Call for Proposals: Virtual Summer Teachers Institute 2021 — Poetry in an Antiracist Classroom
Updated January 19, 2021: The proposal deadline has been extended until February 28, 2021.
Background: The Poetry Foundation seeks to place essential poems before the largest possible audience, serve all poetry communities, and is committed to antiracist practices and policies. In July 2021, the Poetry Foundation will run a virtual institute for over 200 teachers, ranging from Kindergarten to the Community College level, who will learn new ways to teach poetry to their students. The institute is free to attend. This will be the 6th annual institute expanded to a broad, virtual educator audience.
The theme for the 2021 Institute is “Poetry in an Antiracist Classroom,” and the Foundation seeks presentation proposals from experienced educators, teaching artists, and visiting poets to present on aspects of teaching that give other teachers practical ideas on how to combine poetry teaching with antiracist practices. We will prioritize proposal submissions from educators who have tried and tested these ideas in a classroom setting. Selected presenters will prepare one pre-recorded video presentation, shown twice during the month of July 2021 to Institute attendees. Presenters will also need to be available for a live 15-minute Q&A each of those weeks with attending teachers who just watched the presentation.
Details on the Presentation: The focus of the Institute is to provide helpful, practical tips and lesson plans to teachers, rather than deliver papers or theoretical arguments or poetry readings. Selected presenters will connect with a subsection of teachers by grade level, not the entire range of attendees, so your materials and presentation should be catered to one audience level, listed below. Topics of social justice and principles of antiracism must be included in your presentation but do not need to be the sole focus. If selected, we would ask you to work with our video team to develop and record a 30-minute presentation. There may be a pre-consultation to go over lighting, sound, and other logistical items, and perhaps two recording sessions to ensure we can create the best video version of your presentation. Your presentation would be shown twice during the month of July to different groups of teachers. You would need to be available for a live Q&A with participating teachers after each showing.
Pay: We will offer an honorarium of $750 to create the presentation and participate in two teacher Q&A sessions, payable in late July.
Information Needed to Submit a Proposal: When you apply, we will ask you to fill out the form with the following information:
- Speaker Name and Contact Information
- Speaker Role and Experience (years teaching, what subject/s, at what level)
- Presentation Title
- Presentation Description (maximum of 500 words)
- Audience Level (e.g. Grades K-2, 3-5, 6-8, 9-12, and Community College)
- Topic of Emphasis (e.g. forms, social justice, personal experience, politics)
- Mode of Poetry (e.g. reading, analysis, creative writing, performance)
- Anticipated Accessibility Needs for Speaker and/or Audience
Proposal Submission and Format: Please fill out this Google Form, detailing your proposed topic, approach, and texts you may include in your presentation.
Examples of Past Presentations:
- “Poetry and What We Know About Healing” (for grades 9–Community College) In this session, we will learn about a Mexican healing tradition, listen to some poems, and engage in a model poetry workshop exploring the strength & medicines of our cultures, ancestry and identities.
- “Growing Poetry in Your Classroom” (for K–5) Where do you start and how do you introduce poetry in an elementary classroom? In this session we'll learn successful building blocks for introducing and then developing poetic skill, comfort, and play, in the classroom.
- “New Combinations in Poetry: Freshening the Language Palette” (for grades K–8) Simple methods for shaking up and enlivening the possibilities of words placed side-by-side. One reason the language of little children is so rich is they haven’t learned the “usual combinations” of noun-verb connections yet. They experiment to describe things. Too quickly we fall into routine patterns: the bird flies, the sun rises, the heart breaks. How may we keep language freshness alive?
Deadline to Submit the Google Form is February 28, 2021.
Criteria for Presentation Selection: Your proposal will be evaluated using the full information you provide, so please provide as much detail as possible, including the different methods and texts you would highlight. We are looking for clear and coherent proposals that demonstrate how the presentation will yield practical ideas and a lesson plan for attending teachers. We will look for material that is engaging, timely, appropriate, and aligned with our mission and audiences. We also want to ensure that our programming for the institutes approach poetry from many different modes, angles, and approaches.
Updated Key Dates
February 28 - proposal due date
March 15 - acceptance date
March 30 - outlines and other forms due
April 15 - recording with video production partners
June 1 - schedule of Virtual Institute sent out
July 12 - Week 1 of Virtual Institute, must be available for live Q&A at scheduled time
July 26 - Week 2 of Virtual Institute, must be available for live Q&A at scheduled time
Questions? Please reach out to James Sitar (jsitar [at] poetryfoundation.org)