Camosun College is offering a new Creative Writing certificate. The program, which launched in September, consists of five creative writing courses, two English courses, and three electives; students have the option of full-time or part-time study.
Students can choose from a variety of creative writing subjects such as advanced fiction, child and youth fiction, and speculative fiction. Courses in other genres are also available, such as scriptwriting, poetry, personal narrative, and creative nonfiction. Students must also take an industry creative writing course such as publishing or editing.
Camosun student Trillium McNabb is taking the Creative Writing certificate. She says she signed up for the program after she was in a different program and felt burnt out.
“I realized I wasn’t going to like the career I would have had if I stayed,” says McNabb, who also writes for Nexus. “As a way of coping with disappointment, I started writing and discovered a real passion for it. Ever since I started the program, I’ve felt so fulfilled.”
McNabb says she has learned many useful skills in the program, and she continues to develop her writing skills. She says she has learned lots about the more technical aspect of writing from the program.
“Learning how to format dialogue specifically has been the most interesting thing for me,” she says. “So, I didn’t indent what my characters were saying at first, and I had a lot of back-and-forth dialogues, but now, I’ve figured out how to properly do indenting, as well as having some nice descriptions and having some more flow in my writing.”
Camosun instructor Kari Jones teaches creative writing and English; she’s one of the teachers for the new program.
“You’ll leave the program with a wide range of creative writing skills,” says Jones.
Jones says teaching this new program is a lot of fun for her.
“I love teaching creative writing in general. I love teaching students who love to write since I myself am a writer,” she says. “I enjoy talking about writing when I walk into the creative writing classes.”
Jones says anybody who is interested in being creative and exploring writing as a means to do that may be interested in taking the program.
“We often get students who are really new to writing and they’re just thinking about what it is they’d like to write,” she says. “Those students are great to have. Sometimes we get students who have writing experience and are looking to focus themselves.”
Camosun’s literary journal, The Point (formerly known as Beside the Point), is created through a publishing class that’s part of the program.
“The publishing class… pick a theme, and they collect writings from any students and they actually publish it,” says McNabb. “And it becomes a physical book that you can read, which is really cool.”
For McNabb, writing serves a large purpose, and the new program is helping out with that.
“I find that writing can be such a relief and a way to give your mind a break when you’re studying and to become inspired and love life again when maybe you’re not in the greatest place mentally, or you’re stressed out about something,” she says. “I’m finding this program to be extremely therapeutic.”
See camosun.ca for more information.