Contests & Publication

Creative Writing Events Cancelled

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As many of you have already heard, GCC and the Maricopa County Community Colleges District have taken steps to prevent the spread of Covid-19. These steps include the extension of spring break for students by one week, and the implementation of distance/online learning for our classes thereafter. If you are a student at GCC or another college within the district, please check your student email for official communication from the district.

As you might expect, then, we are cancelling/postponing all of our creative writing events for the foreseeable future. That includes:

  • The Humorous Poetry Contest & Traveler Celebratory Reading, currently scheduled for March 18th, has been postponed indefinitely.
  • Our student Writing Club will not meet. Use the Discord channel if you would like to stay in touch with each other and share work.
  • Our Saturday Workshop planned for March 21st has been cancelled. The April workshop is still TBD.

Details about rescheduling postponed events will be provided once they are available. If you have any questions about creative writing events at GCC, please contact jeffrey.baker@gccaz.edu.

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Second Annual Humorous Poetry Contest!

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Spring is near, and soon it will once again be time to be funny and make money. On March 18th, from 6PM to 8PM, students can compete for not one, but two awards for humorous poetry. First place in the Randy Smith Award will earn $100 and second place will earn $50.

As with last year, if you would like to participate, bring an original poem, read/perform it in front of our live and supportive audience, laugh at the hilarity of your peers, and possibly take home some extra cash. Participants will be afforded three minutes to read their work, and they must be registered GCC students. See the flyer below and direct any questions to jeffrey.baker@gccaz.edu.

Humorous Poetry Flyer-page-001

English Department Scholarships Due Soon!

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Every year, the English Department at GCC gives out several scholarships. Most are worth $300 apiece, and all applications for these scholarships are due by the last day of February. Some of these scholarships have specific requirements, whereas others are open to just about anyone. And, there is a scholarship specifically for creative writing students! Please consider applying for as many scholarships as you like and/or as many you qualify for.

A full list of the English Department Scholarships, and instructions for how to apply,  can be found here. If you have any questions, direct them to jeffrey.baker@gccaz.edu.

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Traveler Literary Selections for 2019-2020

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After two months of reading and deliberation, we are ready to announce the selections for Issue #53 of the Traveler, GCC’s Arts & Literary Magazine. Thank you to our student and community readers, and to our faculty judges. Thank you to everyone who submitted their creative work and who made these selections so difficult.With over 100 submissions, the process was highly competitive. We hope that those who were not selected this time around will submit again when he Traveler reopens for submissions in Fall.

The authors and stories listed below will be published in the new issue, due out in April 2020. We will also have a celebratory reading on March 18th, open to the public, where the authors can read their winning work.

Fiction

  • 1st Place: “Symbology” by Malka Daskal
  • 2nd Place: “Alone” by Shannon Fernando
  • 3rd Place: “Antimatter” by Malka Daskal
  • Honorable Mention: “Heart of Ice” by Dawn Gibbs

Creative Nonfiction

  • 1st Place: “Length of a Moment” by Taylor Boucher
  • 2nd Place: “The Third Generation” by Malka Daskal
  • 3rd Place: “A Tuesday Morning Apocalypse” by Taylor Boucher
  • Honorable Mention: “Worthless” by Dawn Gibbs

Poetry

  • 1st Place: “A Decade of Yesterdays” by Bette Griffen
  • 2nd Place: “Double-Edged” by Shannon Fernando
  • 3rd Place: “Stormy Love” by Angel Fletcher
  • Honorable Mention: “Timeless” by Cynthia Herda

One-Act Play/Drama

  • 1st Place: “Sugar Script” by Jacob Nguyen

New Contest: The Robert W. Miller Award for Love Poetry

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We are proud to offer yet another contest for writers at GCC–and one with a monetary reward! Because the calendar has turned to February, and because February is so frequently associated with love and romance, this new contest focuses on love poetry. Thanks to a generous donation by GCC’s English Department Chair, David Miller, we are able to offer two students $100 for their original, creative work. The contest ends on March 1st. Full details and the submission form can be found here: The Robert W. Miller Award for Love Poetry.

Upcoming Writing Events in November

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With numerous competitions, workshops, and readings, November promises to be a busy month for creative writers at GCC and around the valley. Here’s a quick list of important dates and events:

November 4th: GCC is holding a series of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) writing sessions in the library. The first session is November 4th from 4PM to 5:30PM in L-138. Additional sessions will take place on November 12th, November 18th, and November 25th. Full flier here.

November 15th & November 22nd: ASU is offering scholarships for their Desert Nights & Rising Stars conference. While the conference will be held in spring, scholarship applications are due this month! More details here.

November 16th: GCC is hosting its third and final Saturday Workshop for this semester. David Martinez presents “Learning to Bleed on the Page with Style.” The workshop runs from 10AM to 12PM and is free/open to the public.

November 18th: The Maricopa County Community Colleges District is holding a creative writing competition where winners both get published and paid. The new deadline for this competition is Monday, November 18th. Read all about this Artists of Promise competition here.

November 19th: Mesa Community College is hosting Tiffany Midge for their Literary Reading Series. Midge is a bestselling author of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, and she will read from her book Bury My Heart at Chuck E. Cheese’s. The reading begins at 7PM and will be held in the Mesa Community College Art Gallery.

November 20th: GCC is hosting its annual Poetry & Prose Slam. Participants share their original, creative work (poems, very short fiction or prose) to a live audience and a panel of judges. The top three participants earn monetary prizes! This event is free and open to the public.

November 30th: GCC’s Library is holding a Fabulous First Chapter Contest and the deadline lands on the final day of November. This competition is open only to GCC students. Full details can be found here.

Artists of Promise – District Writing Competition

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Each year, the Maricopa Community Colleges hold district-wide arts competitions and celebrations. A writing contest is part of these celebrations, and as writers, you are contractually obligated to submit your creative work to this contest. It’s right there in the fine print, if you look close enough, beneath the bits about imprisonment for tearing mattress labels and how breakfast is the most important meal of the day.

Winning this competition not only results in publication in the district’s annual Passages magazine, but also a monetary award. Writers who place first, second, and third receive $300, $200, and $100 dollars respectively. First Place winners will be entered in the  National Student Literary Competition sponsored by the League for Innovation.

Much like GCC’s Traveler competition, the district accepts work from four genres (listed below). To review the guidelines in depth, and to submit your work, follow this link: https://events.maricopa.edu/event/artists-promise-creative-writing.

The deadline is November 18th, 2019! (Updated)

  • Essay: 2,000 words
  • Fiction: 3,000 words
  • One-Act Play/Script: 3,000 words including stage direction and/or production notes
  • Poetry: 67 lines