Foster Dickson: Our Hope and Writing Our Hope
Foster Dickson is a writer, editor and teacher in Montgomery, Alabama. He is the author of three books: Kindling Not Yet Split (Court Street Press, 2002), I Just Make People Up: Ramblings with Clark Walker (NewSouth Books, 2009), and The Life and Poetry of John Beecher (Edwin Mellen Press, 2009), and the general editor of Treasuring Alabama's Black Belt (AUM/AHF, 2009).
Our Hope: Writings and Photographs by Teenagers on Tolerance and Equality is a full-length literary anthology, which was released in August 2007. The book project was supported by a second Teaching Tolerance grant from the Southern Poverty Law Center, the first of which in 2005 funded Taking the Time. Foster Dickson, who created the project and edited the anthology, gave his students the year-long assignment of producing literary writings - creative nonfiction, poems, play scripts or short stories - on themes of tolerance and equality. The photography magnet also participated in the project, contributing black-and-white images for the cover and a photo insert.
As a follow-up project, Foster created and oversaw Writing Our Hope, a student-edited web-zine that offered high school and college students in North America the opportunity to submit and possibly publish creative nonfiction and poetry on the topics of tolerance and equality. The project also encompassed an annual supplement featuring one teacher's work with his/her students, all on themes of tolerance and equality. Supporters of the project included the Southern Poverty Law Center, EdChange, Native Village, and the National Conversation on Writing. Writing Our Hope was featured on the Young Authors Guide in NewPages.
Unfortunately, and for unknown reasons, Writing Our Hope suffered from a lack of submissions during three successive open-submissions periods in 2008 and 2009, making it impossible to produce an issue #3. The project was discontinued in November 2009, despite an avid readership and steady traffic to the website. The website for the project (www.writingourhope.org) was discontinued in August 2010. The cover images of the two issues (produced during the 2007-2008 school year) and two supplements (produced in May 2008 and May 2009) can be seen above.
Foster Dickson is a writer, editor and teacher in Montgomery, Alabama. He is the author of three books: Kindling Not Yet Split (Court Street Press, 2002), I Just Make People Up: Ramblings with Clark Walker (NewSouth Books, 2009), and The Life and Poetry of John Beecher (Edwin Mellen Press, 2009), and the general editor of Treasuring Alabama's Black Belt (AUM/AHF, 2009).
Our Hope: Writings and Photographs by Teenagers on Tolerance and Equality is a full-length literary anthology, which was released in August 2007. The book project was supported by a second Teaching Tolerance grant from the Southern Poverty Law Center, the first of which in 2005 funded Taking the Time. Foster Dickson, who created the project and edited the anthology, gave his students the year-long assignment of producing literary writings - creative nonfiction, poems, play scripts or short stories - on themes of tolerance and equality. The photography magnet also participated in the project, contributing black-and-white images for the cover and a photo insert.
As a follow-up project, Foster created and oversaw Writing Our Hope, a student-edited web-zine that offered high school and college students in North America the opportunity to submit and possibly publish creative nonfiction and poetry on the topics of tolerance and equality. The project also encompassed an annual supplement featuring one teacher's work with his/her students, all on themes of tolerance and equality. Supporters of the project included the Southern Poverty Law Center, EdChange, Native Village, and the National Conversation on Writing. Writing Our Hope was featured on the Young Authors Guide in NewPages.
Unfortunately, and for unknown reasons, Writing Our Hope suffered from a lack of submissions during three successive open-submissions periods in 2008 and 2009, making it impossible to produce an issue #3. The project was discontinued in November 2009, despite an avid readership and steady traffic to the website. The website for the project (www.writingourhope.org) was discontinued in August 2010. The cover images of the two issues (produced during the 2007-2008 school year) and two supplements (produced in May 2008 and May 2009) can be seen above.