiative works with underserved communities who would benefit from the tools of writing as a way of telling their stories. If you would like to introduce your community to our workshops, please contact us
