I am a senior at Ball State University and last year I started to attend our student club ‘The Writer’s Community’ along with other writer communities on and off campus. Although I have been writing since middle school, my writing had never been graded, nor had it ever been beneficial to my past degree track. I decided to join some of these communities because I was only starting out in my writing degree, and I wanted to have peers I could go to for criticism on poetry or nonfiction works as well as anything else I needed.
Before joining these writer communities, I pictured a group of writers from all different genres with all kinds of different backgrounds but with one common interest or goal: to create a safe place for all types of writers to come and share their experiences, feelings, drafts and just support one another, a place where I could network or collaborate on pieces, a place where I could safely give and receive constructive and positive feedback, a place where I could participate in workshops about numerous things, and a place where I could learn things that I am not sure about or simply have no clue about.
When I first attended these communities, I was bombarded with information, knowledge, and pure joy because they had everything I needed and wanted to become an even more successful, experienced, and knowledgeable writer. Not only did these writing communities give me experience and knowledge but they also gave me confidence in my writing and in my public speaking.
I think spaces like these are important because we as writers are always looking to connect with other writers who are experienced or just starting out. We love to get to know one another and read one another’s work or even chat about common or uncommon interests. We are also always looking to see the past and future generations of the writing community because they help shape the everchanging world of writing.
These communities have impacted my writing in various ways from giving me confidence in sharing my own pieces, to helping me edit my own writings, and even just lending an ear when something in my writings didn’t go as planned. So, if you are thinking about joining a writer’s community but have all these assumptions or fears on why or why not to go, I’m here to tell you
to go for it. You may just be surprised with how much information these communities offer and you might find a group of peers who are motivated to write and help writing.
