Writer – Editor – Blogger
Workshops and Conferences
KY Christian Writers Conference Report
Jun 14th
Great faculty, great keynotes, and a great location add up to a wonderful conference experience for around 75 writers this past weekend. If you aren’t familiar with KCWC, take a look at the Web site.
Virginia Smith did an outstanding job as keynote speaker with a pothole-by-pothole description of her road to publication. Beginners and published writers alike enjoyed two days of networking, learning, and worship.
I taught a workshop entitled, “Get Organized—And Sell Your Work.” Some of the information in my session is included in a series of blog posts. See the summary and links to each post on this page.
If you’re reading this, and you were a KCWC attendee, I encourage you to subscribe so that you won’t miss the book giveaway coming soon.
Writers Conferences: Guide to Publication
Jun 8th
Kentucky Christian Writers Conference begins Friday, and I’m getting more excited by the minute. I’ve been on the organizing committee for KCWC for the past four years. Last year, about 50% of the attendees were first-timers, total newbies. We try really hard to help the beginners. They come so that they can get as much information as possible, but they invariably end up glassy-eyed, suffering from information overload. I view them with great sympathy because I remember my first conference.
In the summer of 1999, I attended my first conference, Southern Christian Writers Conference at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. Somehow, an announcement about the conference reached my local newspaper in Union City, Tennessee. I managed to locate some other West Tennessee writers who were attending SCWC, so I decided to go with them. I had no idea what I would learn or what I would do with the information. I just knew that I liked to write and had been told that I was good at it. I wanted to explore the possibilities. More >
Hone Your Craft with Online Courses
Mar 1st
Have you wanted to attend a Christian writers’ conference but couldn’t afford the tuition and travel? Consider taking online classes. There are a number of options. Usually, the fees are reasonable, and there are no travel expenses to worry about. Your continuing education dollar goes entirely to honing your craft and getting to know other writers as you learn.
The Christian PEN: Freelance editor Kathy Ide organized The Christian Proofreaders and Editors Network as a Google group. She offers online courses for people wanting to become freelance editors. I joined the group about four years ago. The discussions on the group were helpful to me, but the online classes have helped me improve my writing and editing. Especially useful to me as a writer was my first class, “Proofreading and Editing for Clients.”
Contributing members of TCP pay lower course fees than non-members, but all the fees are quite reasonable. Kathy Ide does not teach all of the courses. Instructors must be contributing members and submit a course syllabus to Kathy for approval. She manages the enrollment details for all courses. The complete list of course offerings is here. The 2010 course schedule is here. More >
