When Geoffrey Gevalt created the Young Writers Project in 2003 as a monthly feature in the Burlington Free Press, he had two goals: to teach kids to write and to showcase their work. "A lot of teachers weren't teaching writing correctly," said Gevalt, who was then the paper's managing editor. He had first-hand experience. Gevalt recalled his son "freaking out" when his fifth-grade teacher gave him a five-paragraph essay assignment with a long list of rules. "How do you make something so boring and difficult?" Gevalt remembered thinking. "I just felt there were other ways." Now, after 12 years at the helm of the Young Writers Project, the 67-year-old Connecticut native is ready to step down as the nonprofit's director. "For the last 26 years, I've been helping other people write," he said, "and I just miss doing my own writing." Gevalt has several ideas, including a novel about rural Vermont in the 1890s that's been growing in his mind for nearly two decades, he said. Other possibilities include creating digital stories and a podcast. The Young Writers Project began as a monthly newspaper feature that offered new and effective ways to instruct writing, built student engagement, and showcased the best student work. In the second year, Gevalt's oldest daughter, Anna, helped solicit and select superior student work from around the state. She and her friends set up writing prompts and a submissions system, and the Free Press published their selections. "This proved extremely popular," said Gevalt, "and the quality of work was high, so it became the model for how we did things from then on." Two years later, in 2006, the Vermont Business Roundtable gave Gevalt a two-year founding grant to establish the Young Writers Project as an independent nonprofit. Gevalt, who left the Free Press to assume his new role as YWP executive director, knew he'd need to turn it into a financially viable organization when the grant period ended. Today, the project is "still alive," said Gevalt. YWP has become an informal online learning community where about 4,000 young writers from around the world showcase their creative works. The program also publishes selected works through its media partners — including eight newspapers and Vermont Public Radio — and puts out a monthly digital magazine and an annual anthology. "The thing I am most thrilled that we've done is give so many kids a voice," Gevalt…
When Geoffrey Gevalt created the Young Writers Project in 2003 as a monthly feature in the Burlington Free Press, he had two goals: to teach kids to write and to showcase their work. "A lot of teachers weren't teaching writing correctly," said Gevalt, who was then the paper's managing editor. He had first-hand experience. Gevalt recalled his son "freaking out" when his fifth-grade teacher gave him a five-paragraph essay assignment with a long list of rules. "How do you make something so boring and difficult?" Gevalt remembered thinking. "I just felt there were other ways." Now, after 12 years at the helm of the Young Writers Project, the 67-year-old Connecticut native is ready to step down as the nonprofit's director. "For the last 26 years, I've been helping other people write," he said, "and I just miss doing my own writing." Gevalt has several ideas, including a novel about rural Vermont in the 1890s that's been growing in his mind for nearly two decades, he said. Other possibilities include creating digital stories and a podcast. The Young Writers Project began as a monthly newspaper feature that offered new and effective ways to instruct writing, built student engagement, and showcased the best student work. In the second year, Gevalt's oldest daughter, Anna, helped solicit and select superior student work from around the state. She and her friends set up writing prompts and a submissions system, and the Free Press published their selections. "This proved extremely popular," said Gevalt, "and the quality of work was high, so it became the model for how we did things from then on." Two years later, in 2006, the Vermont Business Roundtable gave Gevalt a two-year founding grant to establish the Young Writers Project as an independent nonprofit. Gevalt, who left the Free Press to assume his new role as YWP executive director, knew he'd need to turn it into a financially viable organization when the grant period ended. Today, the project is "still alive," said Gevalt. YWP has become an informal online learning community where about 4,000 young writers from around the world showcase their creative works. The program also publishes selected works through its media partners — including eight newspapers and Vermont Public Radio — and puts out a monthly digital magazine and an annual anthology. "The thing I am most thrilled that we've done is give so many kids a voice," Gevalt…