by Darci Thoune and Jenn Fishman
Since the inaugural (WIS) in 2018, folks have been telling us that ours is an event where they feel seen, heard, and valued or, in a word, welcome. As Kaia Simon recalls in Community Literacy Journal, describing her experience at our first WIS: “It was my first year out of graduate school,” and “I remember feeling truly like a guest, likeI had been invited and that my presence mattered.”
Comments like these are important to any event organizers, but all of us involved in the WIS couldn’t be more proud because of the priority we place on hosting. In fact, it’s a central part of the WIS mission, and we’ve worked hard to make it one of our hallmarks. In fact, when we started planning WIS ‘22, our first gathering of the COVID era, the importance of hosting was very much on our minds. After a year’s hiatus, we wanted to do more than simply reinstate the WIS. We wanted to amplify our hospitality, although we weren’t sure how.
Enter our colleagues from Macmillan Learning. Thanks to Laura Davidson and Joy Fisher Williams, we were able to level up as hosts beyond our original capacity or our initial imaginings. Through our partnership with them, in 2022 we launched the Bedford/St. Martin’s WIS Fellows Program. It offers 3-5 early career colleagues mentorship and need-based financial support to attend the symposium as well as an opportunity to publish here on the Bits Blog.
Over 3 years, the program has grown and grown, and in 2024, we welcomed our first international cohort of B/SM WIS Fellows. The roster includes:
Abigayle Farrier, a lecturer in the English Department at the University of North Texas, who delivered the flashtalk, "Who Let the Dog Out?: Therapy Dogs and Trauma-Informed Pedagogy," and shared a poster, "Collaging Humans: Reflecting on the Writing Process."
Christina Davidson, a PhD student in Rhetoric and Composition and Assistant Director of Composition at the University of Louisville, who shared her workshop "Collaborative Writing with AI: Utilizing Design Thinking to Improve Classroom Outcomes."
Emma Tam, a writer, interdisciplinary educator, and senior undergraduate at Minerva University, who joined the WIS from the UK as an online participant.
Saurabh Anand, a PhD student in Rhetoric and Composition and Assistant Writing Center Director at the University of Georgia, who presented his poster "My Queer Heart."
Sonakshi Srivastava, a writing tutor at Ashoka University, Sonepat, India, who shared her WIS poster, "What's Attention Got To Do With It: On Reading and Notemaking as Writing Pedagogy," this was also the topic of her 2024 Watson Conference project.
This group attended WIS ‘24, Writing Human/s, both onsite and online, and they made vital contributions as writers, as writing scholars and teachers, and as colleagues. Highlights include the synergy that developed between them and their mentors, all members of the 2024 WIS Steering Committee, including Gitte Frandsen, Jenna Green, Max Gray, Patrick Thomas, and Seán McCarthy.
Today, the Macmillan-WIS partnership is one of the brightest spots in the WIS sky. You’ll see what we mean via forthcoming posts by 2024 Fellows Christina Davidson, Saurabh Anand, and Sonakshi Srivastava. We also invite you to follow the tags for WIS and writing innovation, where you’ll find additional insights from past B/SM WIS Fellows and others. Early career colleagues—undergraduates, graduate students, recent graduates, and others who have recently joined the profession—will find information about the latest fellowship opportunities in the WIS ‘25 CFP.
In all, we hope the B/SM WIS Fellowship is a beacon that shines alongside WIS program opportunities, which include workshops, posters, small-scale performances and displays, and large-scale installations as well as flashtalks, flares, and sparks.
The theme for WIS ‘25 is mise en place, a culinary term for putting things in place before cooking, especially in a professional kitchen. For us, it’s a metaphor for getting ready to write as well as a pathway to exploring the interrelationship between writing and food. Join us online or in Milwaukee, WI, January 30-31, 2025. Proposals are welcome through 10/25 and, for undergraduate writers, through 12/13. Registration opens in early November.
